During 2018, Behavioral Grooves published 44 episodes and expanded our viewers into more than 90 countries. To celebrate our successful first year, Kurt and Tim called out our ten most downloaded episodes from 2018. We hope you check them out. #10. Behavioral Grooves #1: James Heyman, PhD. In this episode, we discussed research that James conducted with Dan Ariely, PhD while they were both at Berkeley. #9. David Yokum – Science is Hard. David’s journey from the White House Insights Team to The Lab @ DC, to Brown University (to establish a center for applying behavioral sciences to governmental policies) is remarkable. #8. Grooving on Cash vs. Non-Cash. For many years, we have been fascinated with why rewards that provide the greatest extrinsic motivation are NOT cash! #7. Grooving on Applying Behavioral Sciences at Your Office. In this episode, we offer tips on how to put your behavioral science desires into action at the office.  #6. Nudge-A-Thon with Dr. Christina Gravert. Christina discussed the difference between a nudge and a sludge in this fun conversation. Also, she established Impactually, a behavioral sciences firm with Nurit Nobel, to offer consulting and online classes. #5. Caroline Webb: Having a Good Day. Our conversation with Caroline rambled from her terrific book to speaking at Davos to singing at Carnegie Hall and even Burning Man! What a life! #4. Don’t Be Creepy – Data Transparency with Charlotte Blank. Charlotte is the Chief Behavioral Officer at Maritz, Inc., and we had a great discussion about how to use data appropriately. #3. Grooving on Books: Our Top 10 Recommended books on Behavioral Science. We were pleasantly surprised to hear from so many listeners around the world who shared their own top 10 lists with us.  #2. Michael Hallsworth: From MINDSCAPE to EAST. Michael’s discoveries of behavioral interventions that worked went hand in hand with many studies that demonstrated what didn’t work. This episode highlights both. #1: Leaving the Matrix: Annie Duke and insights on how you can improve your thinking! Author and poker player extraordinaire, Annie was a delightful guest offering great insights and great laughs. Note: Check out her mentor Lila Gleitman’s contribution to the English Dictionary! Thank you all for a wonderful 2018! If you’ve not subscribed, you can do so with your favorite podcatcher including iTunes, Stitcher, Castbox, Spotify, YouTube and others! Podbean host: https://behavioralgrooves.podbean.com/

Sam Tatam is the behavioral strategy director at Ogilvy in London. Sam helps his clients develop new ways to manage behavioral issues they have with their employees and customers. We were introduced to Sam in San Francisco where he wowed us with his presentation about how applying behavioral science was like writing a song. Sam is an Aussie living in London and his references to songwriting and Jimi Hendrix were at the very least unconventional and instantly made him someone we wanted to meet. Sam’s journey into behavioral science began when he chose to study clinical psychology over graphic design and was formalized when one of his managers recommended Malcolm Gladwell’s book, Tipping Point. Sam found it inspirational. Ironically, his work at Ogilvy has reunited his passions for both psychology and graphic design  From a very early age, Sam indicated he believed in asking people the right questions over telling people what to do. He gave us examples of how asking the right questions allow people to respond authentically which got Sam thinking about how asking consumers the right questions could impact the data they gathered. He’s a regular Socrates for the 21st century! Sam also shared a terrific story about leveraging social proof to increase hand washing among food-processing employees. Sam told us about plant employees who were not thoroughly washing their hands even with lots of reminders. But the GI Joe Fallacy was in full play as knowing was not moving the needle on clean hands. Ogilvy’s very clever solution was to put an inexpensive organic ink stamp on every employee’s hands before they started their shift, immediately before they were supposed to wash their hands. Once they were on the factory floor, it was instantly clear who DID and who DIDN’T wash their hands correctly. Social proof was an important element to increase the rate of proper hand washing, but providing a salient feedback loop for each worker was critical. Like the hand-washing case where awareness was simply not enough, Sam shared some tips on implicit hiring bias that caught our attention: 1. Focusing on process over outcome can lead to higher-quality new-hires. And, 2. Exploiting the diversification heuristic – by slowing down and hiring for more than one position at a time – can bring significantly better new employees your company. We were not surprised that Sam’s eclectic tastes in music bounce between Ronin Keating (from the Irish pop group Boyzone) for his recording of Alison Kraus’ hit for the Notting Hill movie: “When you say nothing at all” to Aussie bands including Powderfinger, and the great AC/DC. But he also called attention to UK-based singer-songwriter, David Gray. We hope you enjoy this episode. If you’re not already a subscriber, check out all the episodes at https://behavioralgrooves.podbean.com/. And if you enjoy this conversation with Sam, please share your thoughts in the form of a positive rating with your favorite podcatcher.

