The Megastudy Approach for Changing Behavior at Scale

Dena M. Gromet (), Sean F. Ellis (), Joseph S. Kay () and Heather N. Graci ()
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Dena M. Gromet: University of Pennsylvania
Sean F. Ellis: University of Pennsylvania
Joseph S. Kay: University of Pennsylvania
Heather N. Graci: Assistant Editor at the Behavioural Scientist and an Editorial Researcher for Authors Angela Duckworth and Dan Heath

A chapter in Behavioral Public Policy in a Global Context, 2023, pp 345-360 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract The Behavior Change for Good (BCFG) Initiative was founded in 2016 to accelerate scientific discovery and identify the best behavioral science strategies to help people make meaningful and lasting changes to improve their lives. There have been many important insights from behavioral science, yet we still know very little about which insights have the best chance at cost-effectively changing behavior in any given situation. This chapter reviews BCFG’s novel, collaborative approach to combat these issues in behavioral science—the “megastudy.” A megastudy is a large field experiment in which many sub-studies are tested simultaneously on the same objective outcome, allowing for apples-to-apples (and dollars-to-dollars) comparisons across many different interventions developed from multiple disciplines. The authors review the benefits and drawback of the megastudy approach, explain how BCFG conducts megastudies, provide an in-depth look into BCFG’s 54-intervention megastudy on encouraging exercise with a large U.S. gym chain, and share the lessons learned for implementing this new approach to conduct behavioral science at scale.

Keywords: Megastudy; Behavior change; Field experiment; Behavioral science; Methods (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-031-31509-1_22

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-31509-1_22

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