In this grooving session, Kurt and Tim share how to conduct a behavioral diagnosis. A behavioral diagnosis is a tool we use to uncover the underlying drivers of behavior inside an organization to bring about meaningful change, all with the use of applied behavioral science. Kurt and Tim have been conducting behavioral diagnoses for many years and have found that leaders often don’t understand why their employees behave the way they do – particularly when it comes to employees response to changes in the workplace.  Leaders all too often expect announcements of corporate changes will be met by rational responses from the employees. However, people are not always rational, and to make things more difficult, don’t understand their own motivational drives. This renders surveys and employee satisfaction studies irrelevant because theses tools don’t get to the heart of the behavioral beast. In order understand the drivers of employee behavior, you must go below the surface. That’s where the behavioral diagnosis comes in. The process of a behavioral diagnostic varies from situation to situation, but typically begins with identifying the key strategic objectives through interview key stakeholders (leadership, typically). Then we research the status quo: what is the culture, what programs are in place, what are the current behaviors of the employees and why are they doing those things? Next we conduct interviews and/or focus groups to get at the underlying motivational drives of the employees. After a complete analysis of trends and available data, Kurt and Tim make recommendations to the leaders and develop interventions to bring about change. If you’re interested in learning more about a Behavioral Diagnosis for your organization, please contact us so we can start a conversation. © 2020 Behavioral Grooves Kurt Nelson: @WhatMotivates Tim Houlihan: @THoulihan Links “A Battle Between Sales & Marketing” by Tim Houlihan: https://www.behavioralchemy.com/the-battle-between-sales-and-marketing

Kurt and Tim are producing a new podcast called Weekly Grooves, launching January 31, 2020. Weekly Grooves is the weekly podcast that offers insights into the headlines through a behavioral lens. Kurt and Tim will be applying their more than 40 years of combined experience in behavioral work to give the headlines more relevance and meaning. We are going to put more meat in your sauce! Check it on Podbean or wherever you get your favorite podcasts. We want YOU to be one of first the Weekly Grooves listeners. And we're giving away a prize to the FIRST person who emails us, tweets us or sends us a message on LinkedIn stating that they listened to Weekly Grooves.  We hope you enjoy!

Stephen Martin and Joe Marks, PhD dive deep into one of the most important eye-openers about communication in our world today: the importance of WHO delivers the message. Their book, “Messengers: Who We Listen To, Who We Don’t, and Why,” is a major revamp on the claim made by Marshall McLuhan in 1964 that, “The Medium IS the Message.” While Steve and Joe are hard-pressed to say McLuhan’s refrain is dead, it’s being outsized by a more contemporary and relevant one: “The Messenger IS the Message.” In our conversation with Steve and Joe, we discussed the way they’ve broken down their research and organized their book. The first section is on what they refer to as Hard Messenger Traits: Socio-Economic Position, Competence, Dominance, and Attractiveness. The second section works its way through the Soft Messenger Traits: Warmth, Vulnerability, Trustworthiness, and Charisma.  Their comments deconstruct how motivated reasoning is more than just aligning our tolerance for untruth with our desires; more importantly, it’s an alignment with the person who is expressing our desires. To illustrate this point, they asked UK voters if they thought that Boris Johnson lied about Brexit. Seventy-five percent agreed that he did. Then the researchers asked if the voters still considered Johnson trustworthy. For “Leavers,” the lies no impact on his trustworthiness. He wasn’t tainted because his lies served the voters’ underlying goals. While there are decades of psychological research on the impact the messenger has on the message, no one has synthesized it into a single narrative as Joe and Steve have. It’s an excellent read and we found our discussion with them filled with anecdotal gems and slightly uncomfortable laughter. It’s also worth noting that Steve is a co-author with Robert Cialdini, PhD on several great papers their groundbreaking book on persuasion. We hope you enjoy our conversation with Joe and Steve.  © 2020 Behavioral Grooves    Links Stephen Martin, PhD: @scienceofyes Joe Marks, PhD: @joemarks13 “Messengers: Who We Listen To, Who We Don’t, and Why”: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/43522604 Robert Cialdini, PhD: https://www.robertcialdinibf.com/ “YES: 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive”: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2208661.Yes_?from_search=true&qid=Tk8IuivDSr&rank=1 John Henry Marks, MD: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Marks_(doctor) “I’m not a doctor, but I play one on TV”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ts0XG6qDIco   Musical Links Bettye Swann: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8iSfknnMfc Otis Redding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTVjnBo96Ug Prince: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXJhDltzYVQ ELO “Electric Light Orchestra”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQUlA8Hcv4s The Beatles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Q_ZzBGPdqE New Order: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYH8DsU2WCk The Baseballs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DM2177pHMT0 Joy Division: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dBt3mJtgJc Ed Sheeran: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymjNGjuBCTo Adel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08DjMT-qR9g Aretha Franklin “Think”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqYnevHibaI Aretha Franklin “Respect”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FOUqQt3Kg0 Right Said Fred “I’m Too Sexy”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5mtclwloEQ AC/DC “Back in Black”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoMLhnvV-yM

Melina Palmer is the host of The Brainy Business podcast and she has dedicated her career to seeking answers to these questions for herself and her clients. Melina uses behavioral economics to help everyone from global corporations to entrepreneurs understand the psychology of why people buy, unlocking the secrets of small changes that make a big difference via her podcast, public speaking, and column on Inc.com. The result is messaging, branding, advertisements, pricing and products that are more “brain-friendly” (meaning more leads, conversions, and revenue). Our conversation with Melina covered the anchoring effect and what a powerful tool it can be for both sellers and buyers alike. We also chatted about her John Mayer playlist on Pandora and some of the things she’s doing to make the world a better place through the education of behavioral economics and neuroscience. Kurt and Tim are also announcing our newest podcast, Weekly Grooves, which will be launching shortly, and we hope you’ll check it out. Groove idea for the week: What are you doing to integrate the anchoring effect into your business or your personal life? © 2020 Behavioral Grooves   Links Brainy Business Website: https://www.thebrainybusiness.com Melina’s INC.com articles: https://www.inc.com/author/melina-palmer Melina’s Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thebrainybiz/ Melina’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thebrainybiz/ Melina’s YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/thebrainybusiness Melina’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/thebrainybiz Melina’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melina-palmer-36ab8712/ Melina’s John Mayer Playlist: https://pandora.app.link/UrWQ28B6l3 Anchoring Effect: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anchoring Decoy Effect: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decoy_effect Ran Kivetz, PhD: https://www8.gsb.columbia.edu/cbs-directory/detail/rk566 Katy Milkman’s Fresh Start Habit: https://magazine.wharton.upenn.edu/digital/katherine-milkmans-fresh-start-study-becomes-perennial-media-favorite/ Counterfactual Thinking: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfactual_thinking Seattle Mariners: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_Mariners Audacity (digital audio workstation): https://www.audacityteam.org/ George Loewenstein, PhD: https://www.cmu.edu/dietrich/sds/people/faculty/george-loewenstein.html    Musical Links Gene Autry “Back in the Saddle”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSqcxFGFVas John Mayer: https://www.johnmayer.com/ Michael Bublé: https://www.michaelbuble.com/ Lady Antebellum: https://www.ladyantebellum.com/ Miranda Lambert: https://www.mirandalambert.com/ Patsy Cline: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patsy_Cline Christina Perri: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christina_Perri US National Anthem: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Star-Spangled_Banner Tom Petty: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Petty Damien Rice: https://damienrice.com/ Red Hot Chili Peppers: https://redhotchilipeppers.com/ Ella Fitzgerald “Mac the Knife: Ella in Berlin 1960”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iR1__k-BxhY Steely Dan “Gaucho”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaucho_(album) Beatles “Abbey Road”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abbey_Road Beatles “Sargent Pepper”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sgt._Pepper%27s_Lonely_Hearts_Club_Band Iron & Wine: http://ironandwine.com/ Dessa: https://www.dessawander.com/

