Behavioral Science

Why do people often behave irrationally or make decisions that aren’t in their best interest? What drives people to stay in unhealthy relationships? Engage in behaviors that are detrimental to their health? Make purchases they can’t really afford? These kinds of questions have been subjects of scientific inquiry for decades. Behavioral science—the field dedicated to studying human behavior—aims to uncover the complex mechanisms behind our often-perplexing thoughts and actions.

Behavioral science draws insights from multiple disciplines. From psychology to neuroscience, the field derives theories and research methods for understanding and studying the mental processes that affect decision-making. Insights from sociology and anthropology encourage behavioral scientists to consider social context, group dynamics, and cultural factors that shape individual behaviors. Behavioral science even draws from fields like economics, using economic insights to examine why people often fail to make “optimal” financial decisions even when they have all the information and tools needed to do so.¹

Studying behavior through this multidisciplinary lens is key to finding commonalities in the way humans process information, a goal of behavioral science. Behavioral scientists strive to identify broad behavioral patterns to contextualize our reasoning and make predictions about our future behavior.²

These generalizations are not just theoretical but have practical applications as well. Insights from behavioral science are frequently used to inform policies or marketing strategies. For instance, companies might apply behavioral science principles to improve their operations while governments might use insights to design effective interventions in areas such as public health or sustainability.

With countless applications, behavioral science has become integral to addressing societal challenges and promoting positive change in individuals, organizations, and even the world at large.

Behaviorism: An approach to studying human behavior with a focus on observable behavior and its external influences rather than internal mental states. Behaviorism views behavior as a response to environmental stimuli, emphasizing that humans learn by interacting with the environment.

Cognitive Biases: Systematic errors in thinking that distort our perception of reality and cause us to make decisions that could be considered irrational or not in our best interest. Behavioral scientists have discovered several cognitive biases that describe how the brain processes information using mental shortcuts or heuristics in predictable patterns.

Applied Behavioral Science: A specific field of study that explores the use of behavioral science to understand and influence behavior in a real-world setting. This practical application of behavioral science involves identifying barriers to specific behaviors—like recycling or filing taxes on time—and designing research-based interventions to address these barriers.

Behavioral Design: A method for influencing behaviors and habits by applying insights from behavioral science to the field of design.³ While traditional design often focuses on aesthetics or functionality, behavioral design aims to influence user behavior. For example, Netflix and Spotify leverage behavioral science principles to personalize their content and boost engagement.

Nudges: Subtle interventions designed to alter people’s behavior in a predictable way without limiting their freedom of choice. For instance, calendar apps on your phone may send you a reminder when you need to leave to make it to your appointment on time. Nudges are a common use of applied behavioral science in various fields, including public policy, health, finance, and environmental conservation.

Behavioral Economics: The combination of economics and behavioral science concerned with understanding the factors that influence financial decision-making. The field seeks to explain why people’s decisions often deviate from the assumptions of traditional economic models.

Philosophers have been pondering about human behavior for thousands of years, but the scientific study of decision-making is a relatively recent development.

The practice of studying behavioral science can be traced back to the early 20th century when psychologist John B. Watson established behaviorism as a psychological school of thought. Watson argued that behavior is determined by environmental stimuli and therefore should be studied by focusing on observable behavior rather than internal mental states. He suggested psychology should follow in the footsteps of the natural sciences and advocated for objective experimentation within the field—to discover generalizable techniques for predicting and controlling behavior.⁴

Behaviorism evolved in the mid-20th century with contributions from other notable psychologists like B.F. Skinner.⁵ Skinner’s experiments on operant conditioning and reinforcement provided insight into how behaviors can be reinforced or punished to influence their likelihood of recurring in the future.

As a school of thought, behaviorism took center stage for several decades. However, its emphasis on observable behavior drew criticism for its inability to explain complex mental processes. This led to the cognitive revolution of the 1950s and 60s, which marked a shift in psychology where researchers began considering the role of internal mental processes like perception, memory, and decision-making in behavior.

