Behaviour Change and Psychological Governance

至少自2004年以来，“行为改变”已成为英国和其他地方政策制定者、研究人员和从业人员的优先事项。行为改变倡议利用微妙的心理、空间或行政提示，鼓励人们就其健康、幸福、财富和环境作出更好的决定。例子包括默认选择加入养老金，器官捐赠的推定同意建议，在人们家中使用智能电表，以及精心设计的空间安排，以促进可持续旅行。这些政策借鉴了行为经济学、神经科学和心理学等研究学科的见解，最近受到了上议院科学和技术特别委员会的民主审查，也成为许多媒体评论的话题，探讨“保姆国家”和心理操纵的指控。这一系列研讨会旨在调查有关行为改变的争论中尚未得到解答的方面以及心理学在治理技术中的应用。具体而言，我们对心理治理形式对国家人口和特定社会群体的影响了解不够。我们也不知道，如果行为改变的替代方案是通过参与性、观察性或解释性的社会科学方法，而不是经济学或行为科学方法来提供信息，那么它们会是什么样子。研讨会将制定一种新的方法，在更广泛的背景下评估行为改变议程-与我们对大脑，思想，行为和自我的文化观念如何变化有关。来自政治学、社会政策、批判心理学、批判神经科学、哲学和人文地理学等一系列职业阶段的国际和英国学术参与者将与致力于各种行为改变倡议的非学术政策制定者和从业者进行交流。他们将确定当前政策对积极心理学、幸福感、心理学、心理学和社会学等特定分支的热情所带来的实际、政治和研究挑战。幸福、繁荣和“正念”。他们将研究两个原始的方面：（a）累积效应，或意想不到的后果，心理学在公共政策中的使用，和（B）的基本假设和原则，他们的基础。7研讨会将在两年多的时间里在阿伯里斯特威斯，伯明翰，布里斯托，和达勒姆，和1将由合作变革社会企业，兰开夏郡主办。研讨会将探讨：-行为科学和心理学如何改变了我们对决策者可用的工具和技术的想法;-我们设计的公共和私人空间如何受到神经科学知识的影响;-心理学方法如何促使我们重新思考我们的人格和文化概念;-这些观点如何应用于公共卫生和环保政策领域。其中一个研讨会将是一个专门的“暑期学校”，让研究生在一个更非正式的环境中，以更直接与自己的研究项目相关的方式参与研究主题，但借鉴了Co-Is在这方面的经验。该系列研讨会的一个关键目标是将关于行为改变的政治和伦理的理论观点与实际改变行为的更实际需求结合起来，以确定行为改变研究和实践所面临的主要未来挑战。研讨会的成果将发表在学术刊物、编辑手册、政策简报和专业出版物上。该系列的评论和论文将通过一个网站提供，而思想作品将在一个开放评论的博客上提供。该网站还将作为与会者在研讨会休会期间保持联系的一种手段，并将在资金到位后继续存在。

'Behaviour Change' has become a priority for policy makers, researchers and practitioners in the UK and elsewhere since at least 2004. Behaviour Change initiatives use subtle psychological, spatial or administrative prompts to encourage people to make better decisions concerning their health, happiness, wealth and the environment. Examples include default opt-in to pensions, proposals for presumed consent for organ donation, the use of smart energy meters in people's homes, and the arrangement of carefully designed spaces to facilitate sustainable travel. Drawing on insights from research disciplines such as behavioural economics, neuroscience and psychology, these policies have been subject to recent democratic scrutiny by the House of Lords Science and Technology Select Committee, as well as being the topic of much media commentary, exploring charges of the 'nanny state' and psychological manipulation.This seminar series aims to investigate as yet unanswered aspects of the debate over Behaviour Change and the use of psychology in techniques of governing. Specifically, we do not know enough about the effects of psychological forms of governance on national populations and specific social groups. Nor do we know what alternatives to Behaviour Change might look like if they were informed by participatory, observational or interpretive social science methods rather than economistic or behavioural science approaches. The seminars will develop a new approach for evaluating the Behaviour Change agenda in its wider context - in relation to how our cultural ideas about the brain, mind, behaviour and self are changing. International and UK based academic participants at a range of career stages from political science, social policy, critical psychology, critical neuroscience, philosophy and human geography will engage with non-academic policy makers and practitioners working on various Behaviour Change initiatives.They will identify the practical, political and research challenges posed by the current policy enthusiasm for particular branches of positive psychology, wellbeing, happiness, flourishing and 'mindfulness'. They will examine two original aspects: (a) the cumulative effect, or unintended consequences of the use of psychology in public policy, and (b) the underlying assumptions and principles on which they are based.7 seminars will be held over two years at Aberystwyth, Birmingham, Bristol, and Durham, and 1 will be hosted by Collaborative Change social enterprise, Lancashire. The seminars will explore:- how behavioural science and psychology have changed our ideas about the tools and techniques which are available to policy makers;- how the public and private spaces we design are influenced by neuroscientific knowledge;- how psychological approaches have urged us to rethink our conceptions of personhood and culture;- how such perspectives can be applied in the fields of public health and pro-environmental policies. One of the seminars will be a dedicated 'summer school' to allow postgraduate students to engage with the research themes in ways more directly related to their own research projects in a more informal setting, but drawing on the experience of Co-Is in this area. A key objective of the seminar series is to bring theoretical perspectives on the politics and ethics of Behaviour Change together with the more practical demands of actually changing behaviours in order to identify major future challenges facing research on and practice of Behaviour Change. Outputs from the seminars will be published in academic journals, an edited handbook, as policy briefings and in professional publications. Commentary and papers from the series will be made available through a website and thinkpieces will be provided publically on a blog open to comments. The website will also act as a means of maintaining contact between participants in between the seminars and will outlive the funding.