UCL Centre for Behaviour Change 2020 Report: Research & Impact in Behavioural Science, Summaries of Behavioural Science

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UCL CENTRE FOR BEHAVIOUR CHANGE

UCL

CENTRE

FOR

BEHAVIOUR

CHANGE

ANNUAL

REPORT

2020

CONTENTS

• Foreword by UCL Vice Provost Professor David Price
• Welcome / message from the Director
• About the CBC
• 2020 highlights
• Our year in numbers
• Online Successes
  • CBC Conference
  • Summer and Winter Schools
• Responding to COVID-19: contributions from the Centre for Behaviour Change
• Research
  • New projects launched in
  • Publications
• Translating knowledge into practice
  • Consultancy
  • Engagement
  • Training
• Teaching
  • MSc Behaviour Change
  • BSc module in Behaviour Change: An Interdisciplinary Approach
• The year ahead
  • Online Short Course
  • Bupa – CBC webinar series
• Staff
  • Committees
  • Advisory Board
  • Executive Committee
• Thank you and contact us

WELCOME

MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTOR

Welcome to UCL Centre for Behaviour Change’s

2020 annual report.

Addressing societal problems through behaviour change, especially in the areas of human health and environmental sustainability, has been at the heart of the Centre for Behaviour Change’s (CBC’s) mission since 2014. As a global leader for interdisciplinary academic expertise in behaviour change, the CBC has continued to deliver an ambitious and wide-ranging portfolio of activities, including research, training, consultancy, teaching, as well as public policy and engagement.

This year we have seen the science of behaviour change increasingly applied across the world, as we adapt how we work and learn. The CBC has made significant changes, delivering our successful annual conference, International Summer Schools and Masters course online, with surprisingly positive effects. We have reached more people globally, increasing equality of access; online small groups and multiple communication channels have encouraged more participation and therefore inclusivity; and providing material in advance of discussion has led to better imparting of knowledge and more time for discussions.

The CBC is a small team with a large impact; our methods enable individuals, organisations and government to generate practical solutions to complex problems using a systematic, science-based approach. Our team of researchers and behaviour change experts continue to form strong partnerships in the UK and internationally to advance the science of behaviour change and develop real- world interventions with impact. We address a wide variety of topics e.g. promoting maternal health in low-resource settings, reducing gender-based violence and increasing women’s economic empowerment, contributing to the national and international response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and embedding behavioural science in strategic planning in large public organisations.

This report presents 2020 highlights, including;

• Our over-subscribed week-long Summer Schools that were supplemented by our first Winter School due to unprecedented demand.
• The 6th international three-day conference, attended by more than 350 delegates from 26 countries.
• Our MSc Behaviour Change programme with a 7% increase in applications from last year.

We continue to contribute to a wide range of UCL activity, including strategic research initiatives, UCL’s environmental sustainability work and the very successful Beyond Boundaries conference where we led the session ‘ Behaviour: The Climate & Sustainability Crises’. We have also worked closely with the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion team, part of the Office of the President and Vice Provost at UCL, to apply behavioural science to improving working conditions and within the institution, contributing our expertise to efforts to prevent sexual misconduct and bullying within higher education.

We keep information and engagement flowing via our revamped website and monthly newsletters to more than 5000 participants. Do sign up to the newsletter for further details: UCL Centre for Behaviour Change mailing list.

Our 2021 initiatives include:

• A new online short course “Behaviour Change Interventions: Introductory Principles and Practice”, to be launched in the Spring
• Our 7th annual international behaviour change conference hosted at the UCL Institute of Education in November; we are excited to host this in person
• A jointly-hosted webinar series with Bupa UK on the application of developments in cutting-edge behavioural science and practice to healthcare
• Our 7th year of the International Summer School series, online.