Will Leach is a marketer, econometrician and author whose recent book, Marketing to Mindstates, captured our attention before it was even published. His clever, behaviorally-focused marketing messages were provocative and we were excited to have him as a guest.  Will’s book focuses on 4 key mind states: Activating a goal, priming the need, framing the choice and triggering the behavior. The book was written as a practical guide for marketers looking to integrate behavioral sciences into their work. To lay the foundation for the book, Will relied on his experience at the PepsiCo SMART lab. There, they tested prices, planograms, promotional messages and packaging on real-life consumers in a simulated shopping experience. There his curiosity was peaked about why people do what they do. He discovered gold in books like Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely, and in Tory Higgins and Heidi Grant Halverson’s book on regulatory fit, Focus. (Both are recommended reading!) In his years following PepsiCo, Will has taken on some very cool clients and introduced us to Phil Kusak, the founder of Wicked Crisps. Will and Phil worked on the development, branding and marketing of a healthy snack food targeted at Millennial Mom’s leveraging the regulatory fit model. Will was struck by Phil’s caring approach to the people in his organization by modifying machines at Wicked Crisps to accommodate the special physical needs of his employees. We were pleased to be introduced to Phil’s work, as well, and hope you support his wonderful work. Before we signed off, Will shared three tips with us: 1. Set goals. It’s important that our first step be to actually set and own the goal.  2. Manage regulatory fit. Will reminded us of the importance of making decisions frictionless.  3., Use behavioral triggers. Together, these tips help tell the mind what to do and when to do it. Our musical discussion had a very eclectic mix to it. We talked about how Will grew up with the sounds of Motown – Aretha Franklin and Bill Withers and he even uses the song Lovely Day as a prime for getting up in the morning. But once he moved to Texas, he realized that the prettiest girls listened to George Strait, Pat Green, and Robert Earl Keen. It always starts with a girl! In our grooving session, we discussed the importance of the ethical application of these tools. The application of regulatory fit and the use of behavioral triggers can be very powerful, and we recommend careful consideration before implementing them.

Every year, millions of people make resolutions at the start of the new year and researchers indicate that 91% of those resolutions are sunk by the end of the second week in January. In this grooving episode, we highlight 10 tips on how you can keep your New Year’s resolutions and how you can manifest an even more amazing version of the already-wonderful YOU. To do so, we’re providing 10 tips and hacks that can help you maintain your resolutions and achieve your goals. We are also taking this medicine to make our own new year’s resolutions more successful! Let’s do it together so we can all stay on the resolution bandwagon!   The Ten Tips Are: Make it emotional. Don’t create a resolution that is completely rational and lacks emotion. Make sure that you engage an emotional trigger and find the larger meaning.  People often talk about SMART goals (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound) and for good reason: because they work and the key piece in SMART is that they are relevant.  Adopt your future self as your present identity – “I’m not losing weight, I’m being the healthy, active person that I want to be” – bring your ideal future self to today. Start talking about yourself and referring to your lifestyle today as if you were already living your I’ve-succeeded-with-my-resolution self.   Start small. The first level of starting small is to keep the number of resolutions small – no more than three! You’re destined for failure if you have a dozen resolutions to try to adhere to. The second level is to break down larger goals into manageable chunks – what are the behaviors that you need to do each week/day/hour that will make you achieve your goal. Tie triggers into current habits to make the modifications you need to adopt the new behavior.  