Business and Human behaviour

4 min readAug 4, 2017

Behavioral science is the study of human behaviour, patterns and decision making. You can normally find different personas by doing primary and secondary research.

Here are the Archetypes (by MateusZ) I also recommend readying his post.

Cognitive information Affecting Archetypes

When people moves away from what is usually perceived as their “behavioral behaviour” , it is usually caused by some form of cognitive bias. There are hundreds of different cognitive biases that have been thoroughly studied in the field of human psychology.

In regards to designing for user behavior, we tend to think things will remain the same. It’s a dangerous assumption — not making an accommodation for change and the impact of biases can quickly cause a user to lose any motivation for continuing with the experience.

Coupling archetypes with the cognitive biases of users gives you clarity when creating a strategic content matrix. The matrix would indicate ways to respond to deviations from the norm in users’ behavior. Let’s look at some of the larger biases addressed in behavioral design.

Loss Aversion

Loss aversion is as it sounds: the tendency to fear losing something or not getting enough over time. This bias is often used by marketing to get you to buy a product now. Designing for this bias means highlighting what will be lost by not acting immediately.

For example: an online service offers a 30 day free trial. Towards the end of the trial, you receive messages saying “Your trial is about to expire. Don’t lose out on this special offer — buy now!” Another common example: You’d better get those airline tickets now because there are only “two seats left”!

Herd Mentality or the Bandwagon Effect

This is the tendency to do (or believe) things because many other people do (or believe) the same things. It is the tendency to want to belong to a group.

For example: have you ever gone to a travel or product site and seen a phrase like “45 other people are viewing this now,” or “35 people are looking to reserve a room at this hotel?” That’s a marketing technique to try to make you feel like you’ll be left out of the group if you don’t buy now. In many cases it also couples with loss aversion. Designing for this bias means highlighting what other people are doing on the site right now.

Availability Heuristic

Availability Heuristic is the quick assessment or decision about an issue, person, etc. based on current opinion. It is the tendency to make assumptions. Designing for this means making sure awareness of information isn’t assumed as users move through the journey. This also relates to the idea that if you hear something repeated long and often enough it must be true.

Hyperbolic Discounting

Think impulse buying — getting a more immediate payoff with a discount. Hyperbolic discounting leads to choices that are inconsistent over time: People make choices today that their future selves would prefer not to have made despite using the same reasoning.

For example, let’s say you want to buy flowers online. You go through the steps to get those beautiful roses delivered and, at the end, you are offered a series of add-on products like chocolates, a teddy bear, etc. all at a discounted rate, but only if purchased now. You may decide to get the add-ons or not. It’s hard to predict. Things like how you feel that day, what your reason is (positive or negative) for getting the flowers, how much is in your bank account, and whether today was payday or not all play a part in whether or not you add that extra item. Designing for this bias means working into the design a feature known as “FOMO” or “fear of missing out” if you don’t act now.

There are hundreds of different biases out there. These are some of the more common ones used in design. Identify a group of them to use for your specific project needs.