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Speaker 1: Pushkin, this is solvable. I'm Ronald Young Junior. What do

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Speaker 1: you get when you put a behavioral scientist in the

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Speaker 1: room with policymakers? Every program in policy has a default

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Speaker 1: design that will influence people one way or the other.

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Speaker 1: If that behavioral scientist is Maya Shankar, you may get

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Speaker 1: an analysis of how our complicated human minds impact our

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Speaker 1: participation in government programs. We are influenced by some very

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Speaker 1: surprising factors that ought to not influence our decisions, but

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Speaker 1: absolutely do. Effective government policies are tricky things to get right.

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Speaker 1: To begin with, there's lobbying and then rigorous debate around

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Speaker 1: whether a policy or program should exist at all. That's

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Speaker 1: followed by, as we've seen recently, a lot of argument

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Speaker 1: about how much money to spend. But once the budget

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Speaker 1: has been settled and the money allocated to federal programs,

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Speaker 1: there's the important step of designing programs that truly serve

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Speaker 1: the people and reach them, and that's where studying human

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Speaker 1: behavior can help. Small changes can be the difference between

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Speaker 1: successful engagement or a low participation rate. So the government

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Speaker 1: ended up leveraging an insight known as the power of defaults,

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Speaker 1: and basically it changed the school Lunch program from an

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Speaker 1: opt in program to an opt out program. The National

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Speaker 1: School Lunch Program reaches nearly thirty million children each year.

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Speaker 1: Thanks to smart, sometimes seemingly subtle changes like these, millions

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Speaker 1: more Americans may be making the most of government programs,

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Speaker 1: from farmers to veterans to college age students. Behavioral science

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Speaker 1: is the study of how and why we make decisions,

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Speaker 1: as well as how we develop our attitudes and beliefs

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Speaker 1: about the world. Maya Shankar is the host of the

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Speaker 1: podcast A Slight Change of Plans, and she founded the

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Speaker 1: White House's Behavioral Science Team, serving as an advisor during

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Speaker 1: the Obama administration to help develop strategy and implement government

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Speaker 1: policies by studying behavioral factors that influence decision making. Better

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Speaker 1: implementation of government policy is solvable but the help of

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Speaker 1: behavioral science. I think if you'd asked me as a

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Speaker 1: little kid, what do you want to be when you

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Speaker 1: grow up? I would have definitely not said cognitive scientists

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Speaker 1: because I had no idea what it was. I was

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Speaker 1: actually a violinist growing up. That was my passion. I

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Speaker 1: started playing when I was six years old, and I

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Speaker 1: really got on the speed train when I was nine

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Speaker 1: and started studying at the Juilliard School of Music in

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Speaker 1: New York. And then when I was a teenager, It's

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Speaker 1: a pearlman asked me to be his private violence student,

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Speaker 1: and so at that point I thought, Wow, I've gotten

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Speaker 1: a vote of confidence from the person I think is

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Speaker 1: the best violinist in the world. I might actually have

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Speaker 1: what it takes. Very Unfortunately, I had a sudden injury

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Speaker 1: in my left hand that basically ended my career overnight

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Speaker 1: when I was fifteen. So how did you make the

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Speaker 1: pivot from violinists to behavioral scientists. I was forced to

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Speaker 1: explore other avenues and other paths In that summer before college,

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Speaker 1: when I was supposed to be touring in China with

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Speaker 1: my friends Ronald and instead I was helping my parents

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Speaker 1: clean their basement. So equally cool summer situation, but I

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Speaker 1: ended up discovering a book on how the mind works.

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Speaker 1: I remember thinking, oh, my gosh, I had no idea

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Speaker 1: just how complicated our mental systems are and what goes

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Speaker 1: behind our ability to make decisions and learn language and

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Speaker 1: you know, interact with the world and the way that

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Speaker 1: we do. And I was just a light bulb moment

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Speaker 1: for me where I realized, I think this is what

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Speaker 1: I want to do. I think this is what I

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Speaker 1: want to study, because I felt completely in all of

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Speaker 1: the human mind. And you did it. You went through

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Speaker 1: a lot of schooling to immerse yourself in this stuff.

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Speaker 1: You studied with esteemed cognitive psychologist Lori Santo said, Yeo,

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Speaker 1: also a Pushkin co worker. Went on to get a

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Speaker 1: PhD and do a post doc and join the ranks

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Speaker 1: in academia. But after a number of years involved with

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Speaker 1: the research side of things, you realize that you didn't

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Speaker 1: love it. You know. It was like an o explotive moment.