A good way to do this is to use when ______, then _______ statements. “When I go to brush my teeth, then I will pick up the dental floss.” Research indicates we are three times more likely to do the desired behavior if we tie it to a trigger from our current behavior. Remove friction. Once you’ve uncovered what might derail you, use if _____, then ______ statements to help figure out what to do when derailments happen. “If I feel like not going to the gym, then I will rely on my commitment to get three visits in this week.” Add friction to things you don’t want to do (move the Oreo cookies to the basement) and reduce friction for things you want to do (put your workout shoes at your bedside before you sleep).   Enlist Social Support. It’s best to have three kinds of people that can help you on your journey: the cheerleader, the coach, and the referee. Build a small group of people to hold you accountable and reward them for focusing on accuracy, not just warm feelings. Measure your progress. It could be as simple placing check marks on a diary or to use an app to automate the process. Measure at a rate that is appropriate for the behavior change you’re undertaking: use daily or weekly measures for shorter-term resolutions and weekly or monthly for longer-term resolutions. Reward your progress. If you’re set milestones along the way, make sure you reward yourself as you achieve these milestones. Don’t hold all your rewards until the very end. These rewards can coincide with the way you’ve broken down your resolution into smaller parts. And they need to be the right kinds of rewards.  Give yourself a break. We are human, not machines and the world is complex. Not everything will go as planned. It’s ok to not be 100%, but “don’t miss twice,” as James Clear says. One of our biggest biases is to underestimate how much time any given task will take. Don’t punish yourself for missing a date – just do the work. Make it fun. Be intentional about laughing and enjoying the process of the change you’re in. When things don’t go as planned, laugh it off and learn from it. Share your hardships and successes with your social networks. Laughing releases endorphins in the brain that cause you to feel less pain and anxiety, which actually makes you more resilient and happier.   References The resolution solution: Longitudinal examination of New Year's change attempts, by JC Norcross at the University of Scranton. Or Forbes article titled “Just 8% of People Achieve Their New Year's Resolutions. Here's How They Do It.”  “Atomic Habits,” by James Clear. “How to Have a Good Day,” by Caroline Webb. “Large Stakes and Big Mistakes,” by Loewenstein, Gneezy, Mazar & Ariely. “Tiny Habits,” by B.J. Fogg.  “Thinking in Bets,” by Annie Duke.

In this episode, we spoke with Dr. Michael Hallsworth PhD, the Managing Director of the North American Behavioral Insights Team. We met up with him at his office in Brooklyn which gave the audio a bit of an echo-chamber vibe. Michael was an early member of the UK’s Behavioral Insights Team. Along with Paul Dolan, Dominic King, Ivo Vlaev, and David Halpern, Michael created MINDSPACE in 2009 and later, the EAST model. Both are mnemonic tools for remembering key elements of behavioral science. To ensure that everyone is comfortable with the MINDSPACE and EAST models, we recommend this link to an overview from the Behavioural Insights Team: https://www.behaviouralinsights.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/BIT-Publication-EAST_FA_WEB.pdf. The paper is brief, informative, easy to read and offers one of the best explanations on how to apply behavioral insights we’ve read. However, in quick recap form, the mnemonic MINDSCAPE stands for: Messenger. We are heavily influenced by who communicates information Incentives. Our responses to incentives are shaped by predictable mental shortcuts such as strongly avoiding losses Norms. We are strongly influenced by what others do Defaults. We “go with the flow” of pre-set options Salience. Our attention is drawn to what is novel and seems relevant to us Priming. Our actions are often influenced by sub-conscious cues Affect. Our emotional associations can powerfully shape our behaviors Commitments. We seek to be consistent with our public promises and reciprocate acts Ego. We act in ways that make us feel better about ourselves   EAST is an updated and simplified version of MINDSPACE. EAST is a powerful tool because it is so easy to remember and it stands for: Easy. Harness the power of defaults; reduce the ‘hassle factor’ of