The present research examined whether the environmental responsibility and actions attributed to large scale organizations, such as the government, can influence people's environmental efforts. In particular, we examined whether people increase or decrease their willingness to enact energy conservation behaviors (ECB) when there is a shortfall between others' actions and their responsibility.

In Studies 1 and 2 we utilized a correlational design to examine if willingness to enact ECB were associated with perceptions of others environmental responsibilities, actions, and the discrepancies between others responsibility and actions. In Study 3, we employed an experimental design and manipulated the extent to which the government's actions were seen as falling short of their responsibility to examine the effects on willingness to enact ECB.