None of this would be possible without the support at UCL and beyond, including strategic leadership from our Advisory Board, operational input from our Executive Committee, scientific guidance from our International Conference committees, and stretching our impact via our network of CBC Associates. I would like to give my sincere thanks to them, along with the talented and hard-working CBC team. We look forward to the year ahead, with all the challenges and opportunities for making a difference that it will begin. 2020 has been tough for all but there have been changes, learnings and advances that can act as a foundation for all of us to work towards #BuildingBackBetter.

Professor Susan Michie, FAcSS, FMedSci Director, Centre for Behaviour Change

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Cutting edge interdisciplinary research

Host interdisciplinary events addressing topical social and methodological issues

Deliver wide-ranging and bespoke training and teaching

Evidence-based consultancy

Build communities to facilitate the engagement of policy-makers, practitioners and researchers

© UCL Health Creatives | June 2020

ABOUT THE CBC

The CBC’s mission is to improve global well-being, social cohesion and equity, and environmental

sustainability through enabling behaviour change. We achieve this by carrying out research to advance

the scientific understanding of behaviour and how to change it, developing methods and tools to

improve the quality, use and impact of applying scientific understanding, and working with others,

nationally and internationally, to translate behavioural science expertise into real-world impact.

The CBC promotes the science and practice of behaviour change to address key challenges facing society through interdisciplinary collaboration and partnerships, for example:

• Engage in cutting-edge interdisciplinary research;
• Deliver wide-ranging and bespoke training and teaching;
• Provide evidence-based consultancy;
• Host interdisciplinary events addressing topical societal and methodological issues;
• Build communities to facilitate the engagement of policy-makers, practitioners, researchers and industry.

OUR YEAR IN NUMBERS

ACTIVE RESEARCH GRANTS

28

CONFERENCE DELEGATES

350

PEER-REVIEWED PUBLICATIONS

73

PRESENTATIONS (EXTERNAL )

40

CONSULTANCY PROJECTS

17

INCOME FROM RESEARCH PROJECTS AWARDED IN 2020

£14m

£1m

of which

was awarded to the CBC

STUDENTS ACCESSING CBC-LED COURSES AT UCL

90 undergraduates 54 postgraduates

ONLINE SUCCESSES

CBC ONLINE CONFERENCE

The CBC’s annual digital health and behaviour change conference is a unique event in the field of digital health and behaviour change. This three-day event brings together academics and industry professionals to exchange ideas and form collaborations to advance the science and practice of digital behaviour change. Conference themes included The Science of Behaviour Change, Methodology, Emerging Technologies, Current Technologies and Real-World Applications.

Thanks to members of the International Advisory Board and Organising and Scientific Committees for their valuable contributions to a dynamic and well received programme. Particular thanks to Scientific Committee chairs, Dr Felix Naughton and Dr Sarah Jackson.

ONLINE SUMMER AND WINTER SCHOOLS

Launched in 2014, the CBC International Summer Schools offer researchers, practitioners and policy makers an opportunity to immerse themselves in learning the principles and practice of behaviour change over a 5-day period.

The schools offer participants the opportunity to work on personalised goals and action plans with mentors, and use pre-recorded learning materials, self-directed learning tasks, live webinars and small group mentoring. Evaluations of the online course indicated very high participant satisfaction.

More than 350

delegates attended from

26 countries,

accessing over 100

presentations 86% of delegates said that the conference met or exceeded expectations for an online event

Three courses

attended by 110 participants

from 36 countries

The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) provides scientific and technical advice to support government decision makers during emergencies. Professor Susan Michie and Professor Robert West are participants in the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Behaviours (SPI-B). Published guidance can be accessed here. One of the outputs led by Professors Michie and West, using the COM-B model and BCW framework to structure thinking and recommendations for policymakers, can be seen at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/bjhp.12428.

Professors Michie and West are also members of Independent SAGE, which provides weekly data updates, reports on a wide range of COVID-19-related topics, and independent advice to the UK Government and other audiences to inform their response to COVID-19. It holds weekly conferences with the press and public live streamed on YouTube. Reports produced by Independent SAGE are available here.

