Let me share some concrete examples of how organisations are already using AI effectively in behaviour change work:

During a recent panel discussion I moderated, organized in collaboration with Robert Rippberger, I had the pleasure of speaking with Laurel Felt, PhD, Margot Fahnestock, Mugambi Nthiga , and Namir Nava, four brilliant leaders from organisations that create social and behaviour change (SBC) dramas across Africa, Latin America, and Asia. Together, we explored what it really takes for a drama to move people, influence norms, and create sustained change, as well as how digital channels are transforming the field. In this post, I’ll break down some of the biggest insights from our conversation, and why I think they matter for anyone working in SBC or social impact entertainment.

Taken together, the results suggest that habits may serve to define who we are, in particular when these are considered in the context of self-related goals or central values. When habits relate to feelings of identity this comes with stronger cognitive self-integration, higher self-esteem, and a striving toward an ideal self. Linking habits to identity may sustain newly formed behaviors and may thus lead to more effective behavior change interventions.

To address vaccine hesitancy, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) launched the “We Can Do This” COVID-19 public education campaign (the Campaign) in 2021 to promote vaccine confidence and increase vaccine uptake. The Campaign introduced a heavy-up media strategy to enhance its reach and engagement with its vaccine hesitant audience. This approach complemented the Campaign’s national media strategy while delivering an additional advertising dose to select priority designated market areas (DMAs) – that is, media markets – each month. We examine the relationship between the Campaign’s heavy-up strategy and initial COVID-19 vaccine uptake from August to December 2021. A stacked difference-in-differences (DID) analysis compared initial COVID-19 vaccine uptake between DMAs that received heavy-up (treatment) and DMAs that did not (control). The Campaign’s short-term heavy-up advertising strategy was associated with increased initial vaccine uptake in treatment DMAs. These results provide valuable insights for public health campaign strategy and evaluation, highlighting the effectiveness of increasing campaign dose in select markets to address vaccine hesitancy and improve public health outcomes.

Public health campaigns addressing COVID-19 vaccination beliefs may be effective in changing COVID-19 vaccination behaviors, particularly among people who remain vaccine hesitant. The “We Can Do This” COVID-19 public education campaign (the Campaign) was designed to increase COVID-19 vaccine confidence and uptake. This study aims to evaluate whether Campaign dose was associated with changes in vaccination beliefs related to COVID-19 vaccine concerns and perceived risks, the importance of COVID-19 vaccines, the perceived benefits of COVID-19 vaccination, normative beliefs about COVID-19 vaccination, and perceptions about general vaccine safety and effectiveness. The study linked data from four waves of a nationally representative longitudinal panel of U.S. adults (January 2021–March 2022) with Campaign paid digital media data (April 2021–May 2022). We used mixed-effects linear regressions to examine the association between Campaign paid digital impressions and changes in vaccination beliefs. The results provide evidence that Campaign digital impressions were significantly associated with changes in respondent beliefs regarding COVID-19 vaccine concerns and perceived risks, perceived benefits of COVID-19 vaccination, and perceptions about general vaccine safety and effectiveness. Findings suggest that public education campaigns may influence vaccine confidence and uptake by increasing positive vaccination beliefs and reducing vaccine concerns.

To investigate factors associated with intention to be vaccinated against COVID-19 we conducted a cross-sectional survey of 1,500 UK adults, recruited from an existing online research panel. Data were collected between 14th and 17th July 2020. We used linear regression analyses to investigate associations between intention to be vaccinated for COVID-19 “when a vaccine becomes available to you” and sociodemographic factors, previous influenza vaccination, general vaccine attitudes and beliefs, attitudes and beliefs about COVID-19, and attitudes and beliefs about a COVID-19 vaccination. 64% of participants reported being very likely to be vaccinated against COVID-19, 27% were unsure, and 9% reported being very unlikely to be vaccinated. Personal and clinical characteristics, previous influenza vaccination, general vaccination beliefs, and beliefs and attitudes about COVID-19 and a COVID-19 vaccination explained 76% of the variance in vaccination intention. Intention to be vaccinated was associated with more positive general COVID-19 vaccination beliefs and attitudes, weaker beliefs that the vaccination would cause side effects or be unsafe, greater perceived information sufficiency to make an informed decision about COVID-19 vaccination, greater perceived risk of COVID-19 to others (but not risk to oneself), older age, and having been vaccinated for influenza last winter (2019/20). Despite uncertainty around the details of a COVID-19 vaccination, most participants reported intending to be vaccinated for COVID-19. Actual uptake may be lower. Vaccination intention reflects general vaccine beliefs and attitudes. Campaigns and messaging about a COVID-19 vaccination could consider emphasizing the risk of COVID-19 to others and necessity for everyone to be vaccinated.

