How much does human behavior influence climate change? Can it be changed, and how? In June, climate change experts and behavioral scientists came together to answer these important questions.
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Articles on Human behavior
Displaying 1 - 20 of 32 articles
A new study doubles the age of ancient DNA in sub-Saharan Africa, revealing how people moved, mingled and had children together over the last 50,000 years.
New research shows that though we are good at making healthy choices for those we care for, we are often subsequently less good at taking care of ourselves.
Behavioral economics, long employed in grocery stores to guide customers to certain products, could be employed by food banks and pantries to encourage healthier choices.
Researchers unearthed the 105,000-year-old artefacts from a spiritual site in southern Africa. Although far from the coast, the area is associated with stories of a great water snake.
Public health recommendations have always been a hard sell. Resistance to new behaviors – like the mask-wearing and social distancing advised during the COVID-19 pandemic – is part of human nature.
The footprints of over 20 different prehistoric people, pressed into volcanic ash thousands of years ago in Tanzania, show possible evidence for sexual division of labor in this ancient community.
Faced with uncertain and anxious times, brains send out instructions to start stockpiling supplies – whether you’re a person facing a pandemic, or a rodent prepping for a long winter.
Using a survey taken from March 10 – March 16, social scientists tried to untangle the complicated connection between feelings of vulnerability and behavior change in response to the coronavirus.
People who act holier than thou aren’t necessarily better than the rest of us. In fact, their moral grandstanding may be driving society apart.
It’s incredibly difficult to will away bad habits. But two simple strategies can make things easier.
Where do the cooperative skills that hold together human societies come from and why don’t our selfish instincts overwhelm them? Evolutionary game theory suggests that empathy is a crucial contributor.
Americans are spending almost three and a half hours on their phones and tablets every day, twice the amount just five years ago. A behavioral scientist offers a few tips on how to take control.
Ninety percent of psychology studies come from countries representing less than 15 percent of the world’s population. Researchers are realizing that universalizing those findings might not make sense.
Law professor Cass Sunstein, on why behavioural science is always nudging us.
The Conversation20.5 MB (download)
Governments and businesses are using "nudges" to influence our choices, but how? On this podcast episode, Cass Sunstein, a Harvard professor who wrote the book on nudges, unpacks behavioural science.
Our social institutions and politics suffer from a collective arrested development – and our relationship to technology has only exacerbated this trend.
Forty years ago, Rebecca Moore’s two sisters helped plan the Jonestown massacre. But she refuses to say they were brainwashed, arguing that it prevents us from truly understanding their behavior.
Research on proactive behavior shows it can help people perform better at their jobs. A failure to do so can be even more consequential.
It was long thought that humans everywhere favor pointing with the index finger. But some fieldwork out of Papua New Guinea identified a group of people who prefer to scrunch their noses.
Predicting human behavior is big business. But science may never be able to do so with perfect certainty.
Top contributors
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University Professor, Harvard University
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Lecturer, University of Maryland
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Harvard University
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Professor of Advertising, University of Florida
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Professor Emeritus of Organizational Behavior, University of Virginia
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PhD Candidate in Communications, University of Florida
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Professor of Communication & Director of the School of Communication, The Ohio State University
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Ph.D. candidate in Psychology, Stanford University
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PhD Researcher, Nature and Function of Human Nonverbal Vocalisations, University of Sussex
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Professor and Department Chair of Psychology, Lebanon Valley College
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Research fellow, BehaviourWorks Australia, Monash Sustainable Development Institute, Monash University
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Professor of Public Policy, Psychology and Behavioral Science, USC Sol Price School of Public Policy, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
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Postdoctoral Researcher of Evolutionary Biology, University of Pennsylvania
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Dwight F. Benton Professor of Marketing, University of Michigan
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Emerita Provost Professor of Psychology and Business, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