Interest in human behavior grew further by integrating insights from economics, neuroscience, and sociology. The emergence of behavioral economics in the 1970s, led by pioneers like Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, revolutionized our understanding of decision-making under uncertainty, particularly by exploring cognitive biases.

Modern behavioral science incorporates insights from these cognitive perspectives as well as elements from multiple other disciplines, including sociology, anthropology, and economics. Today, behavioral science is largely focused on human behavior in the context of complex social systems and the value of practical applications. Researchers are increasingly exploring the use of behavioral science to tackle global challenges like public health issues and economic inequality.⁶

Even more recently, researchers have started studying the application of behavioral science in designing AI systems that accurately model our human decision-making processes.⁷ This is a fascinating area of research that is likely to grow as AI programs become increasingly integrated into decision-making processes across various industries.

John B. Watson: American psychologist who popularized the field of behaviorism in the early 20th century. He famously stated that he could take any child and raise them to be any type of specialist, arguing that a child’s environment is the key factor that shapes behaviors. Watson is also known for his unethical “Little Albert” experiments in which he demonstrated how fears could be conditioned.

B.F. Skinner: Expanding on Watson’s work on behaviorism, Skinner developed the theory of operant conditioning to explain how the consequences of a behavior can influence that behavior. He invented the “Skinner Box” to study conditioning in animals under controlled conditions. Skinner is also known for his book Walden Two where he describes a utopian society achieved through the use of behavioral science principles.

Daniel Kahneman: Kahneman was a pioneer in the field of behavioral economics. His research on cognitive biases has had a far-reaching impact in advancing modern applications of behavioral science. Kahneman’s book Thinking, Fast and Slow popularized these concepts for a general audience and played a role in bringing behavioral science to the field of economics.

Amos Tversky: Influential psychologist who worked with Kahneman on behavioral models and cognitive biases to understand how people make decisions under uncertainty. Tversky played a key role in demonstrating how people’s behaviors often diverge from the predictions of traditional economic models that assume people always behave with perfect rationality.

Behavioral science has seemingly limitless applications. Insights from the field are helping us understand how we make decisions about our health, work, finances, relationships, hobbies, and pretty much everything we do. More specifically, here are some key ways behavioral science is making significant contributions to the world:

• Public Policy: Governments use behavioral science findings to combat problems like poverty, air pollution, discrimination, highway safety, occupational health, climate change, and COVID-19 through the use of nudges, mandates, and other policies.⁸
• Consumer Behavior: Businesses apply behavioral science to influence the decisions consumers make when shopping for goods and services. This area of behavioral science seeks to understand consumer purchasing patterns and the factors that influence people’s buying decisions.
• Organizational Behavior: Behavioral science is often applied in organizational settings to determine what motivates employees. For instance, businesses can use these insights to encourage employee engagement in well-being programs that boost productivity.⁹
• Healthcare Interventions: Behavioral science has made significant contributions in addressing public health challenges by implementing research-based behavior change techniques, though experts assert that these techniques are currently underutilized.¹⁰
• Finance: Financial institutions may implement nudges to help clients avoid cognitive biases and make financial decisions with long-term benefits.
• Insurance: Insurance companies often use similar nudges to impact how customers think about insurance by targeting biases associated with risk perception and loss aversion.
• Cybersecurity: Behavioral science is critical in understanding why people engage in risky online behaviors—like using weak passwords or clicking suspicious links in emails—and coming up with interventions that promote better cybersecurity practices.

We could go on and on about the applications of behavioral science, but these are just a few of the most common areas where human behavior research has shaped our lives. Still, behavioral science is an evolving field. As you’ll see in the following section, there is a lot of room for improvement in areas of behavioral science research and application.

Before we dive into critiques of the field, it’s important to remember that behavioral science is more complex and context-dependent than simplistic explanations of behavioral phenomena might have you believe. Many of the following criticisms have to do with the oversimplification or misapplication of behavioral science, especially in contexts where a nuanced understanding of behavior is required. 

