The BWA behaviour change database: September 2020 update

BehaviourWorks Australia (BWA) researchers at the Monash Sustainable Development Institute (MSDI) have spent several years curating a database of over 5,000 behaviour change publications. This database is used to inform many of our research projects and is now available for others to use.

Here are some of the most interesting and useful papers added this month:

Physical topography is associated with human personality

Regional differences in personality are associated with a range of consequential outcomes. But which factors are responsible for these differences? Frontier settlement theory suggests that physical topography is a crucial factor shaping the psychological landscape of regions. Hence, we investigated whether topography is associated with regional variation in personality across the United States (n = 3,387,014). Consistent with frontier settlement theory, results from multilevel modelling revealed that mountainous areas were lower on agreeableness, extraversion, neuroticism and conscientiousness but higher on openness to experience. Conditional random forest algorithms confirmed mountainousness as a meaningful predictor of personality when tested against a conservative set of controls. East–west comparisons highlighted potential differences between ecological (driven by physical features) and sociocultural (driven by social norms) effects of mountainous terrain.

Acute stress improves long-term reward maximization in decision-making under uncertainty

Acute stress influences reward-seeking tendencies and risky decision-making. However, it is unclear how acute stress influences decision-making in situations in which individuals must learn to either maximize long-term or immediate rewards from experience. Consequently, this study sought to investigate whether acute stress enhances salience of small, immediate or large, delayed rewards on decision-making under uncertainty. The Socially Evaluated Cold Pressor Task (SECPT)was used to induce acute stress. Participants in Experiment 1 (N = 50)were exposed to either the SECPT or a warm-water control condition and then completed a decision-making task in which participants needed to learn to forego immediate rewards in favor of larger delayed rewards. The results demonstrated that acute stress enhanced decisions that maximized long-term, large rewards over immediate, small rewards. Experiment 2 (N = 50)included an assessment of salivary cortisol. Results replicated the behavioral findings in Experiment 1 and demonstrated that the acute stress manipulation increased salivary cortisol, thus providing a potential physiological mechanism for these results. This work suggests that moderate acute stress can improve decision-making under uncertainty that depends on learning to maximize long-term rewards from experience.

Comparing the effects of performing and recalling acts of kindness 

Research suggests that both performing prosocial behaviors (i.e. acts of kindness towards others) and simply recalling them can increase well-being. Do performing and recalling prosocial behaviors impact well-being equally? To investigate this question, we conducted a study with a 2 × 2 design in which participants were randomly assigned either to perform prosocial behaviors, recall prosocial behaviors, both perform and recall prosocial behaviors, or do neither (control). Participants in all conditions assigned to perform and/or recall prosocial behaviors increased in well-being more than those in the control condition. However, participants in the three prosocial conditions did not significantly differ in their well-being gains. Presumably, it is much easier to recall, rather than perform, prosocial behavior. Accordingly, our results suggest that happiness seekers and well-being interventionists consider recalling acts of kindness as a cost-effective practice to raise well-being.

Do ‘watching eyes’ influence antisocial behavior? A systematic review & meta-analysis

Eye cues have been shown to stimulate rapid, reflexive, unconscious processing and in many experimental settings to cue increased prosocial and decreased antisocial behaviour. Eye cues are being widely applied in public policy to reduce crime and antisocial behaviour. Recently, failed replication attempts and two meta-analyses examining the eye cue effect on generosity have raised doubts regarding earlier findings. Much of the wider evidence on eye cues has still not been systematically reviewed, notably that which is most relevant to its practical application: the effect of eye cues on antisocial behaviour. Given the evidence of humans’ heightened sensitivity to threat and negative information, we hypothesized that the watching eyes effect would be more consistent in studies examining antisocial behaviour. In our meta-analysis of 15 experiments from 13 research papers we report a reduction in the risk of antisocial behaviour of 35% when eye cues are present. By contrast, systematic reviews have suggested CCTV cameras reduce crime by only 16%. We conclude that there is sufficient evidence of a watching eyes effect on antisocial behaviour to justify their use in the very low-cost and potentially high-impact real-world interventions that are proliferating in public policy, particularly in the UK. Public significance statement: Our meta-analysis of 15 experiments involving 2035 participants shows that photographs and/or stylized images of eyes reduced antisocial behaviour by 35%. Our findings support public policy initiatives employing pictures of ‘watching eyes’ to reduce crime. Furthermore, in an age when we are watched more than at any time in modern history – both online and on the street – our findings highlight an urgent need to fully understand the effect that perceived surveillance, feeling watched, has on our decisions and actions.

Age and Gender Differences in Human Values: A 20-Nation Study

This study examines age and sex differences in human values, with GDP, GGI (Gender Gap Index), and individualism-collectivism as culture-level moderators, using representative data for age and sex across 20 countries with substantial cultural variability (N = 21,362). Cross-sectional findings revealed that all values dimensions varied in importance over the life span and that men and women are slightly different across most life stages. Specifically, older adults scored higher than young adults in values with social (interactive and normative) and central goals (suprapersonal and existence), whereas values with personal goals (excitement and promotion) showed the opposite pattern. In general, women were higher on social and central goals and men were higher on personal goals. Interactions between age and sex showed that men and women were identical in excitement values when young, and in interactive values when old, but there were significant differences between them in almost all other life stages. There was almost no moderation effect of culture, supporting the life span development psychology idea that values reflect a universal pattern of human agency in facing challenges over the life span. 

To access the database of over 5,000 behaviour change publications, please use this link. For further information about BehaviourWorks please email: [email protected]