Behavioural Insights

Team

Applying behavioural

science to policy

Michael Sanders

Research Fellow

Behavioural Insights Team

DFID presentation, June 12, 2012

2 Sources:

Since 2008 …

3 Sources:

And in government…

4 Sources:

MINDSPACE

Messenger

Incentives

Norms

Defaults

Salience

Priming

Affect

Commitment

Ego

5 Sources: 5

Norms – reducing energy use

6 Sources: 6

Defaults – registering as an organ donor

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Signed at

beginning of form

Signed at

end of form

A study in the US

found that moving

signature boxes to

the beginning of

application forms

primed customers to

increase self-

reported miles

driven by 10%.

Priming – signing up front & honesty

Shu et al. (2011). When to sign on the dotted line? HBS Working Paper

8 Sources:

Behavioural Insights Team

Coalition Agreement, 2010

“Our government will be a much

smarter one... finding intelligent

ways to encourage, support and

enable people to make better

choices for themselves.”

The Behavioural Insights Team

BIT

David Halpern

(Director)

+ 7

Advisory Panel

Gus O’Donnell (Chair)

Richard Thaler (Chicago)

Peter Tufano (Oxford)

Theresa Marteau

(Cambridge)

Peter John (UCL)

Nick Chater (Warwick)

Dan Goldstein (LBS)

Steering Board

Sir Jeremy Heywood (Chair)

UNCLASSIFIED 10

Media - wary early on

“David Cameron’s

Vanity Project”

Media has become supportive

UNCLASSIFIED

A beginning, middle and an end...

Here is my fantasy. We

sack the Behavioural

Insights Team.

The first good trials in

UK politics for many

years may be about to

come out of the

wackiest and most

voguish corner of

government.

What’s more, they’ve all

been run by a small

group of very smart

people running out of the

Cabinet Office, who

have quietly set up what

is effectively a

randomised trials unit in

government.

13 Sources:

What do we do?

Evidence Policy

• Applying behavioural science to policy design

Policy trials: test. learn. adapt

• Testing what works in the field

• Often in partnership with business & local govt

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Testing it out in the field

INTERVENTION

15 Sources:

Testing it out in the field

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Testing it out in the field

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Speeding up tax repayment rates

BIT, 2011

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Boosting repayment rates of court fines

BIT, 2011

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Improving DVLA relicensing rates among

persistent offenders

BIT, 2012

20 Sources:

Installation of loft insulation relative to control

BIT, 2012

21 Sources:

Test, Learn, Adapt

BIT, 2012

•Published last week

• Collaboration with Ben

Goldacre and Professor

David Torgerson

• Nine key steps to setting

up a low cost, rigorous field

trial

22 Sources:

Find out more about our work

BIT, 2011

laura.haynes@cabinet-office.gsi.gov.uk