Designing for Behavior Change

Appendix B. Resources to Learn More

Resources on Behavior and Decision Making

This book provides an overview of the literature on behavior change and decision making. But it isn’t comprehensive: the literature is simply too vast, and most of it doesn’t apply when designing products for behavior change. If you’d like to learn more, though, here are some great resources to inspire your work and spur new ideas.

Resources on Applying the Mind’s Shortcuts to Design

BJ Fogg’s Persuasive Technology and Behavior Model

BJ is the father of contemporary product-mediated behavior change. He founded the field of persuasive technology—the use of computers to persuade—in the 1990s ([ref66]). More recently, he’s developed a model of what’s required for intentional behavior to occur (the Fogg Behavior Model) and a method for building habits (Tiny Habits). There’s a lot more out there, but his work is a good place to start thinking about these issues.

Here is a list of his writings and websites:

• Fogg Behavior Model (http://behaviormodel.org/): motivation, ability, and a trigger are needed for intentional behaviors.

• Behavior Grid (http://behaviorgrid.org/): a typology of 15 types of behaviors, with guides on how they can be changed, based on the frequency of the behavior, and whether it is to be started, stopped, increased, or decreased.

• Fogg’s Persuasive Technology Lab at Stanford (http://captology.stanford.edu/), where Fogg is a half-time professor. The site has links to numerous videos and articles.

• Fogg’s ...