Social Norms as a Driving Force of Attitudes, Intentions, and Behaviour: Meta-analytical Research

Social norms are informal, socially shared, and relatively stable guides of attitudes, intentions and behavior. Despite a large body of research on social norms, their empirically discovered effect sizes vary drastically and it remains unclear when norms are more effective in changing attitudes, intentions and behavior. This meta-analysis (201 independent studies, 652 effect sizes) examines aspects of social norms that determine their impact. Results show that descriptive norms have a larger impact on behavior than injunctive norms, but a lower impact on attitudes. Additionally, the impact of social norms depends on their source and the specificity of their formulatio