taking up a service; simplify messages Attractive. Attract attention; design rewards and sanctions for maximum effect Social. Show that most people perform the desired behavior; leverage the power of networks; encourage people to make a commitment to others Timely. Prompt people when they are likely to be most receptive; consider the immediate costs and benefits; help people plan their response to events   Michael is a relentless researcher. He never fatigues of testing new ideas or recycling old ones and he’s open about situations where replications of his earlier studies worked well and not so well. His candidness about his successes and failures, when it comes to replicating results, is a breath of fresh air in the scientific community. To highlight this fact, we discussed how changes to the format of the letter used by the British tax authority to collect taxes from delinquents generated great results. However, when he applied the same approach to collect dues in Albuquerque, New Mexico with a different audience, the formality effect failed miserably. Michael shared his observations on framing, political systems, confirmation bias and motivated reasoning. All are prominent in the world today, increasing our need to pay attention to them and to be aware of their effects on our decisions and behaviors. He also shared two tips on how to prepare to conduct a study. He teed these two up in a fashion that was highly intentional, so we recommend following his direction if you are interested in conducting a study of your own. Pay attention to details as the human condition (and our world) is complex Ask for written predictions from the experts prior to collecting data – hindsight bias is a powerful effect   We also discussed how Michael came to play piano “quite late” as a child because, unlike many kids who are thrown into piano lessons, he volunteered to study the instrument. Quite simply, he loved music and still does. He still plays a bit today at holiday gatherings and when he’s in close proximity to a piano. Also, he introduced us to a band neither of us had heard of - Okkervil River. A very chill Americana band out of Austin, Texas. That led us to discuss Texas bands and Texas music festivals in our Grooving Session. We remind listeners of 3 great Texas-born songwriters, Willie Nelson, Stevie Ray Vaugh, and Buddy Holly and discussed how the festival known as South by Southwest (SXSW) has become a highly commercialized event in Austin. Is it still fun, entertaining and rewarding for music fans? Certainly, but it’s become a corporate marketing event and is a bit overwhelming for those hoping to the next musical superstar in a small saloon. We hope you enjoy our discussion with Michael Hallsworth, PhD.   Check out our website, www.behavioralgrooves.com if you’re interested in more episodes. And stop by the Podbean hosting site if you’d like to see the episode notes with all the live links in it. The complete and original version is located at https://behavioralgrooves.podbean.com/.

This is a special Re-Grooving session for your speedy listening enjoyment. In this re-grooving episode, we are re-sharing the Grooving Session (only the Grooving Session) that followed Kurt’s and my conversation with Annie Duke, author and poker champion extraordinaire. That means that in this episode, you won’t hear the conversation with Annie. To hear that, you need to check out our podcast called “Leaving the Matrix.” There you can enjoy all of Annie’s insights and enthusiasm first hand. This episode is just the Grooving Session after we spoke with Annie. It’s about 30 minutes long and includes comments Kurt and I made about Annie, as well as our observations on tribes, loss aversion, goal setting, accountability coaches, nudge-fest, Lila Gleitman’s contribution the English dictionary, listening to (or not listening) to music while we’re doing other tasks and Alex Chilton’s impact on musical literature. Also, Kurt and I wanted to let you know that we have instituted the thinking-in-probabilities approach in our conversations with each other and with our respective clients. We encourage you to give it a try. And speaking of probabilities, we believe that you are at least 87% likely to jump onto your favorite podcatcher and give Behavioral Grooves a positive review! Thanks in advance for your support. Check out www.behavioralgrooves.com for more information on meetups and podcasts. 

