MDRC Center for Applied Behavioral Science (CABS)

Project

Overview

Project Overview

Policymakers and administrators are increasingly using evidence about human behavior to improve the design of social services. People — who often rely on intuition instead of reason, make inconsistent choices over time, and can be overloaded by information — are the clients who receive services, the staff who provide them, and the policymakers who create them. Behavioral science demonstrates that even small hassles can create significant barriers that prevent those in need of services from receiving them.

The Center for Applied Behavioral Science (CABS) is a new initiative that combines MDRC’s expertise in social programs with insights from behavioral science. Projects that are affiliated with CABS develop innovative, low-cost interventions to improve the effectiveness of social programs and the experiences of the families and individuals receiving these services. Interventions are based on research from behavioral science, including behavioral economics, social psychology, cognitive psychology, and organizational behavior. Problems tackled by the Center address relevant policies in human services programs, educational settings, and employment training programs. Using a diagnostic methodology to identify opportunities most amenable to light-touch, high-impact interventions, CABS designs interventions and tests their impact through experimentation and provides technical assistance to social service agencies implementing such approaches.

For more information, contact [email protected].

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STATUS: Current

Basics

Issue: Families with Children, Work and Income Security

Focus Area: Child Support, Child Care and Early Education, Two-Generation Programs, Welfare Reform, Work Support and Asset Building

Population: Populations with Barriers to Employment, Families, Populations with Low Incomes, Children and Schools

Focus Population: People in Low-Wage Jobs, People Receiving Public Assistance, People Who Are Unemployed or Underemployed, Two-Parent Families, Fathers, Children 0-5, People Who Have Been Incarcerated, Parents Who Are Ordered to Pay Child Support

New CABS Website Launched

You know your mission. We can help you achieve it.

The Center for Applied Behavioral Science (CABS) combines MDRC’s decades of experience fighting poverty with insights from behavioral science. We take on pressing problems that our partners want to solve, using behavioral insights, design thinking, and technology to improve the way social programs are designed and services are delivered.

Issue Focus

How Behavioral Science Can Help Future-Proof State and Local Government

In this commentary originally published in Route Fifty, experts from MDRC’s Center for Applied Behavioral Science and BIT North America describe how government agencies can use behavioral science to adapt policies, programs, and services during the continuing pandemic crisis.

Overview »

Infographic

The CABS Approach

The Center for Applied Behavioral Science (CABS) combines MDRC’s decades of experience tackling social policy issues with insights from behavioral science. This graphic explains the CABS’s approach to solving problems.

Overview »

Full

Agenda, Scope, <br> & Goals

Agenda, Scope, and Goals

MDRC’s Center for Applied Behavioral Science (CABS) incorporates behavioral strategies into social programs to learn what works to improve program outcomes. Behavioral science sheds light on human decision-making and behavior to better understand how and why people make the choices that they do. Insights from the field are currently being applied to a diverse set of problems and contexts, and the application to social programs is a growing trend in public policy. MDRC has abundant expertise working within complex government agencies and programs. Since our founding more than 40 years ago, we have played a unique role in designing promising new interventions, improving existing programs, conducting rigorous evaluations, and providing technical assistance to build stronger programs and deliver effective interventions at scale. MDRC is known for mounting large-scale demonstrations and evaluations of real-world policies and programs serving low-income people. Interventions designed under the Center contribute to and improve other MDRC initiatives, enhancing the likelihood of finding cost-effective solutions to the most pressing issues.

CABS projects are based on detailed descriptions of how people actually behave in the real world, opposed to how people “should” behave. For example, people are likely to choose the path of least resistance, have shifting preferences, and are often not realistic with their timelines for getting things done. One study conducted by MDRC, as part of the Behavioral Interventions to Advance Self-Sufficiency project, incorporated a plan-making device that encouraged participants to write down when and how they intended to complete a task, which led to more people completing the action.

Recognizing these human tendencies, and developing interventions that account for them, may ultimately improve the programs MDRC works with that serve low-income and at-risk populations. Problems undertaken by CABS are identified through an exploration phase, in partnership with a program or agency, and then addressed by applying behavioral insights. Many behavioral strategies can be implemented within the current environment of government cutbacks and limited budgets for strategic improvements because they are low-cost and reasonably straightforward to implement. Interventions under the Center are evaluated to determine if they are effective at addressing the given issue.