Design has a long history of successfully grappling with ambiguity and embracing user context,

BEHAVIOR
BY DESIGN
recognizing the need to solve for systems and adaptation. Nudges shouldn’t bear the full burden
of designing with behavior in mind when design is well-positioned to do some of the heavy lifting.

Nudging has earned its place in public policy as Life, however, is full of complexity and adaptation This leads us to wonder: to what extent is a focus on A solution is hiding in plain sight:
an effective, efficient, and relatively low-cost lever that can’t be tested with a randomized control trial. evidence-based solutions of testable hypotheses behavioral science should continue to
for addressing knotty challenges grounded in While field experiments and pretests can bring contributing to a form of confirmation bias, make important contributions through
very human “irrational” behavior. These kinds of us closer to the intricacies of real life, nudging’s inadvertently limiting our sense of which problems
nudges and its other methods, but it can
behavioral interventions are primarily designed to natural habitat of well-defined, present-tense and spaces are ripe for behavioral attention and
contribute at an even greater scale by
achieve efficiency and cost savings within current inputs and processes may be at odds with the confining our ability to imagine new applications
partnering with other disciplines...
processes and structures, through solutions to introduction of new to-the-world contexts or the and definitions for what “good” could look like?
known, discrete behavioral challenges. ambiguity of the future.
in particular, with the field of design.

Letting design Here, the landscape consists of larger, more complex systems and
lead the way scenarios, some which may not even exist yet. This is where design
on complex can help us envision what could be, while behavioral science provides
challenges and insights into cognitive shortcuts and tendencies that might derail
future systems. people from acting in their own best interests.

Systemic: Systemic solutions benefit Create new system-level solutions:

not just individuals, or even specific Envisioning the future to develop entirely
organizations, but overall systems. new ways of solving for populations.
Oregon’s automatic voter-registration system, Recent experiments in universal basic
launched in 2016, uses Oregon motor vehicle income provide a current illustration of the
registration information to auto-register potential for new, systems-level solutions
citizens to vote, which has significantly that could have profound effects on
increased the number of registered voters
but also increased their diversity—participants Design-led, health and well-being, financial stability,
entrepreneurship, and even social inclusion

informed by
SYSTEMIC

were more likely to be younger, live in by potentially diminishing the social stigma
lower density areas, have lower income that makes people less likely to use other

behavioral
and education, and represent higher racial income-benefits programs.
diversity—and boosted their likelihood to vote.

Multi-stakeholder: Multiply the impact

insights Address existing processes. Targeting
of solutions by solving simultaneously for processes, rather than inputs, can remove
several answers to “in my best interest.” barriers to action or reduce implicit bias.
MULTI-STAKEHOLDER

Consider blind auditions, in which orchestras Checklists used by John Hopkins Hospital
improved the gender balance of their hires to guide blood clot prevention protocols
WHERE TO PLAY — IN WHOSE BEST INTEREST

by hiding the physical traits of auditioners turned a 50 percent disparity in the

behind a screen. First adopted by the Boston
Behavioral
treatment of men versus women into an
Symphony Orchestra in the 1970s, this even playing field. By simply externalizing
solution benefitted the individual women personal judgment, treatment became far
who received job offers based on their merit,
science-led, more equitable.

informed
but also rewarded orchestras by attracting
the best talent. Job-application software,
like Applied and GapJumpers, are digital
versions of the same concept.
by design Create new solutions: Using behavioral
insights within offerings by reducing

Individuals: Crafting “nudges” to insights user uncertainty, providing immediate

feedback, and simplifying actions.
make it easier for people to take The insurance product Lemonade flips
INDIVIDUALS

actions in their own best interests. traditional business models and customer
Richard Thaler and Shlomo Benartzi’s experience on their head by realigning
“Save More Tomorrow” plan, which in its incentives for action. With flat fees, quick
initial rollout nearly quadrupled 401(k) payouts, and unused premiums going to the
contributions compared to prior rates, is social cause of one’s choice, solutions like
a classic case; health care interventions this incorporate behavioral insights into their
aimed at habit formation such as
MODIFY INCOMING INPUTS ADDRESS EXISTING PROCESSES CREATE NEW SOLUTIONS design, rather than creating interventions to
medication adherence also sit here. address strictly behavioral challenges.
HOW TO WIN — NATURE OF INTERVENTIONS

This is where understanding behavioral challenges and pitfalls Behavioral

helps us improve existing choice architecture, like redesigning science thrives
forms and setting smart defaults. Here, design ensures that the with data-driven
behavioral solutions are focused on helping (or redirecting) people confidence in
to complete particular actions by taking their context into account. what works.

What about how much to play?
This “where to play/how to win” construct draws its inspiration from the
Innovation Ambition Matrix developed by Geoff Tuff and Bansi Nagji in
2012. Their HBR article suggested that only 10 percent of innovation efforts
should aim for transformation, compared to a whopping 70 percent in the
core, and 20 percent toward adjacent efforts in between. But given the pace
and degree of change since then, this 70-20-10 ratio has been updated to
50-30-20 today.
Expanding the terrain of behavioral problems is not advocating to only
swing for the fences. On the contrary, its intent is to broaden our view of what
is possible rather than what is in or out, good or bad. “Small” interventions
can be enormously powerful in their own right, and in some cases a cluster
of individual efforts can create the conditions for large-scale impact.
The one thing we absolutely know about the future is that we’ll be wrong.
But the combination of design and behavioral science is actually unusually,
20%
if not uniquely, qualified to shine a light toward designing for the future.
Our ancestors were just as “predictably irrational” as we are, and these cognitive
30% heuristics and biases will persist into the future even if they manifest differently
as contexts change. By partnering with design and framing behavioral science
as a speculative tool, in addition to an evidence-based one, we can collectively
50% better envision the new, in addition to testing the known.
Thanks to co-conspirator Sarah Reid (@Sarah_Reid_PhD).
Full article at http://behavioralscientist.org/a-new-model-for-integrating-behavioral-science-and-design/

#5 in a series—Perspectives on Behavioral Design © RUTH SCHMIDT 2019