Our course motivates you to apply behavioural science to answer some of the biggest questions facing society – for example, ‘how can we improve people’s wellbeing?’, ‘how can we help people save more for the future?’, and ‘how can we foster more effective environmental behaviours?’. In addition, each year we award the Keep Scotland Beautiful Prize for Best Research in Behavioural Science relating to the Environment.

Learn from the experts

You’ll benefit from the vibrant research community within our Behavioural Science Centre, where there’s a regular programme of visiting speakers, leading academics, and policy and industry professionals. There’s also the opportunity work closely with course staff who have specialist knowledge who have published in leading peer-reviewed outlets on:

• Forecasting
• Risk and how to communicate it
• Altruism
• Donating behaviour
• Survey design
• Selective attention
• Priming, including Mortality Salience
• The optimal design of nudges
• The ethics of nudging
• The replication crisis in the social sciences

Teaching

Teaching is carried out through lectures, seminars, guest speakers, article discussion groups, and presentations. There’s a regular programme of visiting speakers, leading academics and policy and industry professionals at Stirling’s Behaviour Research Centre.