Too often, in our estimation, people make recommendations to us with the intent to improve our life but the effect on us is the opposite of that. Rather than completely engaging us, some recommendations or pieces of advice actually overpower any enthusiasm we might for following up. This is especially true when the recommendation is too big to get our heads around. Casual comments like, “Oh, you should read that book,” or, “You should go to Malaysia,” or, “You should check out that podcast series,” are often too much for us to process. They’re all well-intended, and could be terrific recommendations, but thinking about starting a massive new book in an already jam-packed life can be the opposite of engaging: sometimes, it’s demotivating.    So in this Grooving Session, we use a behavioral science hack to START SMALL and we’re recommending our favorite podcast episodes (produced by other podcasters!) to our listeners. We think you’ll like these specific podcast episodes by some of our favorite hosts on some of our favorite topics. And because they’re itty-bitty single episodes, we hope you can start small and check some of them out in the links below. Coming soon! We are launching a new podcast (a new channel in the podcaster’s vernacular) and it’s called Weekly Grooves. Weekly Grooves will be a weekly review of topical issues in the media during the week done through a behavioral science commentary. This will launch in late January 2020, and we hope you’ll check it out. Please take 23 seconds right now to give us a rating. A review only takes 57 seconds, so you can do that, too! Reviews and 5-star ratings play a positive role in getting Behavioral Grooves promoted to new listeners when they’re out browsing for an interesting behavioral science podcast. As always, thanks for listening and we hope you enjoy lots of great episodes from other podcasters!   Happiness Lab: Laurie Santos, PhD. Make ‘Em Laugh. https://www.happinesslab.fm/season-1-episodes/make-em-laugh Canned laugh tracks positively affect our experience even when we KNOW they’re canned! Great production and a cool person.   Choiceology: Katy Milkman, PhD. Take the Deal. https://www.schwab.com/resource-center/insights/content/choiceology-season-4-episode-4 Danny Kahneman, Colin Camerer, and Luis Green tell the tales of our flawed decision making – even when the consequences are big! Terrific interviewer. Great production.   Big Brains: Paul Rand. Why Talking to Strangers Will Make You Happier. https://news.uchicago.edu/podcasts/big-brains/why-talking-strangers-will-make-you-happier-nicholas-epley Nick Epley, PhD discussed the importance of talking to strangers and how it will make YOU happier.   Intelligence Squared U.S. Debates: John Donvan. Is Social Media Good for Democracy? https://www.intelligencesquaredus.org/debates/social-media-good-democracy-0 Fascinating discussion about the pro’s and con’s of social media.   The David Gilmour Podcast: David Gilmour. The Fender Stratocaster #0001. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-3-the-fender-stratocaster-0001/id1463321559?i=1000441421346 Yes. It really does exist and David Gilmour owns it and cherishes it.   You Are Not So Smart: David McRaney. Pluralistic Ignorance: The psychology behind why people don’t speak out against, and even defend, norms they secretly despise. https://soundcloud.com/youarenotsosmart/157-pluralistic-ignorance A terrific episode exploring how social norms are perpetuated even when the majority don’t agree with them.   Song Exploder: Hrishikesh Hirway. Sheryl Crow: Redemption Day. http://songexploder.net/sheryl-crow/songexploder161-sherylcrow How songwriters come to write and record songs is amazing to me and this is a very articulate songwriter.   O Behave: Ogilvy Consulting. Dollars and Sense. https://podtail.com/en/podcast/o-behave/episode-16-dollars-and-sense-with-jeff-kreisler-an/ Jeff Kreisler (one of our favorites) and Rory Sutherland dig into Jeff’s work in behavioral finance.   Radio Lab: Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich. Smarty Plants. https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/smarty-plants This episode explores the amazingly brainy behaviors of brainless things: plants!   Happiness Lab: Laurie Santos, PhD. The Unhappy Millionaire https://www.happinesslab.fm/season-1-episodes/the-unhappy-millionaire This episode explores how we don’t really understand what makes us happy…with Dan Gilbert    The Knowledge Project: Shane Parrish. Neil Pasricha: Happy Habits https://fs.blog/neil-pasricha/ Looks at habits that can make you happier or not   The Science of Success: Matt Bodner. Guest = Jonathan Haidt https://www.successpodcast.com/show-notes/2018/9/12/three-dangerous-ideas-that-are-putting-our-society-at-risk-with-dr-jonathan-haidt Three dangerous ideas that are putting our society at risk – Looking at the anti-fragile movement that Haidt looks at how we need to allow Coddling the American Mind.  Overprotecting kids and not letting them have failures…question feelings   Hustle and Flowchart Podcast: Matt Wolfe and Joe Fier. Therapy Session (153) – T&C, Podfest, Selling Shirts and Affiliate Marketing https://evergreenprofits.com/therapy-sessions-podfest-affiliate/ Matt and Joe discuss a number of things that have been going on with them and some insights on podcasting     Smart Drug Smarts: Jesse Lawler. Aphantasia with Dr. Joel Pearson https://smartdrugsmarts.com/episodes/219-aphantasia/ Where Kurt found out about Aphantasia and realized that he had it.   Hidden Brain: Shanker Vedantam. Facts Aren’t Enough https://www.npr.org/2019/07/18/743195213/facts-arent-enough-the-psychology-of-false-beliefs A look at confirmation bias and how data doesn’t change our minds…Tali Sharot and Cailin O’Conner add insight (smallpox variolation)   Big Think Think Again: Jason Gotz. Cambridge Analytica whistleblower Christopher Wylie: the cognitive segregation of America https://bigthink.com/podcast/cambridge-analytica © 2020 Behavioral Grooves  