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Speaker 1: What do I do next? And I actually ended up

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Speaker 1: calling up my underground advisor and I called her and

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Speaker 1: I said, Laurie, so, I know I've been doing this

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Speaker 1: whole you know, want to be a professor thing for

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Speaker 1: some time because I really admire you. But I actually

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Speaker 1: don't want to do that anymore. I'm thinking of becoming

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Speaker 1: a general management consultant. And Laurie, you could hear a

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Speaker 1: did not invest all this time into my student for

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Speaker 1: her to leave my field. And so she said okay,

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Speaker 1: before she was very gentle before you explore that path, Maya,

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Speaker 1: I just want to let you know that there's incredible

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Speaker 1: work happening in the Obama White House right now that

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Speaker 1: is helping low income kids get access to free lunch.

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Speaker 1: But there's no actual job that hiring for. There's no

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Speaker 1: They're not like, yeah, we want to hire a behavioral scientist.

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Speaker 1: So I end up sending a cold email to a

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Speaker 1: former Obama advisor, Cass Sunstein, and I say, hey, Cass, like,

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Speaker 1: I'm Maya, I'm a post doc, i have no public

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Speaker 1: policy experience, and I've published nothing of significance, but I'd

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Speaker 1: really love to work at the intersection of behavioral science

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Speaker 1: and policy. Thankfully, he ignored all the insecurities seeping out

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Speaker 1: of my email and immediately got back to me and said,

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Speaker 1: let me connect you with Obama's science advisor and let

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Speaker 1: him know that I sent you along. And so within days,

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Speaker 1: Ronald like this was a crazy life change for me.

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Speaker 1: I was interviewing with Obama officials, pitching them on the

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Speaker 1: idea of creating a new position for me in which

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Speaker 1: I could translate insights about human behavior into the design

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Speaker 1: of public policy. So I packed up my bags and

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Speaker 1: I moved to DC, and you know, I started my

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Speaker 1: job at the White House at the beginning of Obama's

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Speaker 1: second term. Can you talk a little bit about what

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Speaker 1: behavioral factors are, what that looks like, and give a

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Speaker 1: few examples on how that played into the work that

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Speaker 1: you actually did. Behavioral science is the study of how

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Speaker 1: and why we make decisions, as well as how we

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Speaker 1: develop our attitudes and beliefs about the world. And the

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Speaker 1: reason why this field is so important in the context

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Speaker 1: of public policy making is that it reveals that we

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Speaker 1: are influenced by some very surprising factors that ought to

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Speaker 1: not influence our decisions, but absolutely do, sometimes outside of

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Speaker 1: our conscious awareness. So let me give you a concrete example.

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Speaker 1: I think we'd all like to believe that when we

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Speaker 1: go into a voting booth, we'll end up voting for

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Speaker 1: the person we'd most like to see elected into office. Right,

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Speaker 1: That's pretty common sense. But research shows that the order

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Speaker 1: in which the candidate's names appear on a ballot can

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Speaker 1: exert a significant influence on our voting behavior, and so

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Speaker 1: when public policymakers become aware of this bias, they can

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Speaker 1: in turn design a solution, namely to randomize the order

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Speaker 1: in which the candidate's names appear across ballot. When you

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Speaker 1: don't appreciate that these factors are actually informing decisions, then

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Speaker 1: you might be engaging in suboptimal policy design. So my

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Speaker 1: intention joining the White House was to make sure that

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Speaker 1: we were designing public policies with our best understanding of

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Speaker 1: human behavior in mind. So, talk a little bit about

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Speaker 1: the work you did in those early days of the

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Speaker 1: second Obama administration. How did you figure out which policies

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Speaker 1: needed the help of behavioral science. I was knocking on

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Speaker 1: every single door saying, you know what problems are you

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Speaker 1: already trying to solve? Now, let me brainstorm how the

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Speaker 1: tools in my toolbox can help you achieve those goals.

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Speaker 1: So a good example of this is in an early

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Speaker 1: meeting I met with the Department of Veterans Affairs, and

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Speaker 1: they had built up this program that was trying to

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Speaker 1: help veterans reacclimate to civilian life after their time overseas,

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Speaker 1: and that transition, as you might know, can be very

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Speaker 1: challenging and fraught with lots of struggles. We ended up

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Speaker 1: changing just one word in an email marketing message about

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Speaker 1: the program, instead of telling veterans that they were eligible

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Speaker 1: for the program, we simply reminded them that they had

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Speaker 1: earned it through their years of service, and that one

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Speaker 1: word change led to a nine percent increase in access

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Speaker 1: to the veterans program. And it was based on a

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Speaker 1: behavioral science insight called the endowment effect, which basically says

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Speaker 1: that we value things more when we feel that we

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Speaker 1: own them or have earned them, and that again led

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Speaker 1: to a groundswell of activity and excitement for this work.

