A Research Synthesis and Theoretical Model of Relationships Between Factors Influencing Outdoor Domestic Water Consumption

ABSTRACT

Outdoor domestic water use is often targeted by demand management strategies. However, despite a rich empirical evidence base coming from primary studies, it is still unclear how factors that influence this type of demand interact and which are the most suitable to be addressed by water conservation programs. Based on 423 scientific contributions, we develop a research synthesis combining a variety of techniques to create a theoretical model of the relationships among factors most consistently observed in the literature. The findings uncover a great degree of complexity in terms of interactions between spatial-structural, social-structural, and cultural and psychological factors at different scales. For researchers, the methodology and the outcomes can be useful to better frame existing and future research within the literature on the topic. In practice, the adaptation of the theoretical model to local specificities can facilitate the design of more efficient and integrated demand management strategies.

KEYWORDS:

• Household water consumption
• outdoor water use
• qualitative research synthesis
• water conservation
• water demand management

Acknowledgment

We thank Dr. Garcia-Acosta for his helpful comments on a previous version of the article and five anonymous reviewers for their insights and suggestions.