At The Decision Lab, we strongly believe in the power of behavioral science to drive meaningful change—but like anything, it needs to be done right. Careful, context-driven research and tailored application of behavioral science principles are essential for harnessing their full potential to tackle real-world challenges.

Issues with Behavioral Science Research

One of the most significant areas of controversy has to do with how behavioral science research is conducted, presented, and applied. Some critics note that the field, while making significant contributions to our understanding of human behavior, can still feel somewhat theoretical. This sentiment is echoed by behavioral scientist Michael Hallsworth in A manifesto for applying behavioural science.¹ He explains that researchers are constantly deliberating over findings, theories, and assumptions—if you explore the literature yourself, you may wonder how some of these complex or conceptual behavioral frameworks apply to your day-to-day life. Sometimes it’s not clear when certain cognitive biases apply or what factors influence their impact on behavior.

This, along with the complexity of studying human behavior, makes behavioral science theories difficult to study or replicate.¹¹ When theories are challenging to replicate, they’re also difficult to disprove, so ideas are sometimes perpetuated even when there is limited evidence of their reliability or validity.¹

Author Merle van den Akker further critiques the current behavioral science system in response to Hallsworth’s manifesto.¹³ She argues that scientists may be encouraged to focus on discovering new biases to conform to trends in academia that ensure publication. Similarly, some researchers worry that the pressure to publish positive results (publication bias) is causing insignificant findings to be underreported, potentially inflating the effects of some behavioral science interventions like nudges.¹⁴

The risk of all this is that findings could be applied too broadly or to situations where they might not be effective. Hallsworth argues that presenting people with lists of biases may make them overconfident that addressing a single cognitive bias or a problematic thought process will solve a problem. Overall, the usefulness of applying behavioral science in real-world contexts calls for a focus on practical theories based on testable hypotheses.

Neglect of Social Context

Much of behavioral science research neglects the social context in which behavior takes place. Research conducted using randomized controlled trials aims to remove the social and cultural context from experimentation, which limits the generalizability of findings and makes it difficult to see what would happen if policies were implemented at scale.⁶ In the case of observational, real-world studies, much of these take place in Western societies, overlooking the potential impact of other cultures or social norms on behavior. This is something to keep in mind when applying behavioral science findings in a real-world context.

Behavioral Public Policy

Recently, policymakers have been jumping at the opportunity to apply behavioral science to public sector activities like regulation and taxation. While this can have beneficial results, there are important risks to consider. One serious concern is that behavioral public policy could potentially threaten democracy by dismissing people’s opinions as biases rather than valid rational preferences.⁶ This risks giving policy-makers more power to pursue their own goals, creating a “politics of expertise” in which policy decisions are based on expert knowledge rather than public opinion.

Ethical Concerns

Perhaps one of the most significant concerns about behavioral science is the ethics of using psychological principles to influence people’s behavior. It’s one thing to suggest that people brush their teeth every day or bike to work instead of driving, but exposing people to subtle nudges designed to influence their behavior outside of their awareness could be seen as manipulation. In policy-making, for example, nudges are less visible than outright suggestions and thus less likely to become the topic of debates or criticisms. Ensuring these kinds of interventions are designed ethically could benefit from ethical review boards and public discussions.

We’ve provided several broad examples illustrating how behavioral science is applied today. Here’s a more detailed look at the use of interventions based on behavioral science to understand the spread of misinformation on social media—a particularly hot topic during COVID-19. 

In 2022, the Observatory of Public Sector Innovation, in partnership with Impact Canada, launched a study to assess the impact of interventions on people’s intentions to share false news headlines about COVID-19.¹² This randomized controlled trial involved 1,872 participants across Canada. In the experimental group, participants were exposed to one of two behavioral interventions:

• An accuracy evaluation prompt: Participants were presented with a neutral headline and asked to rate its accuracy. 
• Digital media literacy tips: Participants were presented with a list of tips like “investigate the source,” “check the evidence,” and “look at other reports.”

After these interventions, all groups were presented with 14 COVID-19 headlines (from a mix of true and false news stories) and asked how likely they were to share these headlines on social media. 

