Finished: September 1, 2023
Why I read this
I heard about Nudge a long time ago in some textbook or class mentioning the classic example of the flies in the urinals at Schiphol Airport. Since then, this example seems to always be the introduction to this theory/book and I’ve probably heard it more than 10 times. Finally, a sociologist colleague of mine brought up the idea of nudge in a company meeting about improving our processes and from there it really stuck with me. If we can be more effective in our goals and influencing those around us through simple and low-cost ways why aren’t we doing so more? With this idea in mind Nudge was quickly added to my reading list and that constant reminder (or nudge) for me to go and pick it up, which finally I did!
What I learned
The first time I read anything in the genre of sociology/psychology was summer of 2022 when during a trip to Greece the amount of time spent reading on the beach quickly passed the amount of literature I had brought. This forced to explore the limited selection of English books on a small Greek island and I ended up with Humankind by Rutger Bregman. I absolutely loved it, honestly probably too much, because I found myself constantly thinking about the themes and ideas of the book. This discovery of the genre has lead me to read many popular titles such as Thinking Fast and Slow or Mindset and other more scholarly works like Debt the first 5000 years, or Sapiens. All of this to say that I’ve gotten quite a liking for these types of books and the way they help me to learn and grow. Nudge was an excellent continuation to this category.
As I explore this genre more I am quickly realizing that it is a young field. Thinking Fast and Slow and Nudge share many of the same theories which are built on a lot of the same research, and most (if not all of that research) has happened in the last 100 years or so. This means each time I read these theories the supporting material becomes more and more familiar and I recognize more of the concepts (and there are few things more rewarding than reading a book and knowing who they are referencing or why, except maybe making the connection before the real reference comes out!)
Some of my favorite theories or ideas were even confirmed or supported by the concepts in Nudge. For example, my idea to choose restaurants on google by only seeing ones that are 4.5 stars or higher with over 100 reviews (a process that always produces a quality choice), is apparently called “elimination by aspects” which means all my friends who disagree now have to disagree with both me and Amos Tversky!
But more importantly some of the key lessons I really loved from the book that I think are important and can be applied easily to daily life include:
- Default choices are powerful.
- The human mind is limited, checklists and processes are important
- Biases exist and cannot be ignored (anchoring, availability, loss aversion, etc)
- Small improvements can make big changes (See James Clear’s Atomic Habits)
Overall, Nudge was just an excellent read and I’m excited to see where I can attempt to apply it’s principles to my life and “Nudge for Good”!
What I didn’t like
I’m not sure I “disliked” anything from this discussion, however I would say I wished there was more of certain concepts or ideas and slightly less or certain others. For example, the chapters on money focus a lot of retirement savings, because they are a very representative example of the ideas of this theory, however some more variety of examples could have been interesting, especially relating to modern times. For example some discussion on how nudges could relate to advancements in AI could be incredibly interesting, or including a couple chapters on “Nudges and you” where the concepts of nudging can be used by every day people, like putting your sport clothes near the door or in the top drawers of your dresser might increase your motivation to go to the gym, since after all most readers will have this challenge, but very few readers will have the opportunity to design a retirement plan for a major corporation.
Questions I asked
With seemingly so much repetition in works like this (for example when comparing with Thinking Fast and Slow), is the reader expected to read lots of content and therefore have the ideas repeated over and over to foster understanding, or is it more common the reader reads this type of literature infrequently and sparsely so they have to know all the background?
Can anchoring work on ideological viewpoints as well as numerical terms? For example can I anchor a political discussion to be more left by starting with a far left talking point?
What might be the consequences of too much transparency in policy? For example the challenge with Enron releasing enormous amounts of data made it impossible for a normal person to decipher what was important (from What the Dog Saw).
My Favorite Quote
“When people get ordered around, they might get mad and do the opposite of what is being ordered (or even suggested)”
“If you want to encourage people to do something, make it easy”
“Behaviorally sound public policy would evaluate policies based on how efficient they are at achieving their goals and also the visibility of their costs. Unfortunately politicians often do not find it in their best interest to make the costs of their activities transparent”
Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein
Books I liked like this one
Thinking Fast and Slow: Daniel Kahneman (for the exploration of behavioural economics)
Humankind: Rutger Bregman (For the optimism that sociology can help humans for the better)
Book Reviews for Mom 