ResultsThe data reveal large variations in vaccine acceptance that ranges from 82 % in Denmark to 52 % in Hungary. Lack of vaccine acceptance is associated with lack of trust in authorities and scientists, conspiratorial thinking, and a lack of concern about COVID-19. ConclusionMost national levels of vaccine acceptance fall below estimates of the required threshold for herd immunity. The results emphasize the long-term importance of buildingtrust in preparations for health emergencies such as the current pandemic. For health communication, the results emphasize the importance of focusing on personal consequences of infections and debunking of myths to guide communication strategies

People often judge how embarrassing an activity or condition is on the basis of its perceived prevalence. They infer prevalence in part by considering how often they hear other people discussing it. But how often a condition is discussed is a function not only of its prevalence but also of how embarrassing it is. If people fail to take this into account, they will tend to judge embarrassing conditions as being rarer, which will accentuate their embarrassment, and, in turn, further amplify their reluctance to disclose those conditions - a “spiral“ of shame and silence. We present results from two studies that support the existence of such a feedback process. The first, a cross-sectional survey study, asked respondents a series of questions about different embarrassing and non-embarrassing conditions. Respondents (1) indicated whether they had the conditions, (2) judged how embarrassing the conditions were, (3) reported whether they had disclosed, or would disclose, having the conditions to others, and (4) estimated what fraction of survey respondents had the conditions. As predicted, reports of disclosure were negatively related to judgments of embarrassment, and when embarrassment was greater, estimates of prevalence were lower, both for conditions that respondents had and for conditions they did not have. The second, an experimental study, manipulated whether people received a high or low estimate of population prevalence for 5 different conditions, and found that receiving a high prevalence estimate reduced embarrassment and increased self-reported willingness to disclose the condition to others, and vice versa.

The COVID-19 pandemic provided a stark reminder that societies will struggle to address global challenges unless they are able to change behaviour at scale. The widely adopted ‘nudge’ approach epitomizes an individualistic, deficit model of human cognition and motivation that leverages or overcomes people’s weaknesses and biases to get them to do things they would otherwise not. By contrast, we argue that tackling the challenges facing humanity requires a collective, capacity-building approach – one that boosts the competences, opportunities, and motivations of individuals to act together.

This study aims to (1) identify and categorize the strategies used in digital health interventions over the past 25 years; (2) explore the differences and changes in these strategies across time periods, countries, populations, delivery methods, and senders; and (3) serve as a valuable reference for future researchers and practitioners to improve the effectiveness of digital health interventions.

It works like this. Over a short period of three recycling collections, households put their Not Sure Box out along with the usual containers, throwing in it anything they aren’t sure is recyclable. On collection day, council staff sort recyclable items into the recycling and leave feedback in the box about how to correctly dispose of remaining items.

The traditional focus of work on personality and behavior has tended toward “major outcomes” such as health or antisocial behavior, or small sets of behaviors observable over short periods in laboratories or in convenience samples. In a community sample, we examined a wide set (400) of mundane, incidental or “every day” behavioral acts, the frequencies of which were reported over the past year. Using an exploratory methodology similar to genomic approaches (relying on the False Discovery Rate) revealed 26 prototypical acts for Intellect, 24 acts for Extraversion, 13 for Emotional Stability, nine for Conscientiousness, and six for Agreeableness. Many links were consistent with general intuition—for instance, low Conscientiousness with work and procrastination. Some of the most robust associations, however, were for acts too specific for a priori hypothesis. For instance, Extraversion was strongly associated with telling dirty jokes, Intellect with “loung[ing] around [the] house without clothes on”, and Agreeableness with singing in the shower. Frequency categories for these acts changed with markedly non-linearity across Big Five Z-scores. Findings may help ground trait scores in emblematic acts, and enrich understanding of mundane or common behavioral signatures of the Big Five.

What's new in COM-B 2.0? 1.‘Individual-level’ COM-B is distinguished from ‘Population-level’ COM-B2.COM-B components are more precisely defined and linked to the Behaviour Change Intervention Ontology (BCIO)3.COM-B components are broken down into key influences that can form the basis for a detailed diagnosis of what needs to change to influence a given behaviour in a given population and context.

