On a Saturday afternoon in the year 2000, movie goers had settled in their seats for the movie ‘Payback’. They were given soft drink and popcorn.
There was something unusual with the popcorn though – it was wretched! It had been popped 5 days earlier and was stale.
Half got a medium size bucket while the remaining got a large size. Both buckets were so big that no one could finish either. At the end of the movie, researchers measured the amount of popcorn that was eaten. The results were stunning – People with large buckets ate 53% more i.e. 21 extra hand dips and 173 extra calories.
Imagine someone gave you the popcorn study results without mentioning the bucket sizes. You would see that some ate a little, some ate a lot while some seemed to be testing the limits of the human stomach! Armed with a data set like that, you could easily jump to the conclusion that there are some gluttons that need serious motivation to adopt a healthier lifestyle.
But, wait a minute. What you realize from the story is that you don’t need to worry about people’s attitudes and motivations. If you want people to eat less popcorn, just give them smaller buckets!
What looks like a people problem is often a situation problem..
What looks like a people problem is often a situation problem. Simple. And Profound.
I am finding Chip and Dan Heath’s book to be a gold mine. Many more stories to come in the coming weeks..
Here’s to tweaking situations to change behavior this week!
A Learning a Day 