Brian Ahearn is the Chief Influence Officer at Influence People, LLC, and one of only 20 Cialdini Method Certified Trainers in the world. Brian’s experience with Robert Cialdini’s methods places him among the most experienced practitioners alive. It was a pleasure to speak with Brian and to gain some insight on applying the methods of ethical influence that Cialdini pioneered in his book, Influence with clients in the real world.   We hosted Brian in the Behavioral Grooves studio for our wide-ranging and in-depth conversation. It was a treat because we typically have our discussions via the web on Zoom or SquadCast, but Brian was able to meet us at the dining room table and it was terrific. As a result of being in the same room and sitting around the same table, our discussion on priming, influence and ethics was particularly personal and dynamic. Brian began our conversation by outlining the six principles of influence: liking, reciprocity, authority, social proof or consensus, consistency, and scarcity, all of which were identified by Robert Cialdini in his first book.  We wandered into a great story about Cialdini’s very humble personality, that Brian conveyed by way of a dinner meeting with the professor. (Note: Kurt and Tim experienced Cialdini’s humility directly when we met up with the good professor in New York City, recently. Bob, as he urged us to call him, was as curious as a college freshman and solicited our thoughts on every topic we spoke about. Truly an inspiring and amazing guy.) Brian shared his thoughts about Tom Hopkins work on “How to Master the Art of Selling” and the impact that the spoken word has on our beliefs. The ‘what I say becomes what I believe’ was an important reminder that words matter. And in Brian’s case, words are just about everything when it comes to the world of ethical influence. This became clear when he spoke about how he trains insurance salespeople to use primes with their customers when pitching technology. The technology actually helps keep the drivers safer and provides more reliable data to the insurance agencies. Brian trains the agents to say, “…this technology works really well for good drivers like you.” We’re all for being safer on the road.  Of course, we spent a fair amount of our conversation on the subtlety and power of primes. Fortunately, Brian took our musical bait and spoke to how he uses musical playlists to create and deliver his own personal primes. We were happy to hear that he’s created playlists that focus on titles or themes with the words ‘moment’ or ‘time’ in them. And it’s evidence that he takes his own medicine when it comes to the advice he shares with his clients. He’s using music to prime himself and others before meetings! We are always impressed with people, like many of our other guests, who apply these principles to their own lives.  The priming discussion included a great story about how he used reciprocity to engage his daughter in doing some extra chores around the house. Rather than making his request quid pro quo, Brian decided to preempt the request with a raise to her allowance. After the new, upgraded allowance was in place, Brian’s request was met with immediate support. Kurt and Tim have recollections of childhood chores compressed with bad feelings – and they linger long into adulthood. As children, we never experienced enthusiasm over chores or things we were asked to do, in part because of the ways those requests were made. Brian concluded our conversation with three tips about the most impactful tools from the principles of persuasion. They are: Liking. The focus with liking needs to be on ME figuring out how to like YOU, not the other way around. The search for commonalities and the need to deliver compliments are on ME, not you. Authority. While authority has many meanings, a core part of this principle is in being an authority on what you do. Be willing to share advice. Be a giver. Be an authority, don’t just walk through your job with your eyes half closed. Consistency. The biggest part of consistency is, of course, being consistent in your words and deeds. However, beneath the headline is the very powerful subtext of asking, not telling. Be strategic. Be inquisitive. And live up to the words you speak. Our discussion with Brian gave us the opportunity to talk about both Coldplay and Frank Sinatra. With a playlist that wildly varied from a guy from Ohio, what is there not to like? And since Brian is from Ohio, the home of the Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame, we decided to do a little grooving on it. So, Kurt and Tim discussed Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame inductees and who, in our humble opinion, deserves to be nominated. Todd Rundgren was discussed as one of our nominees we'd like to see in the Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame in 2019. (We also discussed Queen, but Queen was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2001, ten years after Freddie Mercury died.) The impact that music has on our lives is nearly immeasurable and we’re grateful to have the opportunity to listen to it, enjoy it, and chat about it. Tee up a lively tune before you listen to this episode! We hope you enjoy our conversation with Brian Ahearn. Subscribe at www.behavioralgrooves.com or learn more about Behavioral Grooves podcast and meetup. 

