Are you too impulsive for your own good? Do you frequently find yourself angrily tweeting at 2am, posting things you later regret enough to erase? You may want to log out of Twitter and read on.

Many of us act on impulse. We crave instant gratification and so we often find ourselves eating things we know we shouldn’t, watching Netflix when we know we should be studying, or saying mean things we later regret.

Nothing screams “instant gratification” like social media. With almost no effort, we can watch videos, read articles, and express whatever is on our minds to audiences of hundreds, thousands, or even millions of others. Unsurprisingly, this ability to instantaneously publish our thoughts can get us into trouble.

Emotional Outbursts and Possible Twitter-ventions

If your account is publicly available, you can’t control who reads your posts or how far they spread. According to researchers at the University of Munster, emotionally charged content is spread more quickly than neutral messaging. This means that if you have a regrettable social media outburst, it will be difficult for others to forget. No one will remember your tweet about what you ate for breakfast, but they will remember when you post an incendiary tweet about the “haters and fools” whose opinions differ from yours.

So, why do we have these outbursts in the first place? When we experience emotions like anger, our self-control suffers, leading us to act more aggressively. However, when we distract ourselves from the emotions we are feeling rather than ruminating about the experience that caused them, we are better able to control our aggression.

Remembering a time when we behaved cooperatively can also help us to regain self-control. In one experiment, participants who remembered a time when they behaved cooperatively were more likely to believe that “one little sin might be one of many,” and were thus less likely to give in to temptation on a later task. For example, if you think about a time when, say, you worked with a large group of people in the hopes that you might win a contest (or perhaps an election of some kind), you may be more well-equipped to resist publicly insulting someone who disagrees with you.

For those trying to prevent themselves from impulsively sending regrettable social media posts, here are a few tips to consider:

1. Take a step back. Think of a time when you cooperatively worked with others. Maybe you had a really great experience volunteering at a local soup kitchen, or maybe you have a really great and productive team of coworkers that you enjoy working with. Putting yourself into this frame of mind might actually decrease your desire to send that overly-emotional tweet.
2. Take the perspective of someone who might advise you. For instance, what might your mother think if you decided to post that antagonistic tweet? If your mother is anything like mine, she would probably tell you that posting angry tweets is not a worthwhile use of time. By thinking about the situation from someone else’s perspective, we diminish the influence of our own irrational emotions, allowing us to think more clearly. This more rational state will allow us to make better decisions and to stay out of trouble.
3. Find an accountability partner. This could be someone who also has trouble biting their tongue (or fingers?) when they get emotional, or even someone who is trying to reach another goal. In this relationship, you hold one another accountable for your actions. If one of you sends an angry tweet or decides to skip the gym and stay at home eating pizza, you will have the other person to answer to. They might ask you what “covfefe” means, and you might ask them why they couldn’t make it to the gym. Being reluctant to disappoint this other person will help keep you on track and off of Twitter.
4. If all else fails, try to distract yourself from the emotion you are feeling. Are you enraged over something someone might have said about you? Sad that your friends seem to be ignoring you? Stay away from Twitter! Instead, do something else to occupy your mind. Go golfing, bake some cookies, or pick up one of those books on your shelf that you’ve been meaning to read. After some time, you may find that your emotions have subsided and you no longer feel the need to berate someone online.

It can sometimes seem like our impulses are impossible to overcome. However, by proactively taking a step back to evaluate whether we really need to give in to our base desires, we may be able to overcome them and to prevent future embarrassment and/or international catastrophe.

Ciara Lutz is a research associate at Duke University’s Center for Advanced Hindsight, an applied behavioral science research lab that helps people be happier, healthier and wealthier.

References

Denson, T. F., Pedersen, W. C., Friese, M., Hahm, A., & Roberts, L. (2011). Understanding impulsive aggression: Angry rumination and reduced self-control capacity are mechanisms underlying the provocation-aggression relationship, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 37(6), 850-862. doi: 10.1177/0146167211401420

Steinmetz, J., & Mussweiler, T. (2017). Only one small sin: How self-construal effects self-control, British Journal of Social Psychology, 56, 675-688. doi:10.1111/bjso.12208

Stieglitz, S., & Dang-Xuan, L. (2013). Emotions and information diffusion in social media–Sentiment of microblogs and sharing behavior, Journal of Management Information Systems, 29(4), 217-247. doi: 10.2753/MIS0742-1222290408

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1. Scaling Nudges with Machine Learning

by Chris Risdon (Behavioral Scientist) // Twitter: @chrisrisdon / @behscientist

(Image Credit: Behavioral Scientist)

“It’s worth thinking about why machine learning could be extremely valuable—and maybe even necessary—when nudging for good. Thanks to technology, we are moving from an age in which products and services connect us to and better manage our things (music, money, email, friends) to an age in which products and services are explicitly designed to help us achieve behavior-based goals.”

