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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

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.‍

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.‍

Checklists

TACTICS

Checklists

Checklists are an age-old tactic for remembering to do certain tasks. Checklists are sometimes used to measure behaviors that should take place with a certain frequency, e.g. every day or X times per week, and other times, to ensure certain steps are followed every time a person does a complex behavior.For behavior designers, the challenges of checklists often entail choosing the right behaviors, breaking them down to the correct level of granularity for a given population, and serving them up in the proper context or sometimes with personalization. They are likely underutilized and consistently improve the performance of even experts, like pilots and surgeons.

Active Choice

TACTICS

Active Choice

Active choice, sometimes referred to as enhanced active choice or forced choice, refers to removing default options and often increasing the salience of potential decisions through emphasizing the consequences of one or more of the options. Coined by Punam Anand Keller and colleagues in 2011, it was originally intended to address concerns around paternalistic nudging for use in situations where forcing the default option may be considered unethical. In one of the original studies, CVS customers were given the choice to enroll in automatic refills of medications via delivery. The choices they were presented were ""Enroll in refills at home"" vs “I Prefer to Order my Own Refills.”‍

Change Effort

TACTICS

Change Effort

Changing effort refers to modifying the difficulty, or sometimes perceived difficulty, of a behavior in order to change its likelihood of occurrence. This often entails making a behavior easier by reducing its intensity or frequency. This is a tactic advocated by BJ Fogg’s model of behavior change.

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.

Behavior Substitution

TACTICS

Behavior Substitution

Behavior substitution refers to attempting to eliminate a problematic behavior by replacing it with another one. Often, the substituted behaviors are intended to have similar sensory qualities (e.g. drink flavored sparkling water instead of soda). The goal is typically to disassociate the original behavior from its cue, enabling the more positive behavior to be triggered automatically.‍

Clawback Incentives

TACTICS

Clawback Incentives

Clawback incentives refer to a framing effect applied to rewards where participants are intended to experience losing the reward via noncompliance rather than accruing it for successful performance of the behavior.For example, a hypertension management program may credit its participants $200 at the beginning of the month, and reduce or "claw back" the amount by $3 each time the patient does not take their medication. The alternative would be starting the month at zero or the previous ballance and adding $3 each time the patient takes the medication.

Research on behavior change

PAPERS

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

PRODUCT

Transform

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity, Diet & Nutrition

PAPERS

Enhancing the effectiveness of community stroke risk screening: a randomized controlled trial.

BEHAVIOR

Other

PAPERS

Designing prenatal care messages for low-income Mexican women.

BEHAVIOR

Other

TACTICS

Education or Information

PAPERS

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

BEHAVIOR

Diet & Nutrition

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

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

Pathway to health: cluster-randomized trial to increase fruit and vegetable consumption among smokers in public housing.

BEHAVIOR

Diet & Nutrition

TACTICS

Motivational Interviewing

PAPERS

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

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity

TACTICS

Spirituality

PAPERS

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

BEHAVIOR

Physical Activity, Disease Management