University of Chicago MBA professor Linnea Gandhi talked with Kurt and Tim recently about her consulting work, her passion for statistics, grading papers and how a good improvisational theatre production can be sheer joy. Self-descriptions of her own achievements are blanketed with modesty; however, her passions shine through when discussing her work, both past and present. Linnea is a remarkable person. After completing her undergraduate at Harvard and an MBA at the University of Chicago Booth School, she worked with the Boston Consulting Group, then with ideas42. And since last year, she’s operated her own consultancy based on the application of behavioral sciences while teaching MBA students at the University of Chicago. Her consultancy, BehavioralSight, takes clients beyond simple biases and into the methodologies of scientific measurement that are critical to professional and personal decision-making. When we caught up with Linnea, she was busy preparing a presentation for a conference she was invited to speak at and, simultaneously, was deep into reading a book on statistics.  Statistics became central to our conversation and she even admitted to having a CRUSH on statistics! She sees a need to understand how we calculate decision probabilities and believes the world could be a better place with better application of statistical tools.   In addition to her extensive work as consultant and teacher, she is one of the very special fraternity of people who have co-authored a paper with Nobel Laureate, Danny Kahneman. The paper, coauthored with Kahneman, Andrew Rosenfield and Tom Blaser, is called “Noise: How to Overcome the High, Hidden Cost of Inconsistent Decision Making.” Published in the October 2016 Harvard Business Review, the article shares the important lesson of how to differentiate biases from noise – you know, that thing we often refer to as chance variability. The authors write: “We call the chance variability of judgments noise. It is an invisible tax on the bottom line of many companies.”  Kurt and Tim found that tremendously insightful. On the topic of excellent articles, Linnea’s piece on the People Science site, “Testing, Testing: Not All Failures Are Created Equal,” hit home with us, too. Her chart featuring the taxonomy of failure breaks down the need to focus on process failures, rather than outcome failures, which led us to discuss thinking in probabilities, a favorite topic of Annie Duke. We also talked about how people are particularly challenged when it comes to grasping uncertainty and developing concrete probabilities around difficult-to-identify risks. Quite frequently, Linnea puts these ideas to work in her consulting business. Clients often overreact to the freshest data or recent market changes, and she helps guide their way through the decisions that can be improved by relying on a broader data set. Stumbling on Kurt Lewin was a stroke of luck. If you’re not familiar, Lewin was a prolific creator of psychological observations and theories. His work is wide-ranging and our own Kurt Nelson, PhD has been a fan of Lewin’s for some time. Noteworthy is Lewin’s Equation, or so it is often called, that simplifies human behavior with a direct and unpretentious approach: behavior is a function of the person in their environment. When Linnea brought up Lewin, it was clear Kurt was loving the conversation. We discovered that Linnea’s connection to music is through movement – like dance and improvisational theatre – and leaves the singing up to people with better vocal cords. However, she’s a fan of Billy Joel and shared her fondness for “For the Longest Time,” which led Kurt and Tim to discuss our own favorite Billy Joel songs. We ended our conversation with Linnea with three succinct tips for those interested in improving their decision making. Look for disconfirming data. If you don’t write it down, it doesn’t exist. (Stolen from Linda Ginzel, a professor at the University of Chicago Booth School and author of “Choosing Leadership.”) Take a course in statistics! With that, we’ll end our comments with a quotation from the great Edwards Deming that reminds us to remain diligent in designing and implementing processes in our work and personal lives: “Every system is perfectly designed to produce the results it gets.”  

