Behavioural economics
Attended a fantastic seminar yesterday by the COI on behavioural economics. Coming from a background based in psychology and sociology, I was fascinated by the research, stating that it is behaviour that influences ones attitude rather than attitude influencing behaviour. Historically, efforts to try and change an individuals behaviour to say, stop smoking, would focus on their attitude toward smoking in the hope that if it was possible to change their attitude or belief about smoking that the knock on effect would be the individuals behaviour (smoking) would change. This awareness of the fact that it is what we DO that shapes our attitudes and beliefs was, for me, quite interesting as a digital media professional. It will certainly influence any creative direction I provide to my clients in their attempts to communicate through the digital channel to their target audiences to try and persuade them to either start, stop, or continue with a behaviour such as, for instance, signing up to...