The result is META BI (Mapping of Environment, Target group and Agent for Behavioural Interventions), a classification system describing interventions across 20 dimensions and using 17 distinct psychological mechanisms. META BI is aligned with a system lens, shifting the focus from single true effects to contextualised assessments. It can help to understand, compare and evaluate nudges and selected interventions for the desired effects.

Here's an interesting question: what if the best way to change someone’s behaviour is to encourage them to fail? And what impact would that have on your marketing campaigns and messaging? In Canada, the Ministry of Health decided to see if they could encourage people to quit smoking by telling smokers that they’ll probably fail to quit smoking...

A new report from Crisis Text Line and Common Good Labs offers solutions to the youth mental health crisis based on over 87,000 anonymized conversations with young people who talked about what helps them cope.

ife events have been theorized to elicit personality trait changes. However, the empirical evidence for event-related personality development remains inconclusive. Even comprehensive reviews and meta-analyses are limited by the availability of effect sizes, the control for relevant confounders, and the way time is treated in the analyses. To overcome these limitations, we conducted a coordinated data analysis and examined event-related personality changes across seven large-scale panel studies (Ntotal = 196,256). Furthermore, we investigated corresponding event-related changes in life satisfaction and self-esteem as benchmarks for the interpretation of effect sizes. Integrating the results across panel studies, we found several consistent changes in the Big Five personality traits in response to life events. For example, new employment predicted increases in conscientiousness and emotional stability, whereas marriage predicted a decrease in openness. However, event-related changes in the Big Five personality traits were small (average bstd = 0.05), with effect sizes similar to those of event-related changes in self-esteem but smaller than corresponding changes in life satisfaction. Building on these findings, future research should focus on the life events with replicable effects on personality development and examine how these life events lead to personality changes.

A team at the Nutrition Council is working on a new initiative: get more leafy greens on people’s plates. They have worked on and tracked many initiatives over the years, about topics ranging from added sugars to vitamins. They gather information about leafy greens consumption in the population, interview nutrition experts, farmers, and professional chefs. This time, they also have a set of thinking styles from a study they did using Data Science that Listens.

Our audience told us that one of the big reasons they didn’t feel comfortable bringing up the topic was that they were scared they’d be wrong. We realized we needed to take a step back and focus more on building knowledge of early signs first—the campaign had to help them walk before they could run.

Here, we develop a novel cognitive framework by organizing these interventions along six cognitive processes: attention, perception, memory, effort, intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation. In addition, we conduct a meta-analysis of field experiments (i.e. randomized controlled trials) that contained real behavioural measures (n = 184 papers, k = 184 observations, N = 2 245 373 participants) from 2008 to 2021 to examine the effect size of these interventions targeting each cognitive process. Our findings demonstrate that interventions changing effort are more effective than interventions changing intrinsic motivation, and nudge and sludge interventions had similar effect sizes. However, these results need to be interpreted with caution due to a potential publication bias. This new meta-analytic framework provides cognitive principles for organizing nudge and sludge with corresponding behavioural impacts.

This article will explore: The unique challenges of using behavioural frameworks in qualitative research Why practical experience is essential for accurate behavioural diagnosis Common pitfalls in coding and how they affect intervention outcomes

Reasons to Stay is a suicide prevention project reaching people at difficult moments through anonymous letters written by volunteers. Each letter on this site was written by a real person and delivered to you at random when you visited this page. This space exists as a reminder that we are not alone, even when it feels that way. There is someone, somewhere who wrote you a letter because they care. If you’d like to, you can write your own letter to a stranger, offering warmth, hope and connection to someone when they need it most.

Two studies investigated associations between habits and identity, in particular what people consider as their “true self.” Habit-identity associations were assessed by within-participant correlations between self-reported habit and associated true self ratings of 80 behaviors. The behaviors were instantiations of 10 basic values. In Study 1, significant correlations were observed between individual differences in the strength of habit-identity associations, measures of cognitive self-integration (prioritizing self-relevant information), self-esteem, and an orientation toward an ideal self. Study 2 further tested the assumption that habits are associated with identity if these relate to important goals or values. An experimental manipulation of value affirmation demonstrated that, compared to a control condition, habit-identity associations were stronger if participants explicitly generated the habit and true self ratings while indicating which values the behaviors would serve. Taken together, the results suggest that habits may serve to define who we are, in particular when these are considered in the context of self-related goals or central values. When habits relate to feelings of identity this comes with stronger cognitive self-integration, higher self-esteem, and a striving toward an ideal self. Linking habits to identity may sustain newly formed behaviors and may thus lead to more effective behavior change interventions.

