Switch - Chip Heath [6]
We don’t expect potential billion-dollar change stories to come dressed up like this. The change effort was led by a single employee, with the able help of a summer intern. It focused on a single product. The scope of the presentation didn’t correspond in any way to the scope of the proposal. Yet Stegner’s strategy worked.
That’s the power of speaking to both the Rider and the Elephant.
8.
It’s true that an unmotivated Elephant can doom a change effort, but let’s not forget that the Rider has his own issues. He’s a navel-gazer, an analyzer, a wheel-spinner. If the Rider isn’t sure exactly what direction to go, he tends to lead the Elephant in circles. And as we’ll see, that tendency explains the third and final surprise about change: What looks like resistance is often a lack of clarity.
Two health researchers, Steve Booth-Butterfield and Bill Reger, professors at West Virginia University, were contemplating ways to persuade people to eat a healthier diet. From past research, they knew that people were more likely to change when the new behavior expected of them was crystal clear, but unfortunately, “eating a healthier diet” was anything but.
Where to begin? Which foods should people stop (or start) eating? Should they change their eating behavior at breakfast, lunch, or dinner? At home or in restaurants? The number of ways to “eat healthier” is limitless, especially given the starting place of the average American diet. This is exactly the kind of situation in which the Rider will spin his wheels, analyzing and agonizing and never moving forward.
As the two researchers brainstormed, their thoughts kept coming back to milk. Most Americans drink milk, and we all know that milk is a great source of calcium. But milk is also the single largest source of saturated fat in the typical American’s diet. In fact, calculations showed something remarkable: If Americans switched from whole milk to skim or 1% milk, the average diet would immediately attain the USDA recommended levels of saturated fat.
How do you get Americans to start drinking low-fat milk? You make sure it shows up in their refrigerators. And that isn’t an entirely facetious answer. People will drink whatever is around the house—a family will plow through low-fat milk as fast as whole milk. So, in essence, the problem was even easier than anticipated: You don’t need to change drinking behavior. You need to change purchasing behavior.
Suddenly the intervention became razor-sharp. What behavior do we want to change? We want consumers to buy skim or 1% milk. When? When they’re shopping for groceries. Where? Duh. What else needs to change? Nothing (for now).
Reger and Booth-Butterfield launched a campaign in two communities in West Virginia, running spots on the local media outlets (TV, newspaper, radio) for two weeks. In contrast to the bland messages of most public-health campaigns, the 1% milk campaign was punchy and specific. One ad trumpeted the fact that one glass of whole milk has the same amount of saturated fat as five strips of bacon! At a press conference, the researchers showed local reporters a tube full of fat—the equivalent of the amount found in a half-gallon of whole milk. (Notice the Elephant appeals: They’re going for an “Oh, gross!” reaction.)
Reger and Booth-Butterfield monitored milk sales data at all eight stores in the intervention area. Before the campaign, the market share of low-fat milk was 18 percent. After the campaign, it was 41 percent. Six months later, it held at 35 percent.
This brings us to the final part of the pattern that characterizes successful changes: If you want people to change, you must provide crystal-clear direction.
By now, you can understand the reason this is so important: It’s so the Rider doesn’t spin his wheels. If you tell people to “act healthier,” think of how many ways they can interpret that—imagine their Riders contemplating the options endlessly. (Do I eat more grains and less meat? Or vice versa? Do I start taking vitamins? Would it be a good trade-off if I exercise more and