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  • Blog
  • 26th Feb 2016

People: peers, pain and power

One of the most fascinating and important areas in life is surely the fine line between wanting to help, and being wary of, those around us. It’s a tension woven deeply into policy and into our humanity. Recently I had one of those afternoons where an accident of meetings seemed…

  • Blog
  • 4th Mar 2016

How can a letter encourage us to pay our parking fines?

Like death and taxes, parking tickets are a fact of life - especially in urban areas. While no driver likes seeing that slip of paper tucked under their windshield wiper, parking tickets serve important functions - like keeping busy roadways free of impediments and making parking fair to all drivers.…

  • Blog
  • 18th Mar 2016

Sugar tax: how will it affect behaviour?

One of the most striking announcements in this week’s UK budget was the introduction of a new ‘soft drinks levy’ (quickly dubbed the sugar tax), which will come into force in 2018. New taxes aren’t usually associated with the Behavioural Insights Team - partly because BIT’s preference is to find…

  • Blog
  • 22nd Mar 2016

Five factors for supporting people to take a more active role in health and wellbeing

Today we launch a report, as part of the Realising the Value consortium, that aims to show how people themselves can take more active roles in their own health and care. They, along with their communities, can create self-care routines which boost health and wellbeing. The potential value of this…

  • Blog
  • 4th Apr 2016

The Power of Thank You

From an early age our parents remind us to say “thank you”. But what is the impact of these words? Are employees more productive if thanked for their hard work? Does thanking people for charitable donations encourage them to keep giving? Over the past year, we’ve started to see a…

  • Blog
  • 29th Apr 2016

Behavioural Insights and Healthier Lives: our new report with VicHealth

Public health is about as behavioural as it gets. The leading causes of death are dominated by behavioural and lifestyle factors: smoking, diet, alcohol consumption, accidents, but also more subtle behavioural factors such as how we relate to and support each other. The Australians have long been seen as leaders…

  • Blog
  • 26th May 2016

Applying behavioural insights to regulated markets

It’s clear that regulated markets are not currently delivering the best outcomes for UK consumers. In the UK, we are collectively overpaying for mobile phone contracts by £355 million a year and almost 9.5 million households would be able to save over £300 each year by switching energy provider. In…

  • Blog
  • 7th Jul 2016

Corruption: Can a behavioural approach shift the dial?

The first global summit on anti-corruption was held in London in May. The summit brought together world leaders, businesses, academics, civil society and international organisations to discuss the practical steps that could be taken to tackle corruption across the world. Here at BIT, we think that behavioural science can make…

  • Blog
  • 8th Aug 2016

Counting Calories: A new report from BIT on the problems with official statistics on calorie intake, and how they can be solved

Without reliable statistics, we can’t know what progress we are making towards achieving our societal goals. If we are trying to improve educational outcomes, we need to know how pupils are performing. If we want to cut down congestion, we need to understand how busy the roads are. And if…

  • Blog
  • 10th Aug 2016

Honouring the political

One of those déjà vu stories has been running over the past couple of weeks. A Prime Minister departs, and in their wake a number of Ministers and their advisers. The departing Prime Minister recommends for honours a number of those who have worked loyally for them and the Party.…