Would You Like to Be an Organ Donor?
The researchers collected data from 11 countries in Europe. The data showed the percentage of people in each country who had selected to be an organ donor.The following chart shows the differences in organ donors by country. Notice that there is one group of countries where the percentages of organ donors are very low (on the left) and one group of countries where the percentages of organ donors are very high (on the right).When the researchers looked at this graph, it was somewhat confusing. Initially, they thought the difference in donations would be caused by factors like religion and culture, but that wasn’t the case.For example, Denmark and Sweden are located right next to one another. They have many geographic, cultural, and social similarities. You would expect their donation rates to be roughly the same. And yet, only 4% of the population in Denmark has chosen to become an organ donor while almost 86% of the population in Sweden has chosen to donate.What could account for such a drastic difference? Are the people in Denmark just more selfish than the people in Sweden?
What Made the Difference
As it turns out, the people in Denmark aren’t more selfish than the people in Sweden.The difference in donation rates was due to the type of form that each country sent out. The countries with low rates of organ donors sent out a form that said, “If you want to be an organ donor, check here.” In other words, the form required people to opt-in.Meanwhile, the countries with high rates of donation sent out a form that said, “If you don’t want to be an organ donor, check here.” In other words, the form required people to opt-out.The difference was astounding.Here’s why this is important…If someone asked why or why not you chose to be an organ donor, you would probably come up with an important reason for your answer. After all, being an organ donor seems like a very personal decision. But the truth is, whether or not you chose to be an organ donor had more to do with the type of form you were sent than anything else.Consider the impact of this. If a simple form can make such a drastic difference in your choices, how do other pieces of your environment impact you on a daily basis?What is going on here? And how can you use it to improve your life?
How Your Environment Impacts Your Behavior
The researchers summarized the impact of the environment design by saying, “In most cases, the majority of people choose the default option to which they were assigned.”In other words, most of us respond the same way to the cues that surround us. If you are sent a form that asks you to make a tough decision, you will probably go with the default option. If you see a cookie on the counter, you will probably eat it. If you hear music, you will probably start tapping your feet.You may think that you control most of your choices, but the truth is that a large portion of your actions every day are simply a response to the environment design around you. The forms you are mailed, the food on your kitchen counter, the items on your desk at work — they all impact your behavior in one way or another.Bringing it back to the researcher’s quote, we could say that your environment is the “default option to which you are assigned.” The environment you surround yourself with determines the default actions that you take on a day-to-day basis.Guess what? This is good news because you can design your environment for success!Here’s how…
How to Design Your Environment for Success
By changing your surroundings, you can place a hurdle in the way of bad behaviors and remove the barriers to good ones. I like to refer to this strategy as environment design.Here’s an easy way to apply environment design to your own life: think about you...
Environment Design: Where to Go From Here
Most of the time we assume that to take a certain action, we need to have an incentive. You hear people say this all the time: “I need to get motivated.” or “I need to have a good reason for doing X.”We also assume this same approach for managing and motiv...
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