But sometimes it can be hard to find the time (and motivation) to exercise. So, what's the least amount of exercise you can get away with doing while still seeing these benefits? That answer depends on how fit you are to begin with. Here's some good news: the lower your starting point is in terms of fitness, the less you have to do to see a benefit.

wait this graph is crazy BART installed anti-fare-hopping gates and the amount of station maintenance and cleanup they had to do went to basically zero strong evidence that the poor condition of public transit is fairly easy to fix + caused by a very small group of people

Nearly five years ago, in April 2020, just a few months into the pandemic, Jay van Bavel – a social psychologist at New York University – published a landmark paper aimed at helping those in power do just that. Bavel and colleagues' paper was influential as it made clear that governments couldn't rely solely on rules and regulations; they needed to motivate the public to follow them. In doing so, they proposed 19 behavioural principles – policies that were rooted in decades of psychological research and designed to help guide the public's response to the pandemic. Many of these principles were adopted by governments around the world, in the hope that psychology might help 'nudge' us, or even shove us, towards safer behaviours. These principles took many forms, from encouraging a shared sense of identity – 'we're all in this together' type thinking – to targeting fake news and misinformation. These questions were especially important to my own research, on adolescent social development and mental health. Could we really get young people to stick to these restrictions? And to what extent were the huge social sacrifices being asked of young people worth it in the long run? These unknown questions were hugely important to understand and to collect data on, and to understand what policies worked and were worth implementing. So, my interest was piqued, and it wasn't too long before I found myself in the unusual position of having first-hand experience of very different approaches to the behavioural principles in action…

To support intervention developers in selecting BCTs to target specific MoAs, an online resource, called the Theory and Technique Tool (TaTT), was previously developed. This tool provides an evidence-based grid showing which BCTs are likely or unlikely to change certain MoAs. Recently, new tools—the Behaviour Change Technique Ontology (BCTO) and Mechanisms of Action Ontology (MoA Ontology)—were developed to include a wider range of BCTs and MoAs and provide more precise and computer-readable BCT and MoA definitions. By aligning the TaTT with these newer tools, we can support (1) ontology users in hypothesising about likely BCT-MoA links, and (2) TaTT users in identifying more detailed yet relevant BCTs and MoAs from the ontologies and using these in computer applications. This study aimed to map the newer ontologies’ categories to the TaTT’s 74 BCTs and 26 MoAs. Researchers carefully compared and discussed definitions from both tools to create mappings. The study found that 85 BCTs in the newer ontology corresponded to 74 BCTs from the TaTT, and 56 MoAs in the newer ontology corresponded to 26 MoAs from the TaTT. By linking the ontologies to the TaTT, this work makes it easier to use these tools together. This helps design and report behaviour change interventions more clearly and supports advanced uses like automated data analysis.

What can behavioural scientists do differently when working on complex problems? Given the need for differentiated methods for different kinds of systems, and particular caution about existing approaches for complex and chaotic domains, applied behavioural scientists should be considering the appropriateness of the cornerstones of applied work, such as defining target behaviours. early on in strategic development, as shown in the table below. The Cynefin framework is a ‘sense-making’ framework – where sense-making is defined by the author David Snowden as “making sense of the world in order to act in it”. It distinguishes between 3 primary systems: ordered, complex, chaotic, which are defined by the type of constraints (or absence of constraints) in that system. Each type of system is described not just how it is constrained, but also describes how to best take action.

What can behavioural scientists do differently when working on complex problems? Given the need for differentiated methods for different kinds of systems, and particular caution about existing approaches for complex and chaotic domains, applied behavioural scientists should be considering the appropriateness of the cornerstones of applied work, such as defining target behaviours. early on in strategic development, as shown in the table below. The Cynefin framework is a ‘sense-making’ framework – where sense-making is defined by the author David Snowden as “making sense of the world in order to act in it”. It distinguishes between 3 primary systems: ordered, complex, chaotic, which are defined by the type of constraints (or absence of constraints) in that system. Each type of system is described not just how it is constrained, but also describes how to best take action.

obs-to-be-done is a great concept for innovators, helping to take the customer perspective and discovering customer insights for innovation and growth strategies. When applying JTBD in practice, however, innovators often get lost. The Job Hierarchy, developed by Vendbridgeand applied in dozens of JTBD projects, can help to maintain orientation and focus, and thereby to exploit the full potential of this powerful concept. Die Job Hierarchie As the word hierarchy implies, we use it to think JTBD in three different levels: The Bigger Why The Deeper Why The Lower How

Intervention Mapping is the most comprehensive approach to systematic behavior change (O'Cathain et al., 2019). For this reason, applying Intervention Mapping can been daunting. In this paper, I discuss the mistakes I made when applying the various iterative steps of Intervention Mapping in the design, implementation, and evaluation of an intervention aiming to reduce HIV stigma in health care settings in the Netherlands.

