Recently in Social Engineering Category

"If you were given the chance, how would you help kids at your school graduate?

If you look around the education system, it is easy to observe that our kids are struggling. Our school system's children come from all over, facing different adversities, living in different environments, and learning in different ways. Is it really a surprise that the dropout rate is as high as it currently is? Students are not happy. They are not learning, not thriving, and not being driven enough to fully desire a graduation of their own."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/20/students-sound-off-high-s_1_n_825298.html

How does this relate to the ABCs of behavior?

(Thanks to Kayla for sending)

"...a significant proportion, about 15 percent, reported they shopped in corner stores both before and after school, five days a week, consuming up to 3,560 calories per week in junk food and soft drinks. For these children, the corner store is a potential health threat."

http://www.miller-mccune.com/business-economics/little-stores-and-fatter-kids-6818/

What are the ABCs related to this story? In behavioral terms what are people try to do about it?

"As part of Lets Move!, the campaign to end childhood obesity, First Lady Michelle Obama is taking on food deserts.  These are nutritional wastelands that exist across America in both urban and rural communities where parents and children simply do not have access to a supermarket.  Some 23.5 million Americans - including 6.5 million children - currently live in food deserts.  Watch the video below and learn what the First Lady is doing to help families in these areas across the country."

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/02/24/taking-food-deserts

How is it that fast foods are an antecedent to obesity? How does the First Lady propose to change these antecedents to change the behaviors associated with obesity? 

http://www.farmville.com

Basic Premise: Plant crops and harvest them to earn money and experience points which will allow you to develop your own personal farm complete with livestock, decorations, equipment, and a home of your choosing.

ABC's-Basic Premise: This farm game offers numerous rewards in order to overtly reinforce people into continuing to play the game for enjoyment purposes (it still makes money through advertisements).  However, it also uses covert behavior modification to increase the likelihood that you will use your credit card to purchase "Farmville Cash" to purchase even cooler buildings, vehicles, and decorations for your farm.  After you realize how long it takes to build a huge farm, why not spend a few bucks to greatly cut down on your time?  After all, time is money...and they'd like some of yours.

"Bigger isn't necessarily better, especially when you want to live sustainably. At least that's what these small home enthusiasts live by. Giving up the luxury of space, tiny-home owners and builders opt instead for a more eco-friendly, less resource intense way of living. By building homes with high ceilings and planting them in open spaces, they still maintain the illusion of space around them. These homeowners are using less heat, electricity and raw materials -- and they might just make you reconsider how important space really is to you. What do you think-- could you live in a 10 by 10 foot space?"

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/18/the-worlds-tiniest-homes_n_425400.html?slidenumber=3uc%2Bv%2BgZERo%3D&&&slideshow

What do you think about these small houses? How would the alter / modify a person's behavior that lived there? What kind of changes might a person go through living in a small home?

"Stack didn't know how to "manage" a company, but he did know about the principals of competition and democracy: keeping score, having fun, providing choice, and having a voice. With these principals he created his own style of management -- open-book management. He had a dream to create a business of business people. Stack realized that the payoff would be enormous: a company that was consistently able to outperform the market."

http://www.greatgame.com/

I have read the book and recommend it to anyone interested in applying behavioral principles to business. This is not IO - it is about making work fun and challenging using what works behaviorally.

What do you think about the site? Read the book or another one they have in their books store (http://www.greatgame.com/bookstore/bookstore.php?category=2) - write a report for extra credit if you like. Keep in mind you can probably get these usedon Amazon.

"It's simple: join or organize a pool with friends or co-workers, or set up a pool for your favorite charity. Everyone puts their money into escrow (there is no "house" cut). After a pre-arranged period of time, whoever's closest to his or her target weight*, percentagewise, takes the pot."

http://www.makemoneylosingweight.com/

What is this about? Is it legit? What behavioral principles are they using to help people lose weight?

"Shedding those extra winter pounds can be a struggle. But some new websites can help you get motivated by making it a bit of a game. How about challenging others to a weight loss race? If you're betting to lose, all it costs is time and commitment. (news write up from cbs: http://cbs2chicago.com/health/Shed.Pounds.Faster.2.984102.html)"

Linke to Fat Bet: http://www.Fatbet.net

What is this site all about? How does it work? What behavioral strategies do they use to help people lose weight? Are they making it fun?

A police cheif brings food to work every time his picture gets in the paper. How does this relate to what we know about behavior modification?

http://splendidtable.publicradio.org/www_publicradio/tools/media_player/popup.php?name=splendid_table/2009/12/25/splendidtable_20091225_64&starttime=00:35:41&endtime=00:34:40

(February 27, 2008) Carrie Armel, research associate at the Precourt Energy Efficiency Center at Stanford University, discusses the use of behavioral sciences to address climate change and energy security issues.

Armel discusses how people can go about changing thier behaviors as solutions, but this is not from a behavioral perspective. How would a behaviorist approach the issue of behavioral solutions for climate and energy change? What part of her talk would best relate to the behaviorist approach.

http://www.youtube.com/stanford#p/u/30/8wY7rj-fDGY