Frequently asked questions about thinking, epistemology, and cognitive tools. 9738 answers
Most decisions are made by default — design defaults that serve you.
Most decisions are made by default — design defaults that serve you.
Conduct a default audit of your daily environment. Divide a page into three columns: Digital Defaults, Physical Defaults, and Social Defaults. Under Digital, list the first five apps or tools you interact with each morning and identify what each one does when you take no action — what is the home.
Believing that awareness of the default effect is sufficient to overcome it. Knowing that defaults are powerful does not make you immune to them — it makes you informed while remaining vulnerable. The cognitive savings that make defaults effective operate below conscious deliberation. Even.
Most decisions are made by default — design defaults that serve you.
Adding friction to bad choices and removing friction from good choices changes behavior.
Adding friction to bad choices and removing friction from good choices changes behavior.
Adding friction to bad choices and removing friction from good choices changes behavior.
Adding friction to bad choices and removing friction from good choices changes behavior.
Adding friction to bad choices and removing friction from good choices changes behavior.
Run a friction audit on one behavior you want to do more of and one behavior you want to do less of. For each, list every micro-step between the impulse and the action. Count them. Then redesign both: remove at least two steps from the desired behavior and add at least two steps to the undesired.
Treating friction engineering as a one-time fix rather than an ongoing calibration. You rearrange your environment once, the behavior improves for two weeks, and then you slowly undo the friction: you bring the phone back to the nightstand because you need the alarm, you reinstall the app because.
Adding friction to bad choices and removing friction from good choices changes behavior.
People follow the easiest path — make the desired path the easiest.
People follow the easiest path — make the desired path the easiest.
People follow the easiest path — make the desired path the easiest.
People follow the easiest path — make the desired path the easiest.
Map the paths of least resistance in your daily routine. Pick three recurring behaviors — one you want to keep, one you want to start, and one you want to stop. For each, trace the literal sequence of steps from trigger to action. Count the physical steps, the decisions required, the friction.
Treating path design as manipulation and therefore resisting it. Some people, upon realizing they can engineer their own behavior through environmental design, feel uncomfortable — as if they are tricking themselves. This misses the point. You are already following paths of least resistance that.
People follow the easiest path — make the desired path the easiest.
Fewer options leads to better decisions — eliminate unnecessary choices.
Fewer options leads to better decisions — eliminate unnecessary choices.
Fewer options leads to better decisions — eliminate unnecessary choices.
Making decisions in advance removes them from the moment of action.