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Speaker 1: May do you think that your work is a result

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Speaker 1: of suboptimal policy making or suboptimal policy enacting. So the

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Speaker 1: policies themselves were fantastic, but there was a there was

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Speaker 1: an implementation gap, right. We weren't thinking about accessibility, availability

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Speaker 1: of the program, what it means in real life to

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Speaker 1: engage with the government in this way. Another name that

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Speaker 1: they had for your team was the Nudge Unit, And

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Speaker 1: when I read that, I was like, I don't want

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Speaker 1: to be nudged. I'm not trying to be nudged in

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Speaker 1: any direction, especially when it comes to the government. But

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Speaker 1: you talking about it being about policy implementation kind of

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Speaker 1: makes me understand it a little bit more. But what

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Speaker 1: would you say to detractors that say, I don't like

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Speaker 1: this policy. I don't want to be nudged into doing it,

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Speaker 1: and now they're using government science trickery in order to

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Speaker 1: get me to do it. I don't feel good about that.

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Speaker 1: How would you respond to those folks? Yeah, well, first

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Speaker 1: I would say there's no default less state of the world.

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Speaker 1: And what I mean by that is every program and

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Speaker 1: policy has a default design that will influence people one

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Speaker 1: way or the other. If you're a veteran and you're

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Speaker 1: asked to fill out a burdens and application form that

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Speaker 1: requires referencing fifteen different resources, well that's a default too.

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Speaker 1: That's a nudge too, right, And chances are those requirements

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Speaker 1: are nudging veterans away from accessing a program that can

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Speaker 1: actually be in their benefit. But nudges will not work

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Speaker 1: for people who don't want to take the action. An

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Speaker 1: example of this is, you know, sending an email reminder

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Speaker 1: about in rolling in a retirement savings plan will make

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Speaker 1: a difference for a military service member who wants to

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Speaker 1: enroll but just needs a reminder. It will not make

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Speaker 1: a difference for someone who doesn't want to enroll because,

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Speaker 1: for example, they want to use the money to make

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Speaker 1: a down payment on a home or they just want

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Speaker 1: the disposable income. So I think it's really important for

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Speaker 1: listeners to understand behavioral science is not a silver bullet, right.

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Speaker 1: It helps to enable people to reach their long term

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Speaker 1: goals who are seeking that long term goal, but it

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Speaker 1: will not make a difference for those who don't want

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Speaker 1: in So, how do you decide that your approach is

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Speaker 1: helping enough people to bother doing it? Leadership and government

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Speaker 1: and in the White House put in a lot of

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Speaker 1: effort to figure out, you know, what are our goals

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Speaker 1: for this year. Then we wanted to make sure that

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Speaker 1: we were responding to those goals and we were leveraging

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Speaker 1: what we knew from behavioral science to help them achieve

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Speaker 1: those goals more effectively. So this might involve helping student

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Speaker 1: loan borrowers repay their loans in a more effective way

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Speaker 1: or understand what their options are, or helping farmers get

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Speaker 1: access to loans with the US Department of Agriculture. And

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Speaker 1: then we would also look at other factors. How many

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Speaker 1: people are we going to be able to help through

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Speaker 1: this project? Right, are we operating in the millions? Because

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Speaker 1: if so, yes, that makes a lot of sense for

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Speaker 1: us to work on. And then we also wanted to

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Speaker 1: make sure that the outcome that we are trying to

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Speaker 1: change was significant from a policy perspective. So things like

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Speaker 1: helping workers find jobs, getting more people to sign up

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Speaker 1: for clean energy plans, or health insurance, these are all

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Speaker 1: outcomes that are of huge significance. Some of the policy

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Speaker 1: solutions I've read about, which come from studying human behavior,

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Speaker 1: kind of sound like common sense. Talking to students telling

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Speaker 1: them to sign them for class by text message, having

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Speaker 1: the opt in program or the opt out program. Do

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Speaker 1: you think that it's necessary to have a government team

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Speaker 1: dedicated to behavioral science for these policy tweaks to actually

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Speaker 1: be implemented, Like I'm imagining if I'm a member of Congress, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and I'm looking at this line item for this team,