Rory Sutherland is a British advertising executive who became fascinated with behavioral science. Between his TED talks, books and articles, he has become one of the field’s greatest proponents. Rory is currently the Executive Creative Director of OgilvyOne, after gigs as vice-chairman of Ogilvy Group UK and co-founder of the Behavioural Sciences Practice, part of the Ogilvy & Mather group of companies. He is the author of The Spectator’s The Wiki Man column and his most recent book, which we highly recommend, is Alchemy: The Dark Art and Curious Science of Creating Magic in Brands, Business, and Life. We started our discussion with Rory by asking him about his new book and some of his insights from it. His approach to advertising, marketing and product design is informed by his ability to look for the things that aren’t there. He once described a solution to improving customer satisfaction on the Chunnel Train between London and Paris by suggesting that a billion dollars would be better spent on supermodel hosts in the cars than on reducing ride time by 15 minutes. He’s a terrifically insightful thinker. Our conversation ran amok of all sorts of rabbit holes, as expected, including ergodicity, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's “The Silver Blaze,” high-end audio and the dietary habits of the world-famous runner, Usain Bolt. In Kurt and Tim’s Grooving Session, we discuss some of our favorite takeaways from Rory’s conversation including, “The Opposite of a Good Idea is a Good Idea” and others. And finally, Kurt teed up the Bonus Track with a final reflection and recap of the key points we discussed. As always, we would be grateful if you would write us a quick review. It helps us get noticed by other folks who are interested in podcasts about behavioral science. It will only take 27 seconds. Thank you, and we appreciate your help.  © 2020 Behavioral Grooves   Links Rory Sutherland: https://ogilvy.co.uk/people/rorys “Alchemy: The Dark Art and Curious Science of Creating Magic in Brands, Business, and Life”: https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062388414/alchemy/ “Friction”: https://www.rogerdooley.com/books/friction/ Murray Gell-Mann, PhD: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Gell-Mann Robin Williams “Scottish Golf”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jx8TzR1-n4Q Don Draper: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Draper Ergodicity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ergodicity John James Cowperthwaite: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_James_Cowperthwaite SatNav: https://www.macmillandictionary.com/us/dictionary/american/satnav Daniel Kahneman, PhD: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Kahneman What You See is All There Is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking,_Fast_and_Slow Arthur Conan-Doyle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Conan_Doyle Sherlock Holmes “Silver Blaze”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_Silver_Blaze Tim Houlihan’s Blog on “Silver Blaze”: https://tinyurl.com/ufumkj6 Ben Franklin T-Test: https://tinyurl.com/wocdsdk Volkswagen Fighter: https://tinyurl.com/qpyqh87 David Ogilvy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Ogilvy_(businessman) Jock Elliot: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2005/dec/01/guardianobituaries.media Battle of Leyte Gulf: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Leyte_Gulf Croft Audio: http://www.croftacoustics.co.uk/main.html Mu-So single speaker: https://www.naimaudio.com/mu-so WFMT Chicago: https://www.wfmt.com/ TK Maxx: https://www.tkmaxx.com/uk/en/ Berlin Hotel with Big Lebowski: https://www.michelbergerhotel.com/en/ Shure: https://www.shure.com/en-US/products/microphones?lpf[top][types][]=microphones Zoom: https://zoom.us/ Satisficing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satisficing Usain Bolt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usain_Bolt Sheena Iyengar, PhD: https://www.sheenaiyengar.com/ Jelly Jar Study: https://tinyurl.com/oo6g6eb Big Band Music: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_band   Musical Links Aretha Franklin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aretha_Franklin Southern California Community Choir: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_California_Community_Choir Abba: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ABBA Felix Mendelssohn: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felix_Mendelssohn George Frideric Handel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Frideric_Handel Johann Sebastian Bach: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Sebastian_Bach Johann Christian Bach: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Christian_Bach  

