Cognitive Design

Changing behavior requires measurement and timely feedback. Getting accurate data and keeping track of your progress can take a lot of effort.  Sometimes that effort is enough to derail your behavior change effort.  To address that problem a number of companies are offering personal body sensors and software to help make measurement and tracking much easier. We have covered some of these in the Cognitive Design blog, for example, see Using Data to Change Behavior.

A reader recently sent me a note about BodyMedia.  It includes an armband with multiple sensors and associated software. The senors measure your motion, heat flux, galvanic skin response and skin temperature.  You get data to guide behavior change around weight, fitness and sleep management.   Data is collected and displayed in a dashboard called the activity manager.  You can access it from from a smart phone and other devices.

There is some research that supports the claim this system changes health behaviors.  You can get the armband and 3 months access to the software in the $100-$150 range. After that the activity manager (software) costs you $7 per month.

Very interested to hear from other readers that are using BodyMedia.  How easy was it to build into your daily life? Is it changing your behavior?

There is little doubt that creativity and innovation plays a  big role in the US economy.  Translating new ideas into better ways of working and market-busting products and services is a serious engine of value creation. Few debate that but many debate how well the US is doing with innovation.  Some argue we have a creativity crisis while others argue we are on the cusp of an innovation-driven economic revolution.

A recent column by  Geoff  Colvin in Fortune Magazine, A Mighty Culture of Innovation Cannot Be Taken For Granted, offers some interesting insight into the debate.  Quoting two global studies he  notes that the US scores high in innovation and that countries that do better tend to be much smaller.  The US is the best large and innovative economy by far.   Mr. Colvin also suggest that the reason for that is culture.

That’s the good news. The bad news is that by some measures it looks like the US’s culture of innovation is eroding.  For evidence he quotes the World Values Study that ranked the US 10th on placing importance on “thinking up new ideas and being creative”. More alarming is the finding that Torrance test scores have been declining since 1990.  The Torrance test has been used to measure the level of creativity in US students for over 50 years.

For a counter point check out Fast Company’s 10th Annual Innovation by Design Issue.  A major theme is how the US consumer is putting a premium on great experiences and products with high design content. Design thinking  both reflects an innovation culture and transforms an innovation-driven economy.

Of special interest to readers of the Cognitive Design Blog is the section outlining where is designing going next.  Margaret Rhodes points out:

“Thoughtful design doesn’t just enable our habits; it pushes us to improve behavior making us more economical, reflective and responsible”

Designs that offer us an opportunity to achieve lasting behavior change in areas such as health, ethics, personal savings and being green offer tremendous potential for creating social and economic value on a macro scale.   Delivering such changes requires a deep understand of how human minds actually work and puts cognitive design at the center of the innovation economy.

So what is the state of creativity in the US? Is it on the decline or swelling to new levels?

The Journal of Consumer Research is a excellent source of insights into how our minds work.  Why and how people buy things is the most studied forms of psychology on the planet.  Many of the insights go beyond the context of making a purchase and are therefore useful to cognitive designers working in all areas.

Take for example the recent article on how entering lotteries might undermine self-control:

“The author investigated why materialism leads to poor self-control and found that materialistic thoughts are specific and concrete, and that the more materialistic thoughts a consumer has, the more likely he or she is to demonstrate a lack of self-control. Prior research has shown that when people’s minds are occupied with concrete thoughts, they tend to seek immediate gratification.”

This has clear implications for cognitive designers working in behavior change.  You can access the entire article HERE.

Positive psychology seeks to understand and improve talent, happiness, thriving, adaptability, well-being and other means by which we flourish and succeed. It has been recognized as a formal branch of psychology for over 15 years. It provides a unique and practical window into “how our minds actual work” and is therefore a vital source of insights for cognitive designers.

But what has it taught us?   While that question is far too broad to deal with in a single post, I did find an interesting article, Three Insights from the Frontiers of Positive Psychology, that offers an interesting perspective.  Here is the bottom line:

1. Being mindful (fully in the present moment) is essential for happiness but thinking about the future, in a constructive and empowering way is essential for meaningfulness.

2. Regular detachment from work has greater restorative power than your typical vacation.

3. Physical design of our environment has a distinct and lasting impact on our mood and other mental states. Open, green well-kept spaces have a positive impact.

None of these insights is a surprise. Indeed some are a part of our folk psychology or wisdom. For example, insight two sounds a lot like “don’t bring your work home”.  While this is true having a scientific understanding or explanation does have its advantages. Most notably it helps to rationally justify investments in certain types of interventions and will take some of the guess work out of our design efforts.

It falls to the cognitive designer to turn these insights into useful interventions, programs, products, services and daily habits that help us flourish.

Venture Beat is offering an early look at Samsung’s SmartWatch. It has a camera, is focused on wellness/fitness, integrates with the phone/tablet and has internet access.