371. Habituation and Its Antidote: A Conversation with Cass Sunstein

Welcome to episode 371 of the Brainy Business Understanding the Psychology of why People Buy. In today's episode, I'm excited to introduce you to Cass Sunstein to discuss his newest book, Look Again.

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You are listening to the Brainy Business Podcast, where we dig into the psychology of why people buy and help you incorporate behavioral economics into your business, making it more brain friendly. Now, here's your host, Melina Palmer.

Hello. Hello everyone. My name is Melina Palmer and I want to welcome you to the Brainy Business Podcast. In today's conversation, I am joined by Cass Sunstein. Yes. Of Nudge fame, as well as the wonderful book Sludge and another I truly love called Simpler, which I've quoted from often on the show and dozens of others. Cass is the nation's most cited legal scholar who for the past 15 years has been at the forefront of behavioral economics. From 2009 to 2012, he served as the administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. Since that time, he has served in the US Government in multiple capacities and worked with United nations and the World Health Organization, where he chaired the Technical Advisory Group on Behavioral Insights and Sciences for health during the COVID 19 pandemic. He is the Robert Walmsley University professor at Harvard Law School. His book Nudge, co authored with Richard Thaler, was a national bestseller. In 2018, he was the recipient of the Holberg Prize from the government of Norway, sometimes described as equivalent of the Nobel Prize for law and the humanities. He's here today to discuss his wonderful new book, Look Again, the Power of Noticing what Was Always There, which just came out this week. And he co authored with Tally Sherritt, whose research on optimism bias has been featured on the show and in my books many, many times as well. I'm so excited for this one, I.

Can'T even tell you. One last thing.

Before we get into the conversation, I want to be sure you know that there are links in the show, notes for everything, including related past episodes, links to articles and books, including Nudge, Sludge, Look Again, and so much more. It's all within the app you're listening to and at the Brainy Business. Now let's jump right in. Cass Sunstein, welcome to the Brainy Business podcast.

Thank you. A great pleasure to be here.

Oh yes, I'm so excited. I tried not to gush too much when we first met a few moments ago. As I told you, most of the listeners will definitely know your name and your work, but for those who are new to you in the space. Can you share a little bit about your background and the work that you do?

Yes. So for a long time at the University of Chicago, where the idea of rationality is in big bold letters across the sky, and that's not just a hope, it's a judgment that people are rational. And as a law professor, I was surprised and skeptical about the claim that people are rational. And I discovered behavioral economics through Richard Thaler and behavioral science through Danny Kahneman and Amos Tversky, and they became collaborators and co authors. And I've worked in governments on these questions and I've worked with companies on these questions, a great deal with business on these questions. And human behavior is fascinating and it turns out a key to what ails us and might what cure us.

Definitely. And as you said, you have worked with some amazing co authors and collaborators. There's I'm going to be linking to. I did a seven part series on the podcast on Nudges. We have an episode on Sludge, which is one of your other books, so we'll definitely have those. And today we're talking about your new book.

Look again, we've got it here.

For everyone who's watching with another fabulous co author, we'll link to the episode on optimism bias too. Can you share a little bit about this new book?

Yes. So Tali Sharat, my co author and great friend, is a neuroscientist who's done pathbreaking work on many subjects. And the question of habituation, too many syllables to be gripping, but bear with me, is as fundamental as anything to our species and also other species, including canines, one of whom is right next to me as I speak. And the idea is that we diminish in our sensitivity to things that are fantastic and that are terrible over time. So the first time you see a beautiful beach that maybe you get to stay near for a month, you might be bowled over. And the second time you might be amazed. And the 30th time you might say, oh, nice beach. The first time you're subject, let's say, to unkindness or worse, on your job or in your neighborhood, you might think, what was that? The 30th time you might just think, oh, I guess it's New York. And that's how people are in New York. So the fact that people habituate to what's fantastic and what's terrible is essential to our evolutionary fitness. If we didn't do that, we probably wouldn't have survived. But for each of us, it's It's a problem in life and dis. Habituation turns out to be the hero of the story. And I can say a little bit about why, if you like.

Oh, of course. Yes, definitely. Please do. I was reflecting, though, in the book, and as you were just talking here of. So I did a semester abroad, lived in Rome when I was in college. And of course, when I first got there, you know, you're walking by, oh, my goodness, there's the Vatican. Oh, there's the Coliseum, whatever, as you go around town and everything. And I lived across the river, and so I had to walk across a bridge right by the Vatican every day to get to school. And in the middle, right, it's just like, there's the Vatican again, right. You don't even notice. And then as it's getting time to leave, you know, in the last couple.

Of weeks, oh, this is the last.

Time I'll walk by the Vatican. Right. You start to really pay attention and notice it. So it was sort of. That's my relatable moments into some of the habituation and dis.

Habituation, yeah, completely. So I was recently, just a few days ago, at the University of Cambridge in England and amazed by the buildings and the history and, you know, there's Trinity and there's kings and there's queens and there's where Newton did things and there's where Keynes did things. There's where Wittgenstein was. And I talked to some of my friends who were there just living at Cambridge, and they like it a lot, but they don't feel astounded in the way I'm sure they did in their first week there.

Definitely.

Yeah.

For sure. So, yes, please do tell.

Why dishabituation matters, both in the awe and the terrible. Why do we need to dis.

Habituate?

