Cooperation and Expectations of Cooperation

The results of both a survey of utility customers and an experiment using role-playing students support the hypothesis that a person is more likely to install load control devices on their heating or cooling units (cooperate) if he or she thinks that others will cooperate. In addition, we find that, as predicted by the norm of reciprocity, customers who are more concerned about conservation are more influenced by thier expectations of the cooperative intentions of others than are customers who are less concerned.