Professor Michie has provided expert evidence and advice to:

• House of Commons Science and Technology Committee Inquiry: Witness in session on COVID-19 and Immunity Passports.
• House of Lords Science and Technology Committee Inquiry: Witness in session on COVID- and Behavioural Science: the session can be seen here.
• the Parliament in Ireland
• the Welsh Assembly
• National Association of Local Councils.

Professor Michie is also a member of:

• London’s Transition Board COVID-19 Outbreak Control Strategy Group, and
• COVID-19 Vaccine Health Equity and Engagement Task and Finish Group

CBC Deputy Director Dr Paul Chadwick is a member of the British Psychological Society’s Behavioural Disease Prevention Taskforce. Chaired by CBC Associate Professor Dr Angel Chater, the taskforce is a hub for behavioural science expertise to support initiatives to reduce the spread of COVID-19. The committee has co-produced 17 guidance documents to support national and local governments to prevent transmission of COVID-19 and limit the impact of the pandemic on physical and psychological health.

INTERNATIONAL

Professor Michie is a member of the World Health Organization’s Behavioural Insights and Sciences Technical and Advisory Group and, together with Dr Elizabeth Corker from CBC, have acted as consultants to the Behavioural Insights team, developing a method for supporting countries to use survey and other data to inform policy and to generate actionable recommendations.

Professor Michie is a member of the Lancet Commission on COVID-19 Task Force on Public Health Measures to Suppress the Pandemic.

WORKING WITH LOCAL GOVERNMENT

Dr Chadwick has worked with the Behavioral Insights Unit at Hertfordshire County Council to adapt the Achieving Behaviour Change Guides for Local Authorities to enable rapid response to requests for behavioural science support from teams across the local authority. The processes and tools developed using the guides have enabled the rapid development of behavioural science briefings to inform a range of public health campaigns under the Stay Safe Hertfordshire umbrella such as increasing resilience, prevention of alcohol dependency, and maintaining social distancing in public spaces.

Advice to UK Government and the World Health Organisation (WHO)

RESEARCH

Our research has been broadly organised around three themes:

Developing methods for advancing the science of behaviour change and its application, including the reporting and synthesis of evidence across and within academic disciplines.

Improving health and well-being, including understanding and changing behaviour to support people to manage their health and enable health care professionals and systems to deliver evidence-based practice.

Combatting threats to the environment and sustainability, by examining how human behaviour and systems can be shaped to improve stewardship of the planet’s resources and mitigate climate change.

Research

highlights

We have 28 active research grants, including NIHR, Wellcome Trust, and UKRI.

Funder: Wellcome Trust

Duration: 2020 - 2022

Partners: IBM Research Dublin, Universities of Aberdeen and Cambridge

CBC leads: Professor Susan Michie

CBC researchers: Dr Alison Wright, Dr Alibhe Finnerty, Dr Oscar Castro, Ella Howes, Emily Hayes, Candice Moore, Institute of Education researchers: Professor James Thomas, Dr Alison O’Mara-Eves, Eva Jermutus

To supplement the Human Behaviour-Change Project an award from the Wellcome Trust Research Enrichment - Public Engagement scheme will fund an investigation of trust in health-promoting digital aids using Artificial Intelligence. The team will bring together health-interested public and population-health decision-makers for a series of workshops. They will enable engagement with key aspects of the Human Behaviour-Change Project’s AI System and co-produce a toolkit of resources to facilitate appropriate trust in AI systems applied to population health decision-making. This will include training and workshops with the UCL Co-Production Collective to develop and practice skills for public engagement activities for research.

Developing a toolkit to facilitate appropriate trust in artificial intelligence for public health decision making 3

PUBLICATIONS

CBC staff, researchers and behaviour change experts publish extensively each year. For the list of outputs and publications from 2020 click here.

