Don't ask me! The limitations of self-reporting research.

Recent advances in behavioural economics, cognitive neuroscience, network theory and social psychology more generally have overturned our common sense understanding of human behaviour. The rational, autonomous, self-aware agent acting in his own self-interest according to static preferences has faded as we realise that behaviour is largely irrational, unconscious and driven by external contexts. Ladies and gentleman, Homo economicus has left the building.

One of the key takeaways from the new science is how woefully ill-equipped people are when it comes to reliably reporting our attitudes, values and behaviours. The ease with which we deceive ourselves and others to protect external perceptions and internal consistency is well documented in recent books by (among others) Daniel Kahneman, David Eagleman and Robert Trivers.

In light of the above, do we need to question why the majority of consumer research is still built on basic self-reporting methodologies?

A shift towards ethnography and co-creation

If we are to deliver on our ambitions to empower new consumer behaviours, it is essential that we listen to the science and go beyond the limitations of traditional self-reporting research methodologies as a source of insight. As I have worked to incorporate these new perspectives into my own work over recent years, the emphasis has shifted towards bespoke approaches based on ethnographic and co-creation principles.

Ethnographic approaches allow us to observe consumer behaviour as it happens in its natural social and cultural context, rather than retrospectively discussing it in a contrived research setting. This emphasis on observation of natural behaviour-in-context affords insight into behavioural influences without the distorting influence of memory and psychological defense mechanisms.

Insight approaches based on co-creation principles empower consumers to understand and articulate their values and needs in ways that don’t rely on conceptual thought and linguistic communication. By engaging collaborative “teams” of consumers in creative problem-solving processes, you allow participants to “think with their hands” and unlock insight often left untouched by traditional methodologies. Not only do the outputs of these processes contain rich and specific insights, but they also provide early prototypes for behaviour change solutions in themselves.

Localised, targeted insight

Through all this there is an overarching need to become much more localised and specific in our behaviour change efforts. The rich diversity of personal, social and structural factors determining the behaviours of different demographic and psychographic segments is the foundation for targeted, localised, effective behaviour change interventions in other sectors.

However, this level of granularity is rarely reached with research focused on broad-brush insight and mass-market approaches. For those brands and businesses willing to grasp this nettle properly, there is a real opportunity for shared value creation and differentiation.

In following this argument, we must be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. The point is to select the tool most appropriate to the task at hand, not to rule out surveys (or any other methodology) on principle. Quantitative surveys will always have a large and important role as a research tool, especially when it comes to defining an issue, segmenting communities and establishing baselines for evaluation.

However, relying on quant surveys to understand the complexity of human behaviour is like relying on the dipstick to understand the complexity of the internal combustion engine. If we are to rise effectively to our behaviour change challenges, we must get our hands dirty amid the messy, complexity that is human behaviour. And we must use every tool at our disposal to understand this complexity and design responses to it.