Leah Everist
Senior Advisor
Summers are hot. But the climate crisis is making record-breaking temperatures the norm.
Heat waves are among the most deadly natural hazards, and typically temperate areas, like Maine and the UK, have experienced them over the past few years. These heat waves caused black outs and thousands of deaths—and will get worse.
People who aren’t used to extreme weather don’t always know how to navigate it. How can local governments support residents to better plan for extreme temperatures?
BIT has helped hundreds of governments worldwide design solutions to policy and public health issues like this using a deep understanding of human behavior. Here are a few ways applied behavioral science can help mitigate the harms of excessive heat by encouraging people to take action to stay safe.
Before heat waves
Incentivize people to retrofit their homes. There are many ways that residents can keep their homes cooler during the summer: covering windows, weather stripping, installing an attic fan, and more. Local governments typically introduce subsidies to encourage take up of these projects.
Designing these incentives with behavioral insights in mind can help increase uptake. For example, people tend to discount future gains to avoid short-term losses, a behavioral principle called hyperbolic discounting.
This means that even though a project like weather stripping will save people money on electricity and cool their homes in the long run, the up front cost or effort may dissuade them from taking on the project. Local governments can offset immediate losses. For example, our team in the UK found that reducing upfront costs is the most impactful way to boost heat pump adoption.
Help people plan. Planning for extreme heat can be overwhelming. There are lots of things a person could do in advance, but it’s not always clear where to start. Plus, having strong intentions to accomplish a goal is often not enough to make it a reality (e.g., “I really want to update my resume so I can apply for jobs!”).
Local governments can use enhanced planning to help residents prepare for potential emergencies in small yet impactful ways.
This can look like specifying when, where, and how the goal will be achieved in advance through implementation intentions (e.g., “When I wake up on Sunday, I will go to a cafe and work on my resume.”). These have helped people achieve all kinds of goals, from getting a flu shot and saving for retirement to attending tutoring sessions.
For instance, instead of telling residents to “Prepare by finding a cooling center,” people can be encouraged to set aside a time to create a plan with specific steps (e.g., “This weekend, visit [website] to find your nearest cooling center” or “After your children’s bedtime tonight, find a cool place to take them during the afternoons next week”).
Simple tools, such as pre-filled checklists with steps like “Check public library hours” or “Fill your ice trays,” can also make planning feel achievable and increase follow-through.
During heat waves
Communicate simply and memorably. Behavioral science has shown that the simpler something is, the more likely people will understand it and take action. During a heat wave, the most important thing local governments can do is inform residents of their options for keeping themselves and others cool, whether that be visiting a cooling center or staying hydrated.
Communicating this information as concisely as possible will help make it top-of-mind for people. We have found this to be the case in situations across sectors, from washing hands properly to prevent disease transmission to communicating policy messages from central banks to the general public.
The time and place that residents receive messages can also have an effect. “Avoid using the oven or stove for cooking,” is a common heat wave communication. If placed in a grocery store—where shoppers are able to choose foods that do not require heating—people will be more able to act on the message.
Leverage behavioral insights to encourage prosocial behaviors. Behavioral insights can help protect those who are most vulnerable during heatwaves, such as people with disabilities. For example, checking on elderly neighbors or relatives is a key tactic to keep people safe. Messaging framing such as, “Protect each other,” appeals to our collective identity, and may be particularly effective in encouraging the non-elderly to check in. This style of messaging also leverages social identity, social influence, and moral behavior.
Older adults may be well-positioned to check on one another, too. This balance creates a relationship of reciprocity—a social norm where people feel motivated to reciprocate others’ actions toward them. Research examining neighborhood assistance indicates that reciprocity plays an important role in provision of care under normal circumstances, suggesting that it may be significant during heat waves.
Making the most of the time before summer
The summer of 2024 was the hottest on record in the US and Northern Hemisphere, and the hottest summer ever measured globally. Summer 2025 is also expected to be one of the warmest. As global efforts like Net Zero tackle the climate crisis on a systemic level, local governments can take critical steps to keep communities safe. Now is the best time to prepare for next year’s extreme heat.
To explore using applied behavioral science to make heat wave relief efforts more effective, contact us here.
