Inside The Nudge Unit is a podcast from The Behavioural Insights Team. Episode 12 looks at recent work from the team in the areas of road safety, online fraud, conflict resolution and synthetic data.

Over the past decade, car crash death rates in the US for pedestrians rose by 36%, even as death rates fell for drivers and passengers. Over a third of San Francisco’s traffic deaths are caused when drivers make left turns and don't see the person in the crosswalk. 

BIT’s Lis Costa is joined by Maximillian Kroner from our US office to discuss a pilot study conducted by BIT on the roads of San Francisco that reduced average speeds of cars approaching potentially dangerous turns by 17%. 

If you’re not familiar with the concept of synthetic data you are not alone but its potential in the fields of behavioural science and policy research is considerable. BIT’s Head of Data Science and Technology Dr Paul Calcraft spoke to BIT’s Aisling Colclough to explain more.

Boko Haram in Nigeria has been conducting a violent campaign against the authorities for many years but increasingly members are turning away from the militant group, expressing remorse and asking to rejoin the society they were previously terrorising. BIT’s Dr Antonio Silva talks about the work the team have been doing to help with this reconciliation and reintegration challenge.

Finally this episode of Inside The Nudge Unit features a project from BIT France looking at how to help protect people from the ever present risk of online fraud. This project was run with and financed by the DITP - France’s Département for Public Transformation. Tom McMinigal from BIT France speaks to BIT’s Andrew Schein about his experience pretending to sell coffee machines through a fake online scam to help teach people how to avoid the actual ones. 

More information can be found on our website www.bi.team:

Road safety: https://www.bi.team/blogs/dangerous-left-turns-slow-by-17-in-traffic-study-leveraging-behavioral-science/

Synthetic data: https://www.bi.team/blogs/accelerating-public-policy-research-with-easier-safer-synthetic-data/

Peacebuilding: https://www.bi.team/blogs/can-mass-media-reduce-violent-conflict/

Online fraud: https://www.modernisation.gouv.fr/publications/comment-mieux-proteger-le-consommateur-des-fraudes-lachat-en-ligne-la-ditp-mobilise

Inside The Nudge Unit is a production of the Behavioural Insights Team

Editing and sound design is by Andy Hetherington of Studio Gibbon: https://www.facebook.com/thestudiogibbon/

Producer is Rich O’Brien

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