Nudging: To know 'what works' you need to know why it works

Pelle Guldborg Hansen ()
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Pelle Guldborg Hansen: Roskilde University and iNudgeyou – The Applied Behavioural Science Group

Journal of Behavioral Economics for Policy, 2019, vol. 3, issue S, 9-11

Abstract: Nudging is widely portrayed as a purely inductive approach to influencing human behavior using insights from the behavioral sciences to learn what works. However, as this paper argues, to understand 'what works', requires not only scientists, but also policy-makers as well as practitioners to understand what cognitive mechanisms brings behavior change about as well as under what conditions. This is argued by explicating how the concept of nudge itself identifies the main condition for the efficacy of nudging as well as calls for considering what specific mechanisms mediate a nudge and its behavioral effects. The practical implications are illustrated relative to the intuitively appealing policy application of nudging people into becoming organ donors by changing the default from an opt-in to an opt-out system; and in turn reveals why prominent scientists in the field believe this policy application to be a bad idea.

Keywords: nudging; behavioural public policy; cognitive psychology; default options (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: B49 D90 Z18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:beh:jbepv1:v:3:y:2019:i:s:p:9-11

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