2. Why Machine Learning and Big Data need Behavioral Economics

by Dr. Colin W. P. Lewis (www.robotenomics.com/)

“Data analysis is complex and requires both human and machine’s working together. The data scientists with knowledge of the biases, heuristics and works on decisions under uncertainty that behavioral economics provide will likely offer far more knowledgeable analysis than those without behavioral economics reasoning.”

3. Human And Machine Intelligence

by Prof. Dilip Soman // Twitter: @dilipsoman Youtube: BE101x 

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“What’s so human about humans that machines cannot replicate, or cannot replicate? […] A couple of hallmarks of human decision making: one is the idea of inconsistency or unpredictability. So, like I’ve mentioned a few times, our theories are stochastic. You give people the same data and often times they come back with different responses, either because the context is different or because they are in a different state.”

4. Why Humans find Faulty Robots more Likeable

by ScienceDailyNews

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“”Our results showed that the participants liked the faulty robot significantly more than the flawless one. This finding confirms the Pratfall Effect, which states that people’s attractiveness increases when they make a mistake,” says Nicole Mirnig. “Specifically exploring erroneous instances of interaction could be useful to further refine the quality of human-robotic interaction.”

5. Bad bots do good: Random artificial intelligence helps people coordinate

by Matthew Hudson // Twitter: @SilverJacket

“Further analysis showed that bots’ slightly noisy behavior benefited the networks in part by setting an example for others. Some people also showed “noise,” by occasionally deciding to pick a color that conflicted with their neighbors. The noise level of bots influenced the noise level in people—even those several nodes away, suggesting a ripple effect.”

6. Robotic Nudges: The Ethics of Engineering a More Socially Just Human Being

by Jason Borenstein and Ron Arkin

“Human behavior can be nudged in countless ways as already existing tactics for doing so clearly illustrate. Yet would “robot nudges” be different ethically or in other important respects from current nudging tactics, and if so, to what degree?”

7. Humans and AI: Rivals or Romance?

by Terence Tse, Mark Esposito and Danny Goh

“But this all begs one question: If technological progress represents a comprehensive threat to humans, then why do we still have jobs left? In fact, many of us are still working, probably much harder than before.”

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San Ramon, Calif. – June 8, 2017 – Research-backed employee financial wellness company Retiremap today unveiled the first financial coaching platform combining human coaching with robo-advisor capabilities. Developed in tandem with Duke University’s Common Cents Lab, the new Retiremap Platform leverages behavioral insights to maintain the human element of financial coaching while automating just-in-time communications to enable a scalable financial coaching program at an affordable price.

Designed for employers and financial advisors, the Retiremap System harnesses behavioral economics best practices to promote accountability, goal creation and progress, confidence, and mental accounting by employees. After building and testing live prototypes with Common Cents, the program is currently being rolled out by a number of employers and advisors, including the award-winning retirement plan advisory firm Channel Financial.

According to a study by the Center for Financial Services Innovation, 57% of American adults are struggling financially, and 43% of U.S. households struggle to keep up with their bills and credit payments.

“Our mission is to help more underserved populations tap into critical financial guidance,” said Retiremap CEO Matt Iverson. “It is clear that financial education has failed to impact employee behavior over the last three decades. However by turning retirement plan advisors into financial coaches using automated technology and behavioral strategies, we are moving the needle for the populations that need it most.”

The use of robo-advisors as an alternative to costly and difficult to scale one-to-one financial coaching has grown in popularity and has led to an increase in venture funding for these technologies. However, researchers have shown that financial coaching remains one of the most effective tools for changing financial behavior and promoting financial wellness.

“Numerous studies indicate that financial education has minimal long term effects on changing financial behaviors,” said Channel Financial Partner Matt Gulseth. “Most of the financial wellness programs we evaluated have been based on the faulty premise that education changes employee behaviours. It doesn’t. We are working with Common Cents Lab and Retiremap because they are creating behaviorally sound protocols that change employee behaviors.”

Created in partnership with Common Cents Lab, the Retiremap platform provides the human element of financial coaching while automating personalized email, SMS and in-app communications. Over the course of a year, the Common Cents team evaluated behavioral research around financial decision-making to create an eight week system that harnessed the resulting best practices to promote financial wellness.

“We partnered with Retiremap to develop a scalable and effective robo-advisor as a way to increase savings and financial wellness,” said Common Cents Lab co-founder Kristen Berman. “The result is a platform that removes the complexity from financial decision making and delivers positive, personalized coaching one step at a time.”

To learn more about the Retiremap System, visit http://retiremaphq.com/.

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About Retiremap

Retiremap is a research-backed social venture focused on helping employees set and achieve their financial goals, particularly those employees experiencing financial stress. Retiremap automates and integrates advisors into the financial wellness program to achieve significantly greater employee behavior change.

To achieve its social impact, Retiremap partners with top plan advisors and recordkeepers seeking to have an outsized, measurable impact on employee behavior.