Jana Gallus, PhD is an Assistant Professor of Strategy and Behavioral Decision Making at UCLA’s Anderson School of Business and our discussion dissected the intersection of behavioral economics, strategy and innovation, by focusing almost exclusively on the way incentives work. This was a terrific conversation for us because Jana revisited the foundation of incentives that is often overlooked in the corporate world: an “incentive” must include a scheme (rules) and a means (rewards). Too often, corporate clients focus on the reward and fail to consider the rules which to earn the reward by. Or vice versa. The rules become overly complicated in an effort to “be fair,” inevitably diluting the results. She also helped us dig deeper into aspects of incentives that are rarely covered, namely these three dimensions: (1) Tangibility, sometimes referred to as the element of an award that is physical and can be re-consumed; (2) Social signal, when combined with tangibility is sometimes referred to as trophy value that we can share with family, friends and co-workers; and (3) the Self signal, which is new to our experience and impacts the effectiveness of the reward-based by how well it aligns with the self-identify of the recipient. Finally, we laughed a lot while we discussed the role that precision plays in incentives and recognition. Frankly, it’s rare that we get to talk to researchers who bring up thought experiments that involve kissing. Jana reminded us how less precision is a key factor in keeping a reward in the realm of recognition. In our Grooving Session, Kurt and Tim cover some of our own war stories and we recap the key points in the Bonus Track – both follow our recording with Jana. © 2019 Behavioral Grooves   Links Jana Gallus, PhD: http://www.janagallus.com/research Jana Gallus, PhD:  jana.gallus@anderson.ucla.edu Uri Gneezy, PhD: https://rady.ucsd.edu/people/faculty/gneezy/ Emma Heikensten, PhD: https://www.emmaheikensten.com/ “Effect of Rewards” paper: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/579e9f8be58c625407391080/t/5c723525f4e1fc9f85bbc327/1550988586355/Gallus%2C+Heikensten.+2019.+Shine+a+Light.pdf Ariely & Heyman “A Tale of Two Markets”: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15482452 Allan Fisk, PhD: https://anthro.ucla.edu/faculty/alan-page-fiske NASA: https://www.nasa.gov/ Scott Jeffrey, PhD: https://www.monmouth.edu/directory/profiles/scott-a-jeffrey/ Etymology of the word “damn”: https://www.etymonline.com/word/damnation   Musical Links Baby Mozart: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7lIvBnc0mo Lang Lang:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZN7XO5pYXqM Milky Chance “Stolen Dance”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iX-QaNzd-0Y The Cure: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cure AFI: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Yzu-4kJg6g Dan Wilson: https://danwilsonmusic.com/music/ Matt Wilson: https://www.minneapolismatt.com/ Raffi: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raffi

The research that Reuben Kline, PhD is working on is focused on climate change mitigation. As an associate professor of political science and the director of the Center for Behavioral Political Economy at Stony Brook University, he is concerned about the actions we’ll take when presented with a list of options to mitigate climate change. Reuben’s research asks which lists are more effective: Long lists (in harmony with neo-classical economic theory to offer lots of choices) or short lists (in harmony with behavioral research on the tyranny of too many options)? He’s also studying the impact of offering people lists of difficult things compared to easy things, or when there’s a mix of both. Would it help the consumer to make trade-offs if there was a variety of effort offered to them? His work reveals some of the complications of how we think about lists of varying length and effort when it comes to climate change mitigation. At one point, we asked Reuben about how he feels when he hears from climate deniers and he noted with a laugh, “I study climate change, so I’m always depressed.” But he was also quick to point out that he’s optimistic about how people respond to some of his research. We should be optimistic, too, with people like Reuben researching these topics. We recorded this conversation at the NoBeC conference at the University of Pennsylvania where Reuben was presenting his findings to the students in the Masters of Norms and Behavior Change program at UPenn. In an alcove beside the main hall, we discussed the behavioral impacts of offering mitigation strategy lists to consumers. And we are grateful to Chris Nave, PhD and Eugen Dimant, PhD for hosting us at the conference. © 2019 Behavioral Grooves   Links Reuben Kline, PhD: https://www.stonybrook.edu/experts/profile/reuben-kline Shanto Iyengar, PhD: https://politicalscience.stanford.edu/people/shanto-iyengar Collective Risk Social Dilemma (The Disaster Game): https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332933221_Collective_Risk_Social_Dilemma_Role_of_information_availability_in_achieving_cooperation_against_climate_change