CBC’s partnership with ActionAid Ireland (AAI) continues to apply behavioural science to the reduction of violence towards women and girls. AAI commissioned the CBC to produce Using the Behaviour Change Wheel Framework in Gender- Focused International Development Programmes: A Field Guide. Launched by webinar in October 2020, with CBC work lead by Dr Paul Chadwick, the guide draws upon the learnings from implementing the Women’s Rights Programme II in Kenya, Ethiopia and Nepal, providing a step-by-step guide to integrating community participatory and behaviour change methods to improve the lives of women in marginalised communities.

WRAP estimates the financial costs associated with avoidable household food waste in the UK is £14.9 billion with the associated greenhouse gas emissions estimated at 22 million tonnes of CO2eq. WRAP worked alongside CBC to apply behavioural systems mapping to their work on developing behaviour change interventions for tackling household food waste. The map identifies the actors, behaviours and influences on food waste, representing the interplay of influence within and between the consumer, retail and manufacturing sector contributing to household food waste.

Preventing gender-based violence in international development

TRANSLATING KNOWLEDGE

INTO PRACTICE

Consultancy

The consultancy work of CBC continues to grow spanning health, sustainability and social justice.

Below is a selection of consultancy projects carried out in 2020:

The Prevention Directorate of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) looks after the interests of UK nationals in other countries. Sexual assault of UK nationals abroad is unacceptably high. The CBC, lead by Dr Paul Chadwick, is working with FCDO to develop a methodology to apply behavioural science to the primary and secondary prevention of sexual assault, piloting the approach in Spain and Turkey.

Now more than ever health and social care services need to think creatively about how services are delivered to have maximum reach, impact and reduce inequalities. The CBC, lead by Dr Lou Atkins and Dr Paul Chadwick, worked with Nesta, Macmillan and the British Heart Foundation to produce Re-imagining Help: An Evidence-based Approach to Helping People Reach Their Goals. Reimagining Help is a toolkit to support those responsible for commissioning, designing and delivering services to deliver effective behaviour change support across a wide range of contexts. We used co-production methods to synthesise evidence from NICE guidance on behaviour change with insights gained from stakeholders from cancer and cardiovascular disease care to create a guide for service redesign.

Preventing harms associated with sexual assault of UK citizens abroad

Placing behavioural science at the heart of service transformation

Applying Behavioural Systems Mapping to food waste

ENGAGEMENT

The CBC has promoted behaviour change and interventions development through engagement activities.

In 2020, CBC Deputy Director Dr Paul Chadwick was seconded as the Joint Head of Public Health England’s Behavioural Insights team for six months, contributing to a range of issues related to the recovery from COVID-19 including cross-government policy on green recovery and obesity. Dr Chadwick is PHE lead for the Behavioural and Social Science Strategy for Public Health.

CBC Senior Research Fellow Dr Jo Hale was seconded to the sustainability team within Policy Connect, a cross-party think tank working in health, education & skills, industry, technology & innovation, and sustainability. She coordinated 14 reports on how to achieve the UK’s Net Zero target by 2050, jointly authored by parliamentarians and academics and informed by a series of round table events.

Dr Jo Hale and Dr Paul Chadwick, in collaboration with Chris Jofeh of the Decarbonisation Advisory Group for Wales, submitted evidence for the BEIS Select Committee Enquiry for Decarbonisaing Heat in Homes based on their experience of applying behavioural systems mapping and the Behaviour Change Wheel framework to develop recommendations for the Better Home, Better Wales Better World report.

Public Health England (PHE)

Policy Connect

BEIS Select Committee Enquiry – Decarbonising Heat in Homes

TRAINING

Bespoke training

CBC training courses and workshops support institutions across the public, commercial and third sectors to understand and apply behaviour change science to a range of issues. This year the CBC has trained over 228 participants from 11 different organisations, adapting its training courses to online.

HERTFORDSHIRE BEHAVIOUR CHANGE UNIT

WEST BERKSHIRE LOCAL AUTHORITY

MOVEMBER FOUNDATION

WRAP

ACTIONAID IRELAND

ROYAL MARINES

FOREIGN, COMMONWEALTH AND DEVELOPMENT OFFICE

TROCAIRE

Organisational Sustainability Change

Social CBC BESPOKE TRAINING DELIVERED IN 2020 Health Justice

TEACHING

MSC BEHAVIOUR CHANGE

Now in its fourth year, our highly regarded MSc Behaviour Change equips students with the knowledge and skills to use behaviour change science to tackle a wide range of issues spanning sustainability, health and social justice.

