Behaviors are among the most important factors that determine whether people will live long, healthy lives. Researchers at SOBC are working to identify what underlies successful behavior change. Knowing what works and what doesn’t work is the key to helping people live healthier lives.
Some interventions lead to changes in behavior for some people.
Even when an intervention works, scientists rarely know how or why it worked.
Just because an intervention worked for one person…
doesn’t mean it will work for another.
Scientists need to understand the how and why in order to develop interventions that work consistently.
SOBC scientists are using an experimental medicine method to identify the mechanisms that lead to behavior change.
SOBC has developed a common method for understanding behavior change. This experimental medicine approach has three important steps:
Identify, Measure, and Influence.
Based on behavior change theory, scientists must first identify the most likely mechanism to investigate.
Next
Next, scientists must develop tools to reliably measure the identified mechanism.
Next
Finally, scientists must determine whether an intervention can reliably change the identified mechanism.
Next
If a change in the mechanism causes a change in behavior, then we can be confident that this is a mechanism of behavior change.
