​Are fines and penalties always the most effective way to discourage unsustainable fisher behaviour?​ 

Behavioural economics is the study of how psychological, social, and emotional factors influence decision-making, often leading individuals to make choices that deviate from traditional rational economic models. These concepts can help explain why fishers might risk breaking the rules despite knowing the consequences.

Traditional fisheries management approaches have emphasised biological and ecological factors while largely overlooking the ways human behaviour impacts resource use. To address this gap, ICES Working Group on Maritime Systems (WGMARS) led a systematic review of 140 studies in the field. The result? The recently published study, Behavioural Economics in Marine Fisheries Management: A Systematic Review. This study concludes that behavioural economics holds significant potential for improving fisheries management by providing insights into how human behaviour influences fishing practices.

Social norms over sanctions?​

The paper contains a table with examples of more than a dozen behavioural economics mechanisms (i.e. social processes that cause certain behaviours) that have been studied in a fisheries context. The most prevalent in the literature was “injunctive social norms", or the tendency to want to comply with shared social standards. One example in the review was a sense of “duty" influencing a community's compliance with a fishing ban. Another mechanism is framing, where different ways of presenting a message can affect its impact. Because of this cognitive bias, it may be more effective to encourage the “right" behaviour rather than punish or ban the “wrong" behaviour.

Using behavioural economics to understand and predict fisher behaviour, targeted interventions could be designed to effectively promote sustainable practices and enhance resource management in marine environments. By recognizing the complexities of human behaviour, the research seeks to integrate these insights for better fisheries management outcomes.

Toward more human-centred policy

The systematic review only included articles that had studied the behaviour of fishers, either as they worked or in controlled experiments or surveys. The purpose of this was to produce a review that would be useful for policymakers and researchers interested in the context-specific insights about fisheries management. However, because the “study species" of behavioural economics is homo sapiens, one could reasonably expect the mechanisms and insights outlined in this review to be applicable in other areas of natural resource management.

The researchers discovered that understanding the psychological and social factors driving fisher decisions, such as social norms and risk preferences, can pave the way for targeted interventions. These insights can lead to improvements in fisheries management beyond mere economic incentives. For example, enhancing communication and fostering community involvement can make management strategies more effective.

Despite the promising findings, the review reveals a critical issue: many existing studies lack robust connections between behavioural insights and practical implementations. As the authors note, a more coordinated and interdisciplinary approach is essential for future research.

The literature includes some evidence that social mechanisms (e.g., a collective sense of duty) impact environmental outcomes (e.g., fishing mortality). This is exciting ground for policy strategists who may have exhausted the traditional top-down mechanisms of education programs or monitoring and punishment. Rather, bottom-up approaches that leverage the community-wide norms or voluntary compliance may be more effective and, importantly, more acceptable to the communities that they aim to govern.

A framework for the future of behavioural fisheries science

As far as future research in this field, the authors outline a conceptual framework to guide behavioural economics studies in a fisheries context. Understanding the impact a social mechanism might have on an environmental outcome requires both social scientists and biologists/ecologists to properly hypothesize and measure any experimental intervention. Unfortunately, many studies in the field drew conclusions from incidental or poorly theorised observations, making their generalization to other contexts difficult.

Finally, the review identified a concerning lack of consideration for ethics in the field. With the implicit aim of steering behaviour, what consent is given by the people who are being manipulated? Co-design and co-development (where fishers and scientists work together to formulate research questions and implement studies) are one way the field can better engage with its ethical dilemmas.​

Read the full paper, Behavioural Economics in Marine Fisheries Management: A Systematic Review​, in Fish and Fisheries.​The Working Group on Maritime Systems (WGMARS)​ is an expert group based on interdisciplinary collaboration to improve understanding of the coupled human-ocean system. As a forum for interdisciplinary perspectives on sustainable ecosystem science, advice, and governance, the group's members engage with maritime stakeholders from across the North Atlantic to take into consideration and better understand their perspectives.