Both groups receiving behaviorally informed interventions were less likely to share false headlines than the control group. More specifically, the digital media literacy tips intervention reduced the sharing of false headlines 3.5 times more than the accuracy prompt intervention. Overall, people receiving the tips were 21% less likely to want to share fake news headlines than people receiving no interventions at all.

This study demonstrates a fantastic use of behavioral science techniques to target a serious problem without relying on manipulation or limiting people’s freedom of choice.

Behavioral Science Companies

Behavioral science companies specialize in bridging the gap between behavioral science research and practical, real-world applications. These companies often work with organizations to develop behavioral interventions that nudge people toward better decisions. Check out this article to learn more about what they do and the positive impact they can have on organizations big and small.

Building Better with BehSci: Collaborating Toward Sustainable and Affordable Housing

With Canadian home prices continuously rising, behavioral science has the potential to help us create more affordable—and sustainable—housing. This article explores how we could apply behavioral science techniques like incentives, nudges, and social proof to communicate the benefits of sustainable practices in making homes more affordable.

1. Hallsworth, M. (2023). A manifesto for applying behavioral science. Nature Human Behaviour, 7(3), 310-322. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-023-01555-3 
2. Sanders, M., Snijders, V., & Hallsworth, M. (2018). Behavioural science and policy: where are we now and where are we going? Behavioural Public Policy, 2(2), 144–167. https://doi.org/10.1017/bpp.2018.17 
3. Interaction Design Foundation - IxDF. (2017, June 29). What is Behavioral Design? https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/topics/behavioral-design 
4. Hayes, L. J., & Fryling, M. J. (2015). A Historical Perspective on the Future of Behavior Science. The Behavior Analyst, 38(2), 149-161. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40614-015-0030-9
5. National Research Council. (1988). Introduction. In The Behavioral and Social Sciences: Achievements and Opportunities. National Academies Press (US). https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK546488/ 
6. Straßheim, H. (2020). The Rise and Spread of Behavioral Public Policy: An Opportunity for Critical Research and Self-Reflection. The International Review of Public Policy, 2(1), 115-128. https://doi.org/10.4000/irpp.897 
7. McIlroy-Young, R., Sen, S., Kleinberg, J., & Anderson, A. (2020). Aligning superhuman AI with human behavior: Chess as a model system. In Proceedings of the 26th ACM SIGKDD International Conference on Knowledge Discovery & Data Mining (pp. 1677–1687). Association for Computing Machinery. https://doi.org/10.1145/3394486.3403219 
8. Sunstein, C. R. (2020). Behavioral Science and Public Policy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
9. Juba, O. O. (2024). Impact of Workplace Safety, Health, and Wellness Programs on Employee Engagement and Productivity. International Journal of Health, Medicine and Nursing Practice, 6(4), 12–27. https://doi.org/10.47941/ijhmnp.1819 
10. Altieri, E., Grove, J., Davies, O. L., Habersaat, K. B., Okeibunor, J., Samhouri, D., & Bezbaruah, S. (2021). Harnessing the power of behavioural science to improve health. Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 99(11), 754. https://doi.org/10.2471/BLT.21.287375 
11. Skinner, B. F. (1953). Science and human behavior. B.F. Skinner Foundation. https://www.bfskinner.org/newtestsite/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/ScienceHumanBehavior.pdf 
12. Observatory of Public Sector Innovation. (2022, October 19). Misinformation and Disinformation: An international effort using behavioural science to tackle the spread of misinformation. https://oecd-opsi.org/publications/behavioural-science-tackle-misinformation/ 
13. van den Akker, M. (2023, April 12). The systems that keep behavioural science from progressing: A reply to BIT's manifesto. Money on the Mind. https://www.moneyonthemind.org/post/the-systems-that-keep-behavioural-science-form-progressing-a-reply-to-bit-s-manifesto 
14. Maier, M., Bartoš, F., Stanley, T. D., Shanks, D. R., Harris, A. J., & Wagenmakers, E. (2022). No evidence for nudging after adjusting for publication bias. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 119(31), e2200300119. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2200300119