Behavioural Science and the Pandemic
Analysis20 Jul 2020

Behavioural Science and the Pandemic

There were two narratives that emerged in the week before we locked down on 23rd March that could go some way to explaining why the UK was relatively slow to lockdown. One was the idea of “herd immunity” - that the virus was always going to spread throughout the population to some extent, and that should be allowed to happen to build up immunity.

That theory may have been based on a misunderstanding of how this particular virus behaved.

The second narrative was based on the idea of “behavioural fatigue”. This centred around the notion that the public will only tolerate a lockdown for so long so it was crucial to wait for the right moment to initiate it. Go too soon, and you might find that people would not comply later on.

It turns out that this theory was also wrong. And based on a fundamental misunderstanding of human behaviour.

Despite photos of packed parks, crammed beaches and VE day conga lines, on the whole the British public complied beyond most people’s expectations.

So what informed the government’s decision making?In this programme we ask, what is “behavioural fatigue”, where did it come from, how much influence did it have on the UK’s late lockdown, and where does Nudge theory fit into the narrative?

Presenter: Sonia Sodha Producer: Gemma Newby Editor: Jasper Corbett

Episoder(389)

Time to Rethink Asylum?

Time to Rethink Asylum?

Tim Finch of the Institute of Public Policy Research asks if it is time for a fundamental rethink of the way we deal with refugees. He investigates the history of asylum as a political issue, the way ...

2 Jun 201428min

Deirdre McCloskey

Deirdre McCloskey

Evan Davis interviews economic historian Deirdre McCloskey in front of an audience at the London School of Economics, where she argues that poverty matters more than inequality. She describes how at t...

26 Mai 201428min

Why Minsky Matters

Why Minsky Matters

American economist Hyman Minsky died in 1996, but his theories offer one of the most compelling explanations of the 2008 financial crisis. His key idea is simple enough to be a t-shirt slogan: "Stabil...

24 Mar 201428min

Eldar Shafir: Scarcity

Eldar Shafir: Scarcity

(Image credit: Jerry Nelson)Jo Fidgen interviews Eldar Shafir, professor of psychology and public affairs at Princeton University, and co-author of Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much in fro...

17 Mar 201427min

The Jihadi Spring

The Jihadi Spring

Owen Bennett-Jones asks if the real beneficiaries of the multiple failures of the Arab revolutions are the Islamist militants both of al-Qaeda and its increasingly violent allies. Does the West's taci...

16 Mar 201428min

Scotland and the Union: Can Britain be Rebooted?

Scotland and the Union: Can Britain be Rebooted?

Is there any such thing as unionism, and what is the case for the union?On September 18th, Scotland will vote in a referendum on whether to become independent. Supporters have been setting out their v...

3 Mar 201428min

Life by Lottery

Life by Lottery

Should we use chance to solve some of our most difficult political dilemmas? From US Green Cards to school place allocation, lotteries have been widely used as a means of fairly resolving apparently i...

24 Feb 201427min

A Is for Anonymous

A Is for Anonymous

The wish to be anonymous in our dealings with private companies or governments, in commenting on the news or in daily life seems to be increasing. For some, anonymity is an ironic response to the cult...

17 Feb 201428min

Populært innen Politikk og nyheter

giver-og-gjengen-vg
aftenpodden
aftenpodden-usa
i-retten
forklart
stopp-verden
popradet
fotballpodden-2
det-store-bildet
dine-penger-pengeradet
rss-gukild-johaug
bt-dokumentar-2
hanna-de-heldige
aftenbla-bla
nokon-ma-ga
rss-ness
e24-podden
rss-penger-polser-og-politikk
frokostshowet-pa-p5
chit-chat-med-helle