Excusing ourselves
I like wine. It’s Friday night.
One wine? Why not?
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday night.
One wine. Why not?
Hey, I only drink at night.
Well I mostly drink at night and I never drink alone.
Well I sometimes drink alone, when there’s no-one home.
And there’s no-one home. I don’t share my house.
Who are you to judge me Willis? What you talkin’ ‘bout?
...
These are the lyrics of Clare Bowditch’s song, Modern Day Addiction, which so...
Why training fails to stick
“But I wasn’t properly trained!”
It’s a familiar excuse when people are found in breach of some sort of requirement.
- During Covid it was protective equipment protocols.
- In restaurants, food handling standards.
- In organisations, security or privacy regulations.
But what does properly trained actually mean?
To be properly trained means behaviour needs to change.
We need to influence people to do X instead of Y.
Yet most training programs are based on...
Where use of behavioural economics goes wrong
There are three stages of using behavioural economics. In this video behavioural expert Bri Williams explains the one thing successful businesses do differently, how to move through each stage, and what to do at the critical juncture where you'll either succeed or fail.
We talk about different stages of grief and different stages of learning. Well in my experience, there are different stages of behavioural economics, too.
By the end of this video you’ll know the one thing...
The ridiculous reason I became vegan
I never would have imagined I would become vegan, but as someone who is deeply into behaviour change I thought I’d share the reason it happened.
In case you are still a little fuzzy about what a vegan diet entails, it is plant-based without meat, eggs or dairy. I had become vegetarian earlier in the year so eliminating meat wasn’t a significant step. Dairy was. So why did it need to happen?
Ice cream.
I had developed an ice-coffee habit, enjoying one most lunch times. Was this a...
Wrap-up of articles and videos from 2020
Influencing Action
Two simple rules for influencing action – on friction to make the old behaviour unappealing and the new behaviour appealing.
Let’s talk behavioural models – (video) on what makes a good behavioural model and what are some of the best to use.
Nanette-ing your approach to influence – The comedian’s role, Hannah Gadsby shared, is to deliberately create tension so they can then relieve us of it. The same approach goes for pitches, presentations and...
Two simple rules for influencing action
When it comes to changing your own behaviour or someone else’s, two simple rules are:
- Make the existing behaviour unappealing, and/or
Make the new behaviour appealing.
Make the existing behaviour unappealing
To reduce the likelihood an existing behaviour will continue, just add friction. For example:
- Slowing elevator doors by just 16 seconds influenced more people to take the stairs. Signs to save energy and improve health didn’t work, but friction did. (Van Houten, Nau &...
The trick to portion control
Public awareness campaigns crop up now and again to remind us how much one standard alcoholic drink is. In Australia, for instance, that means approximately 285 mL of full strength beer, 100 mL of wine or champagne and 30 mL of spirits.
The problem is most of us judge by the container not the contents, making a perceptual rather than intellectual judgment — much it looks, not how much it actually is, so these awareness campaigns are largely ineffective.
Unit bias
This is in part due to...
When it comes to habits, should you moderate or eliminate?
For some, moderation works. My mother, for example, can leave food on her plate and limit herself to two squares of chocolate a night.
For others, elimination is better. I am prone to eating everything on my plate and gobbling two ROWS of chocolate. I am therefore better to serve smaller meals on smaller plates, eliminating the decision whether and how much to leave. Eliminating chocolate from the house also works best for me.
Whether you are wired to moderate or eliminate will have a large...
The other reason you are so tired right now
You might be feeling more tired than usual at the moment.
Understandable if you are working harder than ever, but what if you aren’t?
Some of us have long expanses of unscheduled time on our hands. No more travel. No more commuting. No more gyms, dinner parties or sporting events.
Why so tired, then?
The other reason you are tired
Partly this may be due to stress and anxiety. Your body is working overtime to remained composed, with your parasympathetic nervous system trying to calm the...