Manfred Milinski, PhD: https://www.weforum.org/people/manfred-milinski Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change: https://www.ipcc.ch/ Free Rider: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-rider_problem Conditional Cooperation: https://scholar.harvard.edu/dtingley/publications/conditional-cooperation-international-organizations-and-climate-change Moral Hazard: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_hazard BJ Fogg: https://www.behaviormodel.org/ James Clear: https://jamesclear.com/ Wendy Wood, PhD: https://dornsife.usc.edu/wendywood Sheena Iyengar, PhD, Jam Study: https://www.sheenaiyengar.com/   Musical Links P Funk All-Stars: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxAcW7zgAD4 Parliament: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjKFCYzqq-A Rick James: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_James Sly and the Family Stone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hj6OyIh7GAI Black Puma’s: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0G383538qzQ The New Mastersounds: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acAIQ6ZG5OI The Bamboos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spG8E0nMLDc Johnny Cash: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_Cash Willie Nelson: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willie_Nelson Hank Williams: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hank_Williams Led Zeppelin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Led_Zeppelin Rolling Stones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rolling_Stones Fela Kuti: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fela_Kuti Huey Lewis and the News: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huey_Lewis_and_the_News

Eugen Dimant, PhD is a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Master of Behavioral and Decision Sciences Department and a Senior Research Fellow at the Identity and Conflict Lab, Political Science Department – both at the University of Pennsylvania. His research is rooted in economics and sits at the crossroads of experimental behavioral economics, behavioral ethics, crime, and corruption, with much of his recent work focusing on the ways “bad apples” (people will malintent) can be thwarted. This is also manifest in his research on behavioral contagion of pro- and anti-social behavior among individuals and groups. Because we met up with him presenting a paper at NoBeC, a social norms conference, we also discussed the role of social norms in pro- and anti-social behaviors. We are inspired by Eugen’s work with social nudges and what can be done to minimize the impact of people who are out to corrupt systems and communities. And, we had a great time talking with this incredibly passionate researcher about his wide variety of interests. We are grateful to Eugen for reaching out to us as we were planning our 100th Episode celebration in Philadelphia. He invited us to the University of Pennsylvania’s NoBeC Conference – the Norms and Behavioral Change Conference – that was happening the same days that we were recording our 100th Episode. Eugen, along with his colleague Chris Nave, PhD, helped us arrange conversations with many researchers and speakers at the conference and we are forever grateful. Finally, we invite you to keep listening after our discussion with Eugen to hear Kurt and Tim’s Grooving Session and then the Bonus Track where we recap the key insights from the episode.    Links Eugen Dimant, PhD: https://www.sas.upenn.edu/lps/graduate/mbds/faculty/eugen-dimant Eugen Dimant research website:https://sites.google.com/view/eugendimant/home Paper 1 (erosion of Norm compliance):https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3355028 Paper 2 (backfiring is nudges):https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3294375 Paper 3 (nudges vs collective behavioral change):https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs11127-019-00684-6 Paper 4 (how beliefs matter in behavioral change):https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3326146 NoBeC (Norms and Behavior Change Conference): https://web.sas.upenn.edu/nobec/ Cristina Bicchieri, PhD: https://upenn.academia.edu/CristinaBicchieri Gary Bolton, PhD: https://personal.utdallas.edu/~gxb122130/ Nudge: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nudge_theory Social Norms: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/social-norms/ Injunctive and Descriptive Norms: https://study.com/academy/lesson/injunctive-and-descriptive-group-norms-definitions-differences-examples.html Pluralistic Ignorance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluralistic_ignorance Peer Effects: https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/applied-and-social-sciences-magazines/peer-effects Coleman’s Boat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGaz0xKG060 Chris Nave, PhD: https://www.sas.upenn.edu/lps/graduate/mbds/contact/christopher-nave Bobo Doll Effect: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobo_doll_experiment Robert Cialdini, PhD: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Cialdini Kiki and Bouba: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bouba/kiki_effect Pollstar: https://www.pollstar.com/    Musical Links Drake: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_(musician) Bushido: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushido_(rapper) U2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U2 Ed Sheeran: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Sheeran Eagles: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eagles_(band) Rolling Stones: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rolling_Stones Fleetwood Mac: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fleetwood_Mac