Personalized nudging (PeN) promises greater intervention effectiveness, especially for heterogenous populations. However, developments in PeN are hindered due to a lack of conceptual clarity and high methodological variability. We present a framework for PeN to tackle these challenges. We argue that personalization is contingent on personal data availability and choice environment malleability. Applying these factors to a nudge’s content, design, and underlying mechanism, we suggest that various levels of PeN exist, from simple name changes to more technologically sophisticated adaptive approaches. These levels highlight various novel methodological considerations, which we split into theory-driven (top down) and data-driven (bottom up) approaches. Finally, we discuss how our framework supports practitioner goals and reveals future research directions.

Yet the latest research shows something inconvenient for that narrative: a sharp reduction in fentanyl overdoses that started before Trump took office, almost certainly in response to policy under his predecessor Joe Biden. As researchers noted in a paper published in the journal Science this week, fatal overdoses from synthetic opioids like fentanyl plummeted after peaking at 76,000 in 2023 in the US, dropping by over a third by the end of 2024. (Full numbers aren’t in yet for 2025, but provisional data from the CDC suggests another double-digit percentage drop.) The researchers proposed a possible explanation, writing that a “major disruption in the illicit fentanyl trade, possibly tied to Chinese government actions,” may have “translated into sharp reductions in overdose mortality beginning in mid- or late-2023 and continued into 2024 across both the US and Canada.” In other words, as Axiom reports, diplomatic pressure has proven far more effective than efforts to crack down on drug dealers on the street.

To meet UK Net-Zero emissions targets, meat consumption must decrease. We present results from two studies evaluating interventions to reduce purchasing of meat-containing meals across university cafeterias in Oxford, UK. Study 1 tested whether two dynamic descriptive norm messages changed meal purchasing. Over eight weeks, four cafeterias displayed a norm message incorporating a socially ‘close’ referent group and three cafeterias displayed a message incorporating a socially ‘distant’ referent group. Two cafeterias were assigned a no-message control condition. A generalised linear mixed effect model suggested both messages decreased odds of cafeteria diners purchasing vegetarian meals, in comparison to control, 'Close' Message: Ratio of Odds Ratios (ORs)=0.79, 95% 95% CI [0.72, 0.86]; 'Remote' Message: Ratio of ORs=0.84, 95% CI [0.76,0.92]. Study 2 involved three pre-post experiments testing whether different interventions changed meal purchasing: re-positioning vegetarian products, increasing vegetarian availability, and introducing vegetarian defaults. Generalised linear models suggested each intervention was associated with significant increases in odds of diners purchasing vegetarian meals, Positioning: OR=1.33, 95% CI [1.24,1.44]; Availability: OR=1.60, 95% CI [1.45, 1.75]; Defaults: OR=1.77, 95% CI [1.61, 1.95]. These study results could be due to norm messaging being less effective at promoting vegetarian meals than interventions in availability, defaults, and positioning. But, given the study designs, they could instead be due to self-selection effects, or regression to the mean.

PCS yields three important discoveries in this investigation: First, context variables are more predictive of behavior for some individuals than others. Second, contrary to common wisdom, there is no “magic number” for how long it takes to form a habit. Instead, the speed of habit formation appears to vary significantly between behavioral domain: Gym habits take months to form and handwashing habits take weeks to form. Third, consistent with prior research on nonhuman animals, more habitual gymgoers are reward-insensitive, responding less to a well-designed behavioral intervention

Massive snowfalls like the one that hit the US east coast this week usually spell trouble for traffic. But critics of America's car-centric transport network are using the snow - and Twitter - to demonstrate how roads should be redesigned to make them safer for pedestrians.

Before the lights went out, my social enterprise, DevelopMetrics, turned those tools loose on the USAID archive—one last look at what half a century of development really taught us. If you allocate grants, run programs, or shape policy, this is the closest thing we have to a postmortem on how tens of billions of dollars in development aid actually behaved over the course of decades in the wild. It offers a model for future learning on a mass scale, and the results affirm some important guiding principles as the development ecosystem considers how to build going forward.