Political discussions in many places around the world have become more contentious than at any time in our recent history. It seems almost impossible to have a calm conversation with someone who doesn’t hold our own political views. In North America and Liberia, we’re approaching the Thanksgiving 2018 holiday where families have a tradition of coming together to show gratitude for a successful harvest. In many of these settings, the dinner-table conversation with be with people we don’t agree with. In this episode, Kurt and Tim share 5 tips on how to maintain civil discourse at the dining table during these family gatherings. As we all know, families aren’t homogeneous groups of automatons – in the United States or anywhere else. People choose different paths for their political or religious beliefs and “what I believe” can be difficult for those who don’t share those beliefs. At the heart of these conflicts is that we are all different and different is good. To maintain a successful civilization, we need both conservative and liberal perspectives. Without a conservative perspective, we might fail to honor long-standing institutions. Without a liberal perspective, we might fail to move past our comfort zones. We need both, so we start by recognizing that. Our list begins with being curious and we refer to the person we disagree with as “the crazy uncle,” with no disrespect for uncles or mental illness. When this uncle makes a statement you don’t agree with, don’t zing back a rebuttal…just ask him about his comment. How did he come to this perspective? What makes him believe this is the case? To what degree is he certain of this? We reference an excellent article in Psychology Today by Robert Mauer on the topic of curiosity. Mauer urges readers to frame questions with high integrity and pure wonder. When you’re in that space, you are more likely to engage in conversations with people you initially disagreed with. The second tip is to focus on the topic, not the person. Never attack the person with your objections – focus on the issue at hand. It’s about the topic, not the person!  A critical error in any contentious conversation is the erosion of the dialogue away from the topic at hand. When emotions get the best of us, we can dog-pile our grievances onto the crazy uncle and lose sight of why we disagree in the first place. Don’t wander from the point either of you was trying to make. The third tip is to argue the facts, not the perceptions. And when you don’t agree on facts, agree to move on to a topic that you DO agree on the facts. (That means you need to think about the FACTS, not just your opinion.) It’s more of a philosophical approach, but still important in keeping the discourse civil, it’s best if we can agree on certain facts, even when they don’t support our own position. John Greco’s chapter called “Knowledge as Credit for True Belief” in the Clarendon Press book titled Intellectual Virtue: Perspectives From Ethics and Epistemology is a great example of how to focus on facts and not perceptions. Another way to approach the potentially contentious discussion is to make an agreement up front with the other person to focus on facts. Annie Duke, in her book Thinking in Bets,  speaks to the importance of agreeing on a set of “rules” and sticking to it. Set up an agreement prior to the discussion and hold yourself accountable. Our fourth tip is also related to Annie Duke’s book, and that is to talk in percentages and avoid black-and-white statements. Use statements like, “I’m 75% confident that gun legislation could have a positive impact on mass shootings,” and avoid saying things like, “You’re an idiot for not supporting gun control!” Annie’s book is the best reference for avoiding a black and white approach to topics, especially challenging ones, and gives readers a very powerful toolbox for working our way through difficult dialogues. Most importantly, she reminds us that we don’t know everything – we never have, and we never will. We can feel certain, but that doesn’t mean we are perfectly correct. Allow our conversation with the crazy uncle to rest in the space of, “We could be wrong, even a little bit.” The fifth tip is to respect our differences. Political difference has roots that are deeper than where we grew up – scientists are discovering that there are biological differences between conservatives and liberals. From what we know, the brains of people who tend to be more progressive experience triggers differently from those who tend to be more conservative. For instance, loud noises tend to impact people who are more conservative with more fear or caution than those who tend to be more progressive. These are uncontrollable, reflexive responses and we’re not going to persuade anyone to change their DNA. To expand on this topic, we refer you to two pieces of value. In a Scientific American article by Emily Laber-Warren, the author highlights key findings in recent years about how Conservatives are better organizers and cleaners while Liberals are more novelty-seeking. And one of our favorite books, Jonathan Haidt’s The Righteous Mind, is a reference volume on how to understand and work with the differences we have. Highly recommended.   BONUS TIP: What do you want to achieve in this conversation? If you’re approaching your dinner conversation with the intent to persuade others to your point of view, think again. How would you feel if you felt as though others at the dinner table were trying to persuade you to agree with their controversial ideas?  We recommend you leverage the power of your curiosity to learn more about what your crazy uncle has going on in his cranium. You just might leave the dinner table a little more informed than when you arrived.

