ARE NUDGES INFLUENTIAL IN REDUCING SOCIAL ISSUES IN PAKISTAN? INSIGHTS FROM SURVEY-BASED STUDY

Abstract

Research in behavioral economics is deliberately becoming the most trending for policy making in the last few years. Nudges get growing interest as an effective concept to alter people’s decisions without significantly changing economic incentives or limiting options. People respond to monetary incentives but they also do respond to nudges, hence, this research is attempted to empirically evaluate the approval of six social nudges in the context of Pakistan. Different hypothetical scenarios are used to elicit attitudes towards different interventions because public and private organizations can nudge people to make better decisions. This study intended to use survey method of research and data is collected from capital cities of four provinces and federal capital of Pakistan through questionnaire. Structural Equation Model (SEM) is used to check whether trust in institutions, health and environmental concern, and people’s happiness contribute for the acceptance of nudges. Results show that these variables are significant and have positive influence on the approval of social nudges related to smoking, safety, population growth, female education, corruption and obesity. Findings of this research study suggest that keeping in view the significance of trust in institutions, public and private interventions may be proved helpful to positively change the behaviour of people.