The Good Behavior Log and The Observer Effect

At work today, a long-term planning team was discussing how we could motivate social change in reducing the use of resources. We planned to measure results. But the real insight was in realizing that measuring behavior and making those measurements obvious to people in real-time will motivate people to change their behavior. 

Most of us know the phrase: "You can't manage what you don't measure."

Some of us have vague memories of learning the Heisenberg uncertainty principle from quantum mechanics. In simplistic language, Heisenberg observed that it's not possible to know with exact precision both parts of a complementary pair of facts about a particle, e.g., you can't know exactly where a particle is and exactly what momentum it has at that moment.  A related but lesser known statement is called the observer effect, which notes that measurements of certain systems cannot be made without affecting the systems. 

We can and should take advantage of the observer effect. On a community scale, we can measure energy use, or food waste, or water use, and then simply by making that information available to the community, and perhaps some information about their peer's behavior, they will with near certainty change their behavior for the better. People are self-conscious and want to do well.

The same thing applies to us on the individual scale.

There is a set of behaviors I'd like to encourage myself to do more of: get enough sleep, eat plenty of fruits and veggies, get aerobic exercise, do strength exercise, and meditate. These are all desirable and don't take tons of motivation, but they don't come without conscious effort. Similarly, I'd like to drink a little less and snack a little less, not over-eat, not grossly under-sleep, and sharply limit non-vegan foods. Overall, I wanted to drop 12 pounds from my weight on January 1st to achieve the weight I've been during recent high-fitness periods. 

So like a typical engineer, I made a spreadsheet, made grossly simplifying assumptions, and did a simple calculation. 

I awarded a positive point for every desired behavior each day and a negative point for every undesired behavior each day. I added good, subtracted bad, and came up with a net score for the day. Also noted my morning weight. Excel has some nice conditional formatting features that do the color coding automatically. Green is best in the month transitioning to red, the worst in the month.

No calories counted. No messy portions to add up or weigh. No complex math. Simple stuff to remember. If I want snacks and wine, fine. I can bike to make up for it, or not. No flogging me over it. Just record the data and be honest with myself about what I've chosen to do that day. Believe me. Keeping an honest record of behavior is plenty of motivation to make a change. 

Each day is a new day. Each month, all is forgiven and start over where you are at that moment. Turn the page. Don't look back. You are where you are.

Be well.