Life after death (part 2)

We have had a debate in the office recently about the role of research agencies in the ‘behaviour change’ agenda, considering why traditional research companies seem to have been hesitant to embrace this zeitgeist.

There can be a degree of confusion over what topics and ideas are covered by this behaviour change concept. For some, it covers only the field of behavioural economics, popularised by books like ‘Nudge’, and ‘Predictably Irrational’, which identifies ways to understand and transform behaviour through reference to the quirks, rules-of-thumb and limitations of our cognitive processes.

But ‘behaviour change’ is actually wider than this.

Last week, I wrote about an event  I attended at the RSA, talking about organ donation and the concept of altruism . The debate considered the concept of having a ‘presumed consent’ or ‘opt-out’ system for organ donation in the UK to bridge the tragic shortfall between registered organ donors and the need for transplants.

This proposal is a typical ‘behavioural economics’ solution, and while it might dramatically increase the number of donors, there are many reasons why it might not be a magic bullet, not least because it is, on face value, controversial.

But if not the ‘Nudge’-solution, what then?

Chris Rudge , National Clinical Director for Transplantation at the Department of Health, commented during the lecture that one of the key things that needs to be understood is why people do not register, or do not consent to have their relative’s organs donated. What motivates them and what holds them back? How can the conflict between attitude and behaviour be resolved?

To me it seems likely that a panoply of psychological factors are at work – some that are ‘Nudge’-able and some that require a more sophisticated engagement.  From reflecting on my own failure to register for something so obviously worthy, I concluded that I held an almost subconscious aversion to even thinking about my death.

Addressing such issues goes beyond choice architecture . It requires an understanding of how attitudes and emotions influence behaviour and the impact social norms and networks can have.

It is this wider remit that ‘behaviour change’, somewhat ambitiously, seeks to encompass.

To my mind, it is in tackling these broad questions about the drivers of human behaviour that research consultancies can play a part in the behaviour change conversation. Deriving such insight is what we do on a day-to-day basis.

Combined with a careful understanding of the models and theories that the behaviour change movement encapsulates, this insight can be translated into a holistic social marketing-style approach that genuinely changes behaviour.

Read more here

• There’s a little Homer Simpson in all of us
• The Nudge blog
• NHS Blood and Transplant

About the author

Jamie Halliday is a Research Manager working with a number of consumer, public sector and corporate clients. His interests include evolutionary psychology, rugby and the music of Tom Waits, though rarely all at the same time.