Making good behavior easier November 8, 2010

Overview Using the power of the situation to your advantage – Make a path – Make a plan – Make a list – Take small steps – Take advantage of existing resources – Block the path

The person versus the situation Driving forces versus restraining forces Intentions and desires The situation Intentions and desires The situation Intentions and desires The situation

The person and the situation Two questions: Which is more informative? – Why does she do what does? – Why doesn’t she do what we want her to do? We often focus on a person’s personality as the root cause of their behavior, when the situation is just as important

Don’t diet with self-control Diet by changing your environment – People eat more stale popcorn out of bigger buckets – They eat more soup out of self-refilling bowls – They serve more ice cream with bigger scoops and eat more out of bigger bowls – They eat more chips out of containers without suggested stopping points

Don’t diet with self-control Other Wansink hints: – Keep serving dishes in the kitchen, not on the table – Eat off smaller plates, so you can’t eat as much at one time – Keep healthy snacks in the front of the fridge

Portion control

Channel factors Channel factors are aspects of the situation that make action particularly easy or likely (or vice versa) – These can be very small changes – Think of small changes in the landscape that can lead to large changes in the channel a river takes

Channel factors Yale seniors were tested for compliance in getting tetanus shots – Some received appeals that were very scary (graphic pictures, extreme symptoms) or that were rather mild (no pictures, neutral description of symptoms) – Some were only told that the shots were available, while others were asked to think of when they would be available to take the shot, and were given a map of Yale with DUH circled Leventhal, Singer, & Jones, 1965

Channel factors 0% of a control group received a shot in the next month, while 3.3% of the low specificity group did, and 27.6% of the high specificity group did Fear had no effect on likelihood of getting the shot

Make a plan Implementation intention: an if-then plan that links a situational cue with a response Helps turn goals into action – By helping people get started: Prevents forgetting to act Helps people seize opportune times to act Prevents second thoughts – By helping people stick to change Reduces temptation’s power Helps suppress unwanted behavior

Implementation intentions work They have been shown to help people: – Perform monthly breast exams – Take vitamins – Exercise more – Eat healthier – Increase workplace safety – Study more – Drink less alcohol – Recycle

Recycling & implementation intentions

Make it specific There’s a trick: the more specific the better – Compare intentions to implementation intentions: I am going to exercise more I am going to exercise every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 8:30 As a marketer, make the plan for them: Cartwright (1948) found that war bond sales increased the more specific the appeals were (re: time, place, amount)

The Checklist Manifesto Checklists make it easier to remember important steps, and harder to skip them without justification Positive effects of checklists are threefold: – Make sure all steps are completed – Equalize status – Force social interaction among team members

Small steps If every household in the US replaced just one incandescent light bulb with a compact fluorescent bulb, it would save 90 billion pounds of greenhouse gases from entering the atmosphere – That’s like taking 7.5 million cars off the road If every person ate just 100 calories fewer per day, it would help prevent significant weight gain and obesity – That’s the equivalent of one small cookie a day

Keep the change

Use the slippery slope Start with a very small change and slowly ramp it up as you get used to it – Five-minute room rescue – One-minute exercise plan What about changing products for the better?

Take advantage of existing resources

Make bad behavior harder

Summary The easier you make it to be good, the better people will be – Ease their way – Help them make a plan – Make a checklist – Smaller changes are easier changes – Use what you’ve got – If all else fails, make the bad stuff harder