About Common Cents Lab

The Common Cents Lab, supported by MetLife Foundation, is a financial research lab at the Center for Advanced Hindsight at Duke University that creates and tests interventions to help low- to moderate-income households increase their financial well-being. Common Cents leverages research gleaned from behavioral economics to create interventions that lead to positive financial behaviors. The lab is led by Behavioral Economics Professor Dan Ariely and is comprised of researchers and experts in product design, economics, psychology, public policy, advertising, business administration, and more.

To fulfill its mission, Common Cents partners with organizations, including fintech companies, credit unions, banks, and nonprofits, that believe their work could be improved through insights gained from behavioral economics. To learn more about Common Cents Lab visit www.commoncentslab.org.

Press Contact:

Michael Azzano

Cosmo PR

415/596-1978

michael@cosmo-pr.com

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Our team at Common Cents worked with employee financial wellness company Retiremap to build an 8 week financial health platform that keeps the human advisor but uses technology to automate the coaching. By doing this, we aim to provide the benefits of financial counseling at a larger scale.  After building and testing live prototypes, we are rolling out the program with a number of employers and advisors, including the award-winning retirement plan advisory firm Channel Financial. Over the next year we’ll kick off a controlled trial to measure its impact.

In order to build this product, Retiremap and Common Cents had to understand and then operationalize the key drivers of financial counseling programs. Accountability, Confidence and One-Time Decisions are the three main product principles that we narrowed on to drive the development.

Accountability

To overcome the “intention-action” gap, we often need an external push. Accountability through deadlines or check-ins are just two examples of external motivators.

We’ve seen the power of deadlines time and again in our own experiments: one doubled the response rate to an email by including a reply deadline, and another increased the number of applications for a low interest rate loan by 24% simply by including a deadline.

For example, Minneapolis North High School effectively applies the accountability principle. Students are required to meet with a designated adviser: a classroom teacher who essentially doubles as an academic coach. This 36-minute period of accountability is cited by teachers and administrators to be a main driver in improved graduation rate. Minneapolis Public Schools increased their graduation rate by 39 percentage points over the last two years.

How do we apply this in Retiremap?  

There are two phone sessions with your advisor at the start and at the end of the program. But we needed to keep people motivated during the 8 weeks to complete the financial challenges and make some real changes to their savings, debt, and spending habits. To set ourselves up for success, the platform incorporates deadlines, active commitments, forced choice, calendar appointments, and implementation intentions to help increase the odds that people won’t lose motivation.

Below are some sample screen captures highlighting the accountability concept. 

Confidence

In a clever study,  researchers Hadar, Sood, and Fox examined the role confidence plays in our financial decision-making for retirement savings. The study’s researchers broke participants into two groups and provided each with different materials. One group was given basic descriptions of low- and high-risk investment funds, while the second – a more advanced description with complex terminology.

The participants were then asked how likely they would be to invest in each fund. Those given more technical and advanced descriptions were less likely to invest, regardless of whether the fund was low or high risk.

Participants’ confidence in their understanding of the funds played more of a role in their investment decisions than the actual risk profile of the funds.

How do we apply this in Retiremap?  

In the RetireMap Platform, there are many times that we remind users that they are more than capable and ready to take control of their financial future.

Below are some sample screen captures highlighting the confidence concept. 

One Time Behaviors vs Habits

Habits are hard to break. Habits are hard to form. When at all possible the Retiremap platform emphasizes “one-time” behaviors that people can do to improve their financial life.

For example, we help people design their bank account structure to match their long term goals. In a three-year randomized experiment, researchers found that parents provided with college savings accounts showed higher social and cognitive performance. The hypothesis is that parents given college savings accounts changed how they thought about their child’s future.

This intervention was not about educating parents about their child or about their finances. Instead, this intervention was designed to help parents create a “college-bound” savings account by default. In this way, researchers made it easy for parents to opt into a child savings account.

By providing a separate account, the researchers helped create a college-bound identity for the children in their parents’ minds.

How do we apply this in Retiremap?  

RetireMap uses this same strategy to help employees save on everything from short-term savings to 529 plans to retirement accounts. This One- Time Behavior of setting up an account and the automatic transfer takes much less mental energy than monthly budgeting to figure out how much you can spend and how much you have saved up.

It’s just the beginning.

Common Cents partnered with Retiremap to develop a scalable and effective robo-advisor as a way to increase savings and financial wellness for those who need it most. We think the result is a platform that removes the complexity from financial decision making and delivers positive, personalized coaching one step at a time. As the journey continues we will report on its impact in the field.

To learn more about the Retiremap System, visit http://retiremaphq.com/

1.  Lerman et al., 1995; Marcus et al., 1998; Proper et al., 2003; Rimer and Kreuter, 2006
2. The ABCs of Financial Education: Experimental Evidence on Attitudes, Behavior, and Cognitive Biases Fenella Carpena, Shawn Cole, Jeremy Shapiro, and Bilal Zia

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