David Yokum may not be a household name but that shouldn’t stop you from listening. If you’ve ever wondered about police officer body cameras and the effect they’re having on crime, policing and adjudication, we have David to thank for conducting the first major randomized study on the use of police officer body cameras. We came to know his work by a stroke of good fortune. He and Tim met as guests of George Loewenstein at the 2016 inauguration of Carnegie Mellon University’s undergraduate degree in Behavioral Economics. It was clear from the first handshake that David is not just another guy who’s curious about behavioral sciences. Even though he’s earned a law degree and a PhD in psychology, he’s not just another science geek. He’s a doer. When they were introduced, David was transitioning from the White House Social and Behavioral Science Team to be a founding member of The Lab @ DC, which resides in the Executive Office of the Mayor of the District of Columbia. Among their many accomplishments, David and his colleagues conducted the foundational study on the impact of police officer body cameras. They set out to understand how body cameras might influence the use of force, how the cameras might impact crime and how the cameras might impact the flow of cases through the courts. But they discovered much more. They realized that the context in which the study was rolled out mattered a great deal. The District of Columbia is not a static laboratory – it’s a city with nearly 4,000 law enforcement officers that represent a spectrum of quality, ability and experience on the job. Police officer training, police force reform, the urban crime environment, the population of the city, the support from other governmental agencies…all of these create a context that impacted the study’s results. David shared with us about how, at the launch of the study, the team considered how body cameras might create an effect to increase the perceived legitimacy of the police force. And in some cases that happened. They believed that pairing the body camera data with existing datasets would reveal great insights for potential changes to police work. However, even with the tremendous amount of adjudication data and the dreaded police reporting paperwork, known to every viewer of a television police drama, there were still surprises. They discovered that some of the correlations (and sometimes lack of correlations) on arrests and quality of adjudication simply weren’t what they expected. To some degree, they got a null result. On that level, David noted that the null effect was an important message that prompted deeper analysis. We wandered into a great discussion about the pratfalls of researchers relying too much on data, especially when they lack the ‘feet on the street’ view that comes from actually being in the field. All of this was predicated on the Lab@DC’s study on the capital city’s rat problem. The study changed for the better when the research team was enlightened with insights from the animal vector team and rat biology specialists. At this point in our discussion, David enthusiastically noted that you should never stop developing a study. A study needs to be open to new insights, new data points, new information and reflect the latest and best thinking of the team. A study isn’t a shiny, newly-minted penny…it’s a living, breathing thing. All this connected us with the fact that not all results from just any similar study will replicate in your situation. This led us to a note about David’s failed attempt to replicate Michael Hallsworth’s tax letter studies, which reinforced the need for regular and rigorous research from context to context. We were pleased to be conducting our discussion with David from Brown University, where he very recently assumed a post as an adjunct professor and has been tasked with establishing and directing a new center that will support applied public policy research with state and local governments. There is so much more to come from David Yokum! Of course, we ended our discussion on music and we laughed our way through comments about Eddie Vedder to South African pop artist Mathew Mole and into the lost art of making a mixtape. Today, music is curated digitally, created by computers observing our likes and dislikes. We don’t even need to select individual songs, just click a ‘create’ button. But in the days before digital music, mixtapes allowed listeners to enjoy their favorite album tracks in the order that they wanted to listen to them. They were used at parties or for private consumption. And, in some cases, mixtapes were created as love letters – providing that special someone with a curated musical story of how you felt about him or her. As technology changes, the world changes with it. For better or for worse, our human brains are huffing to keep up with that changing world. Our biases appear to be stuck in the context of a world that existed not 4 years ago, but 40,000 years ago. As long as we have a gap between our brain’s ability to process the contemporary world, we need science to help us understand it. We need people like David Yokum to do the hard work of figuring out how to apply the behavioral sciences to government. Yes, science is hard. And we have David Yokum to thank for contributing to a better understanding of how governmental policies can improve our daily lives.   PS: As of this writing, Behavioral Grooves is now listened to in more than 85 countries. We are pleased to have listeners around this wonderful world. Thank you all for sharing in our journey.