Behavioural Design is revolutionizing the way we design digital products and services. Take, for example, a digital insurance company that increased completion of its sign-up process by 30% simply by reducing the number of steps and adding reassuring microcopy at key moments. This intervention, based on Behavioural Design principles, activated users’ automatic decision-making mechanisms, eliminating cognitive friction and increasing trust. Understanding how people make decisions is no longer a luxury, but a strategic lever for those who design experiences.<\/p>\n
Building on neuroscientific and behavioral discoveries, Behavioural Design leverages people’s automatic decision-making mechanisms (what Daniel Kahneman called “System 1”) to design experiences that guide the user to action. But doing so ethically is essential. In this article we will explore what Behavioural Design is, how it works, how it is applied and why it can radically improve the effectiveness of Experience Design.<\/p>\n
Behavioural Design is a design approach that integrates behavioral sciences into the design of products, services and experiences, with the aim of influencing user behavior. It is based on “System 1”, the automatic, fast and emotional part of the human brain, responsible for most daily decisions (up to 35,000 a day, according to some estimates).<\/p>\n
Daniel Kahneman, Nobel laureate in economics, described the brain as made up of two systems:<\/p>\n
Behavioural Design acts mainly on System 1, designing stimuli and microinteractions that speak directly to the user’s intuition, facilitating decisions and actions<\/a>.<\/p>\n Human behavior is often governed by habits. The CAR model (Cue\u2013Action\u2013Reward) is one of the most widely used to analyze and build such habits:<\/p>\n An effective example of the CAR model in practice is the Headspace app. This meditation platform uses daily notifications (cue) to prompt the user, offers short, simple sessions (action), and provides emotional and symbolic rewards (badges, progress tracking, perceived well-being).<\/p>\n An effective Behavioural Design project can be broken down into three phases:<\/p>\n Designing to influence behaviors carries a responsibility<\/a>. Here are eight ethical principles to respect:<\/p>\n The Fogg Behavior Model<\/strong><\/a>, developed by BJ Fogg (Stanford University), states that a behavior occurs only when the following converge:<\/p>\n If even just one of these elements is missing, the behavior does not occur.<\/p>\n Behavioural Design applies effectively in many areas of Experience Design:<\/p>\n Concrete examples:<\/p>\n At Then we integrate Behavioural Design into our Experience Design projects, starting from a solid foundation of research and analysis. Our method includes:<\/p>\n Some concrete results:<\/p>\n These data show that Behavioural Design, when applied correctly, improves both the user experience and business metrics.<\/p>\n Behavioural Design is not a fad, but a strategic lever for those who want to design experiences that are effective, ethical and results-oriented. It is the bridge between scientific knowledge of human behavior and the design of everyday interactions.<\/p>\n Want to find out how to apply it concretely to your projects? Book an introductory call<\/a> with one of our experts to get a first personalized consultation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Cue-Action-Reward model and cognitive biases applied to designing behaviors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":17600,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_title":"Behavioural design: what it is, models and principles","rank_math_description":"What behavioural design is, which models explain people's choices and how to apply them without manipulating.","rank_math_focus_keyword":"behavioural design","fonti_articolo":" An insurance company increased completed policies by 30% by removing steps and adding reassuring microcopy at the right points. No new features.<\/p>\n Behavioural design works on automatic decision-making mechanisms, what Kahneman calls System 1.<\/p>\n The Cue, Action, Reward model and Fogg's model, the three-phase process from behavioral diagnosis to biases to experimentation, and the eight ethical principles that separate design from manipulation.<\/p>","footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ux-and-ui-design"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19767\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/then.agency\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The CAR model: Cue, Action, Reward<\/h2>\n
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The Behavioural Design process in 3 phases<\/h2>\n
1. Behavioral diagnosis<\/h3>\n
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2. Identifying cognitive biases<\/h3>\n
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3. Experimentation and prototyping<\/h3>\n
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Ethics and Behavioural Design: 8 fundamental principles<\/h2>\n
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The Fogg model: Motivation x Ability x Trigger<\/h2>\n
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Applications of Behavioural Design in UX, CX, EX<\/h2>\n
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Behavioural Design according to Then<\/h2>\n
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Conclusion: why invest in Behavioural Design<\/h2>\n
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