BEHAVIOURAL INSIGHT UNIT

BEHAVIOURAL INSIGHT UNIT

In 2019, McNamara partnered with Dr. Nathanial Barr to launch the CIF 2.0; formally known as The Community Ideas Factory: Behavioural Insights Unit.  This second iteration of the CIF sought to capitalize on a growing interest in the psychology of human decision-making.  Here, a new CIF partner, BEworks, was invaluable.  BEworks is a Toronto-based consulting firm and advanced research institute established by world-leading behavioural scientists Dan Ariely (Duke University), Nina Mazar (Boston University) and Kelly Peters (BEworks Co-founder and CEO).  Together, we realized that the benefits of behavioural science were only being realized in large organizations with the financial resources to invest in the research.  We also realized that most non-profits and community organizations in our network were keen to explore the benefits of behavioural science but lacked sufficient resources to do so.  Hence, it made good sense to orient CIF 2.0 in this direction.  In the role of Project Director once again, we procured an NSERC grant ($360,000/3 years) to support CIF 2.0.  The core objective is to  devise, develop, implement and test behaviourally-informed interventions attuned to the needs of our community partners.  Today, CIF 2.0 features a suite of projects, each specifically designed around the Behavioural Science needs of our community partner. Our community partners include the United Way Hamilton/Halton (UWHH), the Halton Environmental Network (HEN), Food For Life (FFL), YMCA Oakville and the Oakville Community Foundation (OCF).