"We may not even recognise that rules are things that other humans, just like ourselves, make up. Nothing is fixed and everything is full of potential.

Through play we may discover that an object, an activity, a relationship or a social situation can be changed, reorganised or reordered."

“I'd grossly underestimated the value of building out a behavioural language.

Doing so has unlocked a completely new way of viewing the world and solving problems at a much deeper level.”

"There's a mismatch between our modern environment and the environment to which we're adapted.

Because we're mismatched to our current environments, modern humans are akin to fish out of water.

Fish out of water die, orangutans in zoos and rodents in laboratories become morbidly obese; people in space need adult toilet training.

Almost nothing comes naturally or functions smoothly in a novel environment"

It gives businesses a powerful new tool and instructions to build on the expertise of diverse teams across Research, UX, Data, Change Management, Innovation and Sales.

This toolbox provides a common human language that all teams can speak.

This guides the organisation by putting human behavior at the very centre of the value-generating model.

"The problem with airline meals is that they usually include an unhealthy dessert item such as a brownie that many of us would rather not eat.

However, because the brownie is likely to sit on our tray table for an hour or more before being swept away by flight attendants, all too often the brownie gets eaten.

My colleague Jay’s solution is to use the mayonnaise that comes with the meal and smear it on the brownie as soon as possible.

The brownie becomes disgusting to Jay and his willpower battle is over."

“Change seems to happen more effectively when people are given a sense of ownership over it.

As Peter Senge said: ‘People don’t mind change, they mind being changed’”

"A while ago, I heard someone say that they like how AI can help them bring their ideas to life instantly. I remember thinking that this person is either overworked or does not like the creative process.

If we want to skip the making part of 'making' something, do we really want to make or do we just want to 'make it?"

The beauty of logic is that anyone who follows the steps will end up at the same answer. The curse of logic is that everyone ends up at the same answer.

If you want predictability, follow logic.
If you want innovation, abandon it immediately.

"A lot of the focus in the past has been on how Behavioural Science can achieve impact with mere nudges.

However, we should be thinking far bigger.

The future will be full of disruptive businesses that are built from the ground up with the foundational principles of Behavioural Science.

If you can understand why people do what they do, you can build that into your products to create more empathic experiences that solve problems at a deeper level"

"Behavioural science uncovers universal patterns that shape how we think, behave and make decisions, while culture refines their expression.

Consider the Peak-End Rule, which shows that endings disproportionately shape memories.

In the US, a high-energy farewell celebration might create a lasting positive impression, while in Japan, a thoughtful, personal goodbye resonates more deeply due to cultural norms of harmony, respect and interpersonal connection.

When behavioural science meets cultural understanding, designs and strategies become both effective and deeply connected with local audiences."

“Stop using UX language when talking to non-designers. Instead, adopt the language of Design KPIs and UX metrics.


Deeply connect your work to business objectives at the top of the organisation."

"When Nobel-prize-winning Behavioural Scientist Richard Thaler sat at book signings for his seminal work "Nudge", co-written with Cass Sunstein, he would always sign off with "Nudge for good" to ethically-prime the book's owners.

This is a great first step, and we can and should go further.

At Coglode, we teach to "Nudge for Great"; to create incredible behavioural experiences that solve for many peoples' problems, but also delight them in the process.

When you Nudge for Great, you're asking yourself "How do I want people to feel?" when applying Behavioural Science.

We find that to be a powerful anchor to move beyond mere ethics and towards great emotional experiences."

“Behavioral science must evolve beyond a focus on individual decisions—it’s shaped by interactions, evolving environments, and long-term ripple effects.

To create real impact, we need to move beyond quick fixes and rethink how we design interventions for lasting, systemic change.”

“Allowing an image, custom name and a goal on a savings pot provides visual reinforcement and encouragement, reminding customers why they made that initial positive decision.

I have a savings pot with a smiling picture of my daughter on it, there’s no way I’m dipping into that one compared to the ‘rainy day’ pot I raid semi often.”

"If you want to get somebody to do something, make it easy.

If you want to get people to eat healthier foods, then put healthier foods in the cafeteria, and make them easier to find, and make them taste better.

So in every meeting I say, ‘Make it easy.’ It’s kind of obvious, but it’s also easy to miss.

And you know what is better than 'make it easy'? 'Make it automatic.'"

"We spend so much time making things frictionless, but by making it frictionless we make it forgettable. Friction is often the most memorable part.

When you learn that you can handle some friction, you realize you can handle even more. By always trying to reduce even small amounts of friction, we take away our own power to handle hard things.”

"You don't save for 3 behavioural reasons: 

Present bias is our tendency to live in the here and now. We discount the future excessively and ignore it. For example, you want to exercise but choose immediate pleasures like eating and watching TV instead.

Second, you have inertia or the status quo. Change is difficult. It's so easy to keep doing what we're doing and if we're used to going out and spending, it's so easy to keep going out and spending.

