Introduction

Welcome to our 2024 series of text walls on behavioural science. This information is for anyone who wants to attempt an application of behavioural science strategy to marketing or user experience design, without paying a consultant. The goal of these knowledge pages is to describe the key components of various theories/strategies, and provide useful references and examples as a jumping-off point for your research. We expect that you have some background in the behavioural sciences, or experience reading scientific papers. Otherwise, it might be difficult to interpret the nuances of the studies associated with this knoweldge.

Most pages are composed of four main sections. The first section is an overview of the topic and a description of how it can be applied to marketing and/or user experience design. We try our best to be realistic about the applicability of these topics to marketing, but we also have a bias based on our personal experience with different topics. Thus, we may overemphasize components of a topic that we find to be useful in the real world, and underemphaise more theoretical or unappliacble topics. The second section presents practical examples that demonstrate hypothetical situations involving the topic at hand. The third section (if available) presents famous or interesting research examples pertaining to the topic, and generally describes one or more studies. We try to cover the seminal research studies here that you would be exposed to in a psychology or behavioural science class in university. The fourth and last section is the works cited, which is a great resource if you want to do your own research, or better understand the concepts and examples we discuss.

These pages are not 100% perfect. We have altered and updated the notes we have been using for many years, to make them somewhat reader-friendly and applicable to 2024. But there is still quite a lot of information for many of the topics, which may feel overwhelming. Further, very few of these theories or strategies will help your business on their own. Rather, you need to consider numerous behavioural factors and variables whenever implementing a strategy. Thus, these may be more helpful to someone with a background in beahavioural science as a review, rather than someone new to behavioural science.

We have tried to simplify some complex topics and may have lost some nuance in the process. However, we believe that if you adopt our advice, you will likely see beneficial results. At that point, you can dive into the research (e.g. see the works cited section) and then make small alterations based on an advanced understanding of the topic.

If you notice any errors or issues, or if you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us.

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