Despite the challenges facing the higher education sector this year saw over 200 applications - a 7% increase from last year. The 2020-21 cohort has 35 MSc, 2 PG Diploma and 2 PG Certificate students. Half of the students are from the UK, 11% are international and the remainder are from Europe. The academic backgrounds of students span Psychology, Business, Economics, Humanities and Politics.

Many of the research-based dissertations are based on real-world projects developed in partnership with the CBC, UCL ARENA, the UCL Sustainability Team and third sector organisations such as The Mix.

MSc Behaviour Change publications

Approximately 30% of research dissertations are being prepared for or have been accepted in peer-reviewed journals. Two examples:

A qualitative study using the theoretical domains framework and the capability opportunity motivation-behaviour model Kam, W., Haklay, M., & Lorke, J. (2020). Exploring factors associated with participation in citizen science among UK museum visitors aged 40–60: A qualitative study using the theoretical domains framework and the capability opportunity motivation-behaviour model. Public Understanding of Science, 0963662520963511.

Mental Health Training to Improve Communication with Children and Adolescents: A Process Evaluation Moran, R., & Gutman, L. M. (2020). Mental Health Training to Improve Communication with Children and Adolescents: A Process Evaluation. Journal of Clinical Nursing.

Mini conference

The annual MSc Behaviour Change mini-conference allows outgoing students to showcase their research-based dissertation as well as offers opportunities for networking among new and former students. This year the mini-conference was a successful online event with more than 70 attendees.

MSc Alumni

This year we launched the MSc Behaviour Change Alumni Group to support networking and collaboration amongst our alumni and with CBC; 55 students are active in the group.

MSc Highlights

For more information on the MSc programme: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/behaviour-change/study/msc- behaviour-change

The Mix have collaborated

with two UCL students

studying MSc Behaviour Change

who focused their dissertations

on the Mix webchat counselling

service. Both students produced

very insightful works with clear and

actionable recommendations, some

of which we will implement.

Data, Evaluation and Insights Manager at The Mix, Bohdana Dock.

BSC MODULE IN BEHAVIOUR CHANGE: AN

INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH

Behaviour Change: An Interdisciplinary Approach enables 3rd year undergraduate students from across UCL to study principles of behaviour change from an interdisciplinary perspective and how it can be applied to a variety of topics, such as international development, digital applications, transport, and the way that the built environment shapes behaviours relating to energy use, health and wellbeing. 144 students (90 undergraduate, 54 postgraduate) are enrolled for 2020-2021.

THE YEAR AHEAD

ONLINE SHORT COURSE

We will launch a new online short course ‘Behaviour Change Interventions: Introductory Principles and Practice’ in early 2021. Led by CBC staff Dr Danielle D’Lima, Dr Paul Chadwick and Professor Susan Michie, this course will provide an entry level understanding of how to systematically design behaviour change interventions in a range of contexts. More information on this course, including content, price and how to register, will be released soon.

BUPA – CBC WEBINAR SERIES

In early 2021 the CBC will be launch the CBC and Bupa UK’s jointly hosted webinar series on behaviour change and healthcare, led by CBC staff and associates. All webinars will be available on the CBC website.

Using digital

behaviour change

interventions to improve

health outcomes -

engagement and beyond

Dr Aleksandra Herbec & Dr Olga Perksi

Maximising

high-quality healthcare:

a behavioural science

approach to

implementing

change

Dr Danielle D’Lima

Applications

of behavioural

science to combating

antimicrobial

resistance

Dr Fabiana Lorencatto

Using

behaviour change

science to improve

self-management

of long-term conditions

Dr Paul Chadwick

BUPA-CBC webinar series