With the “Save More Tomorrow" program, we don't fight inertia, we work with it to make it easy to start saving.

Once you’re in the program, when next year happens, you're going to automatically save into your future. Also every year thereafter we're going to automatically increase the savings.

This automation helps to overcome inertia as it's going to happen on its own it's like on autopilot.

The third is loss aversion, which is a problem with savings because if I'm asking you to take my money away, I’m not able to spend it. Putting it aside it could feel like a loss. So we don’t do it.

We overcame this by thinking about when to take your money. It’s easier to find a bit extra to save when there’s an increase in income, reducing the feeling of loss. So we took the savings when people had a salary increase."

"When introducing Behavioural Science to business leaders, it’s important to start with their goals, problems or challenges - and then work backwards, to show how BeSci can be part of the solution.

Lead with what's directly relevant to them, rather than the science!"

“Wouldn’t it be a good thing if people were more aware of how they are influenced, of the shortcuts in our heads that sometimes get them into trouble?

After all, most of the nudges in the world aren’t from government, but from businesses, from other people, or sometimes just in the environment around us.”

"Manipulative and deceptive patterns don’t just affect individuals—they can affect markets too, stifling fair competition.

Researchers argue that they can be used to interfere with consumers’ decision-making, and they can be used to lock consumers in, making it hard for them to leave.

These tactics trap users, limit autonomy, and raise costs for competitors, reinforcing monopoly power and reducing market fairness."

We’re seeing a shift in the value of service in retail. While the purchase of a product is an isolated event, the service endures - think 20/80. When we think about it like that, designing service with behavioural psychology in mind is really quite untapped.

The 20% is I find it, I add it to basket, I buy it, I receive it (or not), I use it.

The 80% - the service and support, is the packaging that sits around the product. Without getting that right, driving trust and confidence, and meeting/delighting their service expectations, then we can’t expect them to come back again.

They become a purchaser, not a committed customer.

How can we use BeSci to drive certainty throughout the purchase journey to reduce them needing helping and support? How are we giving confidence?

And that’s all the way from when they think about purchasing with us, through to using the product and re-engaging with us.

"There's a robust body of research that demonstrates the power of negative thinking.

Mental contrasting is the process of imagining the obstacles that might lie along the route to your destination. Anticipating the ways things might go wrong on the path to achieving your goals helps you more successfully reach your destination.

For example, amongst people on a program trying to lose at least 50 pounds, those who imagined the ways in which they might fail lost 26 pounds more on average than those who focused on positive visualisation alone.

Imagining success affirms your sense of competence and ability to achieve your goals. Positive visualisation gives you a taste of the emotional high you actually get from actually succeeding.

On the flip side, imagining failure is emotionally similar to actually failing.

The temporary discomfort from imagining failure is worth it, because embracing that discomfort makes it more likely that you'll experience success.

Mental pain leads to real-world gains."

"Play teaches us a flexibility to face up to and live with a changing world.

Being in play, in the state of mind that says 'I wonder what might happen if I tried this' and then not worrying of being afraid of the outcome, is a state of mind that can cope with the unexpected."

“We’ve used Product-Person Bias to humanise our agent, minimise friction, and design in warm Peak-Ends to create trust in our outcomes...even if it takes us a bit longer.”

"Behavioural insights act like a cheat-code to rationalize seemingly irrational behaviour.

In finance, combining this understanding with a holistic view of our customers' personal circumstances today and goals tomorrow enables us to influence and support better short and long-term financial decisions."

"...you must think like a scientist.
This is Curiosity.

You must act like an engineer.
This is Technicality.

You must feel like an artist.
This is Creativity.

You must behave like a teacher.
This is Articulating.

And you must walk like a user.
This is Empathy."

"Combining behavioural tools with approaches from other fields - such as cultural psychology and anthropology - help to triangulate your interventions and create context sensitive impact."

Behavioral insights aren’t just about understanding people—they’re about empowering brands to speak the same language as their customers.

If brands can master this art, they can create experiences that feel deeply personal and authentic, not transactional.

There are limitless opportunities for leading companies to have customers feel their brand values and tone of voice in ways they hadn't anticipated, by artfully using behavioural insights."

"Our shift to a lifestyle that emphasizes autonomy has unwittingly but inevitably sacrificed the connections that keep our life in balance.

Autonomy without connection-the very dynamic that characterizes modern society-creates what I call sad success stories; people whose achievements feel hollow and unsatisfying because they don't have a tight network of friends to share them with."

"Every time we design something, we’re simulating how people will respond.

But our mental simulations are biased—we assume others think and act like we do. Behavioral science helps us see beyond our own perspective."

"Take control of novel environments to constrain or remove bad behaviours.

For example:

Live on the fourth floor of a building with no elevator.

Auto-deduct pension payments from your salary.

Don't take your credit card to Las Vegas.

Delete the day-trading app from your phone.

Get a parking permit a mile from your office.

Don't get the key to the hotel minibar.

Move to Singapore (to stop taking drugs)."