Cognitive Design

 There was an excellent article yesterday by Shari Roan, a staff writer for the LA Times, Cue the Gluttony, on the role of environmental triggers in Americans’ overeating. 

Part of the argument is that we are hardwired to overeat so when we are in an environment that offers easy access to giant portions, a constant flow of snacks and drinks and specially designed flavors, smells, packaging and displays that say “eat” most of us will get fat.  Cognitive design has played no small role in getting us into this problem. Consumer research pulls on the latest findings in cognitive science to influence our behaviors and choices. It has been especially effective with food.   

Most of the experts quoted in her article call for changing the environment to help elevate the problem, after all as one expert said, “it is easier to change the environment than it is to change people.”  In this way we might be able to design our way out of obesity with the right regulations (e.g. portion size restrictions), package designs (e.g. 100 calorie packs) and environmental designs (e.g. no fast food outlets in High Schools).  

These ideas will in fact lower the mental work I have to do to influence and ultimately control my eating behaviors. Lowering cognitive load is good cognitive design. The concern is that it limits public choice and business freedoms (which we often do for the public good). It also does not really get at the core of the problem. 

The core problem is that many in the US are unable to influence their own behaviors (self-regulate) sufficiently to maintain health, happiness and financial security.  Not just eating but exercise, drinking/drugs, following treatment plans and other health-related behaviors are clearly outside of individual control. Indeed this is a driver the bulk of the cost problem in healthcare. Further, I over spend for a lot of the same reasons I over eat and therefore threaten my financial health.    When you stack all these up the strategy to re-engineer our environment to compensate for failures to self regulate becomes something we want to approach very cautiously. 

A complementing strategy is to use design to support and enhance the ability of consumers to self-regulate (influence their own behaviors) despite the well-engineered temptations that are everywhere in the environment.  I am not talking about designing healthly choice alternatives (although that is essential) but more about using a deep understanding of cognitive science to develop programs that build our self-regulatory strength.  We need to restore our capacity to act as captains of our own ships – that is how we design our way out of obesity and other lifestyle problems. 

The question is what is known about the cognition of self regulation and how can we use it to better influence our choices and behaviors in tough situations?