Imagine that the two drawings below are called Kiki and Bouba in some alien language.  If you had to guess which one was Kiki and which one was Bouba - without any other information, which one would be Kiki, and which one would be Bouba?   If you are like most people, the sharp angular shape (on the left) would be named Kiki while the curvier rounded shape (on the right) would be named Bouba.  This effect is called the Bouba/Kiki effect which highlights how we map sounds to visual shapes and was first observed by Wolfgang Kohler in the late 1920s and then refined in the early 2000s by Vilayanure Ramachandran and Edward Hubbard.   In experiments, over 95% of respondents selected the curvy shape as Bouba and the jagged one as Kiki.  The effect shows that words that have softer, rounded sounds (i.e., oo’s and ah’s) are associated with rounder shapes, while sounds that have more angular, sharp sounds (i.e., k’s and I’s) are associated with more pointed shapes.  While this effect focused on speech and visuals, my colleague and co-host of Behavioral Grooves, Tim Houlihan and I have started to use it as a way to describe how we think.  Some of us think with a “Kiki” like a brain.  Others of us think with a “Bouba” like a brain.  While not perfect, it does help in understanding the differences in how our brains process, retain, and regurgitate information.  For instance, a “Kiki brain” is precise and sharp and can remember specific names, dates, and titles.  While a more “Bouba brain” retains information about the general concepts and impacts but is less precise and more holistic in the combination of ideas and thoughts.   So while Tim can typically recall the name of a behavioral science study, the year it was published, and the author(s) (very much a Kiki brain), Kurt can usually only recall the concept that the study explored, how that concept can be applied, and how it interacts with other behavioral science concepts (more of a Bouba brain).    Often times during the podcast, my Bouba mind will be at a loss for the name of a study or a particular researcher, however, Tim’s Kiki brain will have those names readily available.  On the other side of the coin, Tim will be reciting a specific study and my Bouba brain will instantly go to the nuances of the application of how this works and implications for the people involved.  Of course, like most other ways of describing ourselves, this is not an either/or situation.  I would argue that we all have aspects of Kiki thinking AND Bouba thinking depending on the topic, situation, and other factors (i.e., how much sleep we had the night before).  And no brain is just Kiki or Bouba – we shift between the two on a regular basis.  Like personalities, these descriptions are just the tendencies for the way we think.  For instance, I’m not always at a loss for remembering a study name or researcher nor do I not understand the subtleties or connections from those studies that I do remember.  We fluctuate on a continuum and we often move easily between the thinking styles.  In general, my notion is that Kiki brains are more admired.  Those are the people that I don’t like getting into debates with, because they will bring in facts and figures and names at lightning speed and I’m just trying to stay up and connect the dots.   I need to be on my phone looking up references and facts, while they are seemingly pulling them out of the air.  People with KikI brains come across as smarter and more informed – because they can recall these details whereas people with Bouba brains are left talking about the general proposition.  Kiki brains are not fumbling to remember people’s names, the exact figure for the organization’s budget or the year that the Challenger exploded.  At this point, there is no research that is on this or supports this crazy theory.  However, by naming these types of thinking styles, I think we can better interact with each other and contribute to our work.  The power of this is in helping us understand how we communicate with others and understanding how we process and remember information.       Notes Image:  Monochrome version 1 June 2007 by Bendž Vectorized with Inkscape  Maurer, Pathman, and Modloch (2006), The shape of Boubas: sound-shape correspondences in toddlers and adults.  Developmental Science. Ramachandran, V.S. & Hubbard, E.M. (2001). "Synaesthesia: A window into perception, thought and language" (PDF). Journal of Consciousness Studies.   © 2019 Behavioral Grooves