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Learn how to change behavior.

The world's largest collection of resources and data on behavioral science.

Tactics that change behavior

Depression rating

TACTICS

Depression rating

Depression rating simply refers to having someone rate their mood. Often, this may be an informal method like a smiley-face based Lickert scale or choosing a word from a list, rather than using a standardized instrument like the Beck Depression Inventory.‍

Behavioral Activation (BA)

TACTICS

Behavioral Activation (BA)

Behavioral activation is a therapeutic approach that typically pairs activity scheduling with either monitoring tools or goal-setting. For example, someone might aim to balance activities they "should" do but underperform, like self-care behaviors, with activities they enjoy. Users of this technique may also track which activities cause certain cognitions or affective states, like those associated with depression.‍

Coaching or Counselling

TACTICS

Coaching or Counselling

Coaching or counselling here refers to having a trained person provide guidance to someone attempting a behavior. Many mental health and lifestyle programs utilize coaching in various forms, including phone calls, video chat, text messaging, or in-person sessions. Some programs have replaced some or all of these traditionally human-delivered touchpoints with AI or rules-based interactions.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

TACTICS

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is a therapuetic approach to improving mental and behavioral health. The core philosophy is that behavior can be modified by noticing and correcting patterns in thought that influence the behavior. Modern CBT is typically associated with Albert Ellis and Alan Beck.The structured and rules-based nature of CBT have made it a popular candidate for digital interventions and application by lightly-trained or even untrained practitioners.

Education or Information

TACTICS

Education or Information

Education refers to empowering a person with more knowledge or training than they had previously. While providing information alone is often a suboptimal way to drive meaningful behavior change or long-term interventions, the right message at the right time can be a powerful part of a behavior change strategy.‍

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

TACTICS

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

ACT is a therapeutic approach originalled developed by Steven Hayes. It borrows from previous concepts like cognitive behavioral therapy and Morita therapy. The principles of ACT are fairly systematic and lend themselves well to program design, finding empirical support in adaptations like 2morrow's smoking cessation and pain management interventions.‍

Behavioral Economics

TACTICS

Behavioral Economics

Behavioral economics is the exploration of how people make consequential decisions where psychological and sociological factors may influence the outcome or process. It is often considered the fusion of economics and psychology (which itself was an interdisciplinary field entailing medicine and philosophy). The exploration of psychological factors in economic decision-making, including deviation from rationality, traces well back to classical and neoclassical economics (i.e. Gabriel Tarde, Wilfredo Pareto, and John Maynard Keynes) and prior to psychology becoming a formal discipline. Behavioral economics is often associated with behavior change tactics like smart defaults, reducing friction or barriers, increasing salience, incentives, active choice, and commitment devices.‍

Covert Learning

TACTICS

Covert Learning

Covert learning refers to imparting educational information into non-traditional methods of delivery. For example, a film where someone learns cognitive behavioral therapy techniques or receives training on body-weight fitness exercises may teach someone how to do these (or at least generally what they are). People may also learn the consequences of a behavior through watching someone else experience them, and this concept (viarious experience) is a key component of Bandura's social cognitive theory.

Research on behavior change

PAPERS

Randomized Controlled Pilot Study Testing Use of Smartphone Technology for Obesity Treatment

PRODUCT

Lose It!

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity, Diet & Nutrition

TACTICS

Education or Information, Reminders, Cues, & Triggers, Self-Monitoring or Tracking, Social Support, Feedback

PAPERS

Physical activity with spiritual strategies intervention: a cluster randomized trial with older African American women.

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity

TACTICS

Spirituality

PAPERS

The effects of a multimodal intervention trial to promote lifestyle factors associated with the prevention of cardiovascular disease in menopausal and postmenopausal Australian women.

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity

PAPERS

The PULSE (Prevention Using LifeStyle Education) trial protocol: a randomised controlled trial of a Type 2 Diabetes Prevention programme for men.

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity, Diet & Nutrition

PAPERS

Continuous glucose monitoring counseling improves physical activity behaviors of individuals with type 2 diabetes: A randomized clinical trial.

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity, Disease Management

PAPERS

A Digital Diabetes Prevention Program (Transform) for Adults With Prediabetes: Secondary Analysis

PRODUCT

Transform

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity, Diet & Nutrition

PAPERS

The program for rheumatic independent self-management: a pilot evaluation.

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity

PAPERS

Nutrition education worksite intervention for university staff: application of the health belief model.

BEHAVIOR

Diet & Nutrition

PAPERS

Increasing screening mammography in asymptomatic women: evaluation of a second-generation, theory-based program.

BEHAVIOR

Other