Behavioral Scientist

10/08/2025

Happening Today! — How Can We Continue to Innovate in Behavioral Design? with Piyush Tantia

Today, we'll speak with Piyush Tantia, former founding executive director and chief innovation officer at ideas42, about how we can continue to innovate in behavioral design. Full info: https://behavioralscientist.org/event-2025-frontiers-conversation-series/ -tantia

10/04/2025

In this weekend’s read from the archive, Katie Hoemann and Batja Mesquita reveal how limited our study of emotion has been—and where we could look to correct that.

The Hadza don’t talk about emotion the way psychologists were used to. To capture human emotion in all its richness, we have to broaden where and how we study it.

09/27/2025

Your weekend read, from the archive:

Why are some cultures more emotionally expressive than others? One explanation, Ryan Hampton and Paula Niedenthal write, could be that overt emotion helped people overcome diverse linguistic and cultural barriers.

Why are some cultures more emotionally expressive than others? One explanation could be that overt emotion helped people overcome diverse linguistic and cultural barriers.

09/20/2025

In this weekend’s read from the archive: People often think recycling is the place where they can have the greatest environmental impact. This misperception lets wasteful companies off the hook, write Patrick I. Hancock and Michaela Barnett.

For many people, recycling seems like the place where they can have the greatest impact on the waste stream. This misperception lets wasteful companies off the hook.

09/13/2025

In this weekend’s read from the archive, Evan Nesterak interviews Nobel Prize winner Simon Johnson about the relationship between technological progress and prosperity, including how societies have made these choices in the past.

We speak with Nobel Prize winner Simon Johnson about the relationship between technological progress and prosperity, including how societies have made these choices in the past and what our decisions about the current wave of AI could mean for our future.

09/06/2025

Americans Are Overworked. Could AI Change That? — AI promises to help us get more done in less time. It’s an opportunity to reverse the trend of American overwork, but powerful structural factors stand in the way.

AI promises to help us get more done in less time. It’s an opportunity to reverse the trend of American overwork, but powerful structural factors stand in the way.

09/06/2025

Questions of who we are or what we’re worth can send us into a tailspin. But the very same processes that pull us down can propel us up, too.

Why We Spiral By Gregory M. Walton

Questions of who we are or what we’re worth can send us into a tailspin. But the very same processes that pull us down can propel us up, too.

09/06/2025

Your weekend read, from the archive: Michael Muthukrishna and Evan Nesterak explore whether energy is the sine qua non of understanding the human world.

The common constraint for all life is the ability to find and use energy, yet we take it for granted, says Michael Muthukrishna. In his new book, he makes the case that energy should be central in how we understand ourselves and how we design our world.

09/05/2025

"Without enough alone time, I feel disconnected from myself. But too much alone time makes me feel like I’m losing part of myself, too—the part of me that comes alive when I’m with other people."

The Art of Balancing Solitude and Connection By Elizabeth Weingarten

Without enough alone time, I feel disconnected from myself. But too much alone time makes me feel like I’m losing part of myself, too—the part of me that comes alive when I’m with other people.

09/05/2025

Many leaders mistakenly believe that their organizations thrive under constant pressure. But overloaded systems are broken systems—to fix them, we must learn our way to the right amount of work.

How to Rescue an Overloaded Organization by Nelson P. Repenning and Donald C. Kieffer —

Many leaders mistakenly believe that their organizations thrive under constant pressure. But overloaded systems are broken systems—to fix them, we must learn our way to the right amount of work.

08/30/2025

In this weekend’s read from the archive, Evan Nesterak and Michael Muthukrishna plumb a sweeping “theory of everyone,” a possible key to advancing social and behavioral science.

Michael Muthukrishna wants to integrate the science of human beings, from genes to culture to our environments, into ‘a theory of everyone.’ Doing so, he says, is key to advancing social and behavioral science.

08/23/2025

In this weekend’s read from the archive, Rory Sutherland makes the case that a little bu****it makes behavioral science better.

BS (behavioral science) without creativity—indeed BS without a tiny little whiff of BS (meaning bu****it)—is actually suboptimal.