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Speaker 1: I'm wondering, do we need a whole team to carry

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Speaker 1: out little tweaks like this? Yeah? So I think one is,

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Speaker 1: you know, some of these insights can absolutely seem like

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Speaker 1: common sense after the fact, but the reality is that

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Speaker 1: they weren't being implemented in our absence. And it's also

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Speaker 1: important to note that behavioral science is a very context

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Speaker 1: specific space to work in. Not all insights will work

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Speaker 1: in all areas. And you need trained behavioral scientists in

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Speaker 1: order to make the right prescriptions, right to design meaningful

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Speaker 1: experiments to teach us what is working in what context

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Speaker 1: in the ideal world some decades from now. It would

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Speaker 1: be amazing if our team was rendered obsolete because agencies

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Speaker 1: were just hiring the relevant people with the relevant skill

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Speaker 1: sets to do this work. As a matter of course,

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Speaker 1: just good government, that is the goal to drive yourself

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Speaker 1: out of existence. But at the time, and it continues

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Speaker 1: to be the case today because the team is very

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Speaker 1: much still around and the Biden administration and was around

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Speaker 1: during the Trump administration doing great work to help you

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Speaker 1: on topics like the opioid epidemic and wildfires and whatnot.

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Speaker 1: It's important to sometimes have these dedicated teams that are

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Speaker 1: exclusively focused on the particular goal of translating human behavioral

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Speaker 1: insights into public policy improvements, because otherwise it's too easy

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Speaker 1: for it to get ignored. How do we apply these

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Speaker 1: ideas when there's not a dedicated office, Like, how would

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Speaker 1: state and localities apply some of these principles. Well, the

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Speaker 1: nice thing is actually there's been a flurry of activity

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Speaker 1: in state and local government in which nudge units are sprouting.

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Speaker 1: So lots of state and local governments now have their

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Speaker 1: own nudge units or they are using insights from behavioral science.

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Speaker 1: But there's no one size fits all approach with behavioral science.

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Speaker 1: You can't just say, oh, here are my favorite ten insights,

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Speaker 1: let me just apply them to all the policies and

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Speaker 1: programs there. There is a rigorous science behind it, and

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Speaker 1: you need to make sure that you do have experts

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Speaker 1: who are looking at those optimal translations. Is there anything

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Speaker 1: our listeners can do if they want to, If they

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Speaker 1: they're listening to this and they're like, man, I want

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Speaker 1: more science in government, I want to inject more What

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Speaker 1: do you, well, what can they do to help if

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Speaker 1: they want to be a part of this now? So

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Speaker 1: I would say, like, the bible of behavioral science and

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Speaker 1: policy is this book called Nudge. And actually Richard Taylor

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Speaker 1: and Cass Sunstein, the authors of this book, came out

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Speaker 1: with a final edition version just recently. It actually references

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Speaker 1: the work that's happened in the UK and the United

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Speaker 1: States to try to increase the translation of behavioral science

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Speaker 1: into policy. So I would send listeners to that book

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Speaker 1: first and foremost on my podcast, A slight change of Plans.

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Speaker 1: I had a chance to interview some science experts where

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Speaker 1: we talk about the science behind changing people's minds with

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Speaker 1: folks like Adam Grant, the science of behavior change with

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Speaker 1: doctor Katie Milkman, and I would point folks to those

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Speaker 1: specific episodes because I think it's a really nice primer

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Speaker 1: for where the science is at right now when it

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Speaker 1: comes to human behavior. Maya, thank you so much for

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Speaker 1: being with us today. Thanks so much for having me Ronald.

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Speaker 1: It was so much fun to chat with you. Doctor

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Speaker 1: Maya Shankar is the founder of the White House's Behavioral

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Speaker 1: Science Team. She served as a senior advisor in the

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Speaker 1: Obama White House. In twenty sixteen, Shanker served as the

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Speaker 1: first Behavioral Science Advisor to the United Nations under Bond

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Speaker 1: Ki Moon. She's also the host of A Slight Change

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Speaker 1: of Plans, another great Pushkin podcast. You should check it out.

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Speaker 1: It's available everywhere you listen. Solvable is produced by Jocelyn Frank,

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Speaker 1: research by David Jack, booking by Lisa Dunn. Special thanks

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Speaker 1: to Keishell Williams. Our managing producer is Sasha Matthias, and

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Speaker 1: our executive producer is Mia LaBelle. I'm Ronald Young Jr.

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Speaker 1: Thanks for listening,