Goals, Habits, and Behaviors

An interesting piece on NPR morning edition today (1/2/12) on goals, environment, and behavior change. Key researchers interviewed are Jerome Jaffe, Lee Robins, Wendy Wood, and David T. Neal. Basically, while goals are a key driver of behaviors and behavior change, the performance environment plays a strong role in how behaviors are changed. If the environment in which the behavior or habit was learned/reinforced doesn't change, then it is likely the performance won't change either. Environment change can be as small has changing the hand you use to accomplish a task or as big as moving to a different country.

Fear and Graphic Labels

Communication that influences customer performance relies on four key methods of framing: fear, pride, imitation, and gain. In Thailand, the government's fight against alcohol abuse has turned to using fear in its communications. Similar to the "Red Asphalt" drivers education movies that began in the 1960's (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Asphalt), Thailand is moving toward placing graphic labels on liquor bottles. The graphical labels are used to illustrate six types of messages, including:

Type 1 “Drinking alcohol causes the hypertension liver cirrhosis”
Type 2 “Drunk driving causes disability or death”
Type 3 “Drinking alcohol leads to unconsciousness and even death”
Type 4 “Drinking alcohol leads to sexual impotency”
Type 5 “Drinking alcohol leads to adverse health effect and family problems
Type 6 “Drinking alcohol is a bad role model for children and young people”

Examples of the policy and more graphical labels can be found at: http://www.puntofocal.gov.ar/notific_otros_miembros/tha332_t.pdf

Too Little Customer Education?

The report investigating PG&E's smart meter program was released on September 2, 2010. While the report found the smart meters accurate, the consumer backlash associated with the program was connected to poor customer education and customer support. A presentation I attended at Smart Metering International (Sept. 8th) by Chris Villareal from the California PUC echoed these issues and provided additional insight into their rise. Additional details are in the WSJ 9/7/10 p. A5 and http://gigaom.com/cleantech/report-pges-smart-meter-tech-works-but-outreach-lacking/.

Rise in Co-designed Products

WSJ (8/26/10 B5) reports that there is a rise in customized, made-to-order goods, ranging from custom mattresses, food, kids products, and even toilet paper. Typically, a website provides customers tools to co-design and customize the products.

Paying the Patient

I just came across this great meta-analysis of positive and negative incentives that are used to motivate patient behavior across a wide range of behavioral health issues: diet, smoking, STDs, and so on. A quick summary:

• The most successful schemes are positive incentives tied to small behaviors.
• Lottery-style incentives appear to increase recruitment and participation (smoking cessation, weight loss), but there was significant relapse when the incentives were removed.
• The greater the lottery reward, the greater the participation.
• Incentive amount is relative, based upon income level. Lower income = lower incentive needed to simulate behavior.
• Incentives that focus attention on the reward, and not the behavior, have limited long-term benefit/persistence.

You can find it at: http://www.wpro.who.int/NR/rdonlyres/BCC2F5C3-B685-4FF1-AE77-39C52F4ED247/0/payingthepatient.pdf

Twitter tracking of customer complaints

WSJ 6/24/10 D1 discusses how hotels are using Twitter and other social media tools to capture and respond to customer complaints. The scenario is that a customer checks into a hotel and complains about some aspect of the experience via Twitter. Hotel employees are monitoring such tweets and respond appropriate. This is extended to how businesses monitor and respond to online complaints associated with such sites as TripAdvisor.

Paying to avoid punishing conditions

Airlines have started introducing fees that allow customers to buy their way out of the unpleasantness of travel. Southwest Airlines is offering "Early Bird" check-in, which costs $10 and enables the customer to jump ahead in the boarding group A, B, C pecking order. American Airlines is offering something similar, with prices ranging from $9 to $19, which enables customers to board the airline before regular coach customers. Such fees may evolve into special pricing for a bundle of services, such as Family Plans for families traveling together. See WSJ 6/24/10 D1.