Tony Nevin — Behavior, Oil and the "Inertia of Affluence"

Oil, Local Change and the "Inertia of Affluence"

John "Tony" Nevin is a behavioral scientist. Among other things, he studies what goes into acquiring some sort of behavior, a pigeon pecking a dot for food, and what it takes to alter that behavior. He's analyzed behavior from an individual's addiction to drugs to our global addiction to fossil fuel. We get into all of it here.

In this discussion we examine what it takes to alter behavior, particularly how we might wean ourselves off a dependency on oil in an affluent culture. He believes and has studied how it is hard to change when we have a great number of positive reinforcements. Even $5.00 gasoline only makes us pause — our identity as a mobile society is just too culturally important... what happens if gas tripled overnight? We examine what it means for us here, locally.

I have kept this discussion largely intact. Any point in the 45 minute discussion has something rich to listen to — food for thought. Think of it as a lesser Charlie Rose discussion — it's worth the time. You can download it for later listening, or just come back for more.

I take the title of this piece from Nevin's "Inertia of Affluence" — an essay published in "Behavior and Social Issues, 14 (2005). In it in short, Nevin outlines how local action can have an impact on "behalf of the future." From the paper's abstract:

"Behavior is highly resistant to change in situations with large and frequent reinforcers but weak contingencies relating reinforcers to behavior. This empirical result may help us to understand why patterns of behavior are so difficult to change in the affluent society of the USA, despite the likelihood that their continuation will destroy the environment on which we depend. The argument is illustrated by fossil fuel consumption, especially by driving cars for personal transportation, where many costs are deferred or hidden but reinforcers are immediate and are experienced in a situation of general affluence. The behavioral momentum metaphor accounts for the resistance to change of driving, and of social policies that subsidize driving. Using wind power as an example, the metaphor suggests why local action on behalf of the future may be successful and how support for future-oriented projects may be gained."