Okay, so the star of the tale in the book is Julia Roberts, the actress. And in the midst of the book, she did an interview. I think this is unrelated. She didn't know we were doing the book. She did an interview with the New York Times in which she was asked, what's your perfect day? And she said, I get up, I make breakfast for my kids, I have lunch with my husband, I get ready to pick up my kids after sports. Then she stopped herself and she said, it's boring. And then she added, but given my job, I go away for a while to make a show or a movie, and. And when I come back, it's surrounded by pixie dust. It re. Sparkles. So what's instructive about that? Is the word resparkles that for each of us, if we're at all lucky, we have a neighborhood, we have friends, might have a partner, we might have a dog, we might have a backyard, we might have a street corner that are part of our life. That might not be Rome, it might not be University of Cambridge, but it's in its way amazing. And we might be sufficiently used to it that we don't cherish it or get amazed by it in the way that we should. As we talk, I'm smiling because I'm speaking from Concord, Massachusetts, which is where I mostly live. And that's where the United States started. The revolution started, actually kind of outside this door where British troops came. And apart from the history, there's a little store that's about a mile away that is a piece of heaven. It has great coffee and great croissant. The people are really nice. And as I talk, the fantasticness of these things, it just isn't something that one thinks about all the time. And we don't notice things that we're used to that are great become like furniture that you've lived with for a long time. And it would be very good for each of our lives, our well being, our sense of surprise, in the best sense, to notice things that are there that we would notice if we were gone for a month and then came back. Here's a way to put it with respect to dis. Habituating to the good. You know when you sometimes have a dream and you it's a bad dream and you lose something that you care about. It might be a friend, it might be a job, it might be a family member, it might be a loved one. And then you wake up and the bad thing didn't happen and you're completely amazed. And there's a feeling of relief that's almost like exhilaration. That's because the dream disabituates you. It makes you treat the familiar as a gift. And that's what we should all do, really, I think. And it helps morale, it helps people do better at their jobs, it helps people do better in their relationships. It helps people be astonished by at least some good things. In our days on the tough side, there are for all of us challenges, some of which are just because life has challenges. But it might be because someone is in of front, very nice. Or it might be because an employer is being a little harsh. Or it might be because there's some form of discrimination that we're facing of one kind or another. And to dis Habituate to that can be not a lot of fun because then you have to deal with something that's not so great. But it can be liberating because it can give a sense that this is something that it doesn't have to be ideal as it is or as unkind as it is. And it can get us to say something and do something. So some people in life are dis habituation entrepreneurs. Let's say some consumers are dis habituation entrepreneurs. Some business people, leaders are dis habituation entrepreneurs. Some people in a firm are exactly that. Martin Luther King was a big time dis habituation entrepreneur. Gloria Steinem was a disabituation entrepreneur. And there are zillions of them. All of us at one or another point in our life are dis habituation entrepreneurs. If only we say, let's say to a parent, you know, be a little nicer to me on this. I'm kind of sensitive or something. And businesses that often do spectacularly well are disabituating businesses. Apple was emphatically in the early days, a dis habituating business. Rockports, they invented a new kind of shoe and they disabituated. And that often involves a critical distance from existing practices, seeing that maybe there's something wrong with them, where what's wrong might be a lack of kindness, including maybe, let's say, kindness, defeat.

I love it. And yeah, as you have been sharing, there are so, so many wonderful examples throughout the book. It's definitely one as, you know, reading, you keep going and then you get.

Oh, it's the end of a chapter already, right?

And then, you know, you're ready for the, the next one. So many wonderful examples throughout and to a little bit of the business aspect.

Of things, as this is the brainy business.

I really would love if you can share a little bit about creativity and how we can be more creative through.

This understanding of habituation.

Okay, maybe we'll take this from the side. Yeah, we'll get right there, I promise. There's an Olympic athlete named Dick Fosbury who invented the Fosbury Flop. It's a good name because the Fosbury Flop was anything but a flop. He won the Olympic gold medal. And what he did was he invented a way of jumping that is not intuitive at all. It seems very odd and awkward. But it's a way of jumping that basically high jumpers now do. And it turned everything around. He was like Steve Jobs or Thomas Edison or people who don't make it into the, you know, the books, but who are Right now, doing good and doing well. There are Fosbury flops of all kinds. And what he did, Fosberry, was he dis. Habituated. He saw the way that people jumped and he thought, I don't know that that's the way that people should jump. If the goal is to get as high as possible, what if they did it this way? And to think of it like that, you would have to have a critical distance from existing practice. So I've worked in the US Government on several occasions, and I know that creativity in the government often comes from thinking, we've always done it this way. What if we do the equivalent of Fosbury flop? Now, one way to do it might be, and this might be a little bit of a controversial example, but Republicans and Democrats both like it. This was early 1980s where people said, when we issue a regulation involving the environment or safety and health, we try as best we can to analyze the costs and benefits. Is it going to cost, you know, $200 million or 50 million? Are the benefits, as best we can monetize them going to be a million dollars or are they going to be $600 million? Why don't we do that? And that came from people who weren't, you know, longtime government people. There were. That was a Fosbury flop. And it has helped, I think, in government save American companies lots and lots of money. And it's also helped save a lot of lives. Because if you have a safety regulation that's going to protect a lot of workers from getting hurt, the value in economic terms is really high. That's like a Fosberry flop. And I saw little things like that in government where someone might have an idea about, maybe we can have people come into the United States who we know are safe and they won't have to take their shoes off, et cetera. Let's call it global entry, or TSA pre. And many people are benefiting from global entry or TSA pre, which are like a lot of people are, which are developed by creative people who saw something from the side. It's like a Fosberry flop. And I guarantee there are businesses right now sometimes called disruptors. And what disruptors typically are are people who by temperament or determination refuse to habituate. So they will take something from some other area. So maybe they're an engineer and they take something from psychology. Maybe they're a computer scientist and they take something from economics. Maybe they are involved in business planning, but they studied literature, so they learn something from Shakespeare or James Joyce. That's a little crazy considering what standardly done but it turns out to be turn a company around.

I really loved the section in the book where you're talking about whether you learn by, you know, it's exploration or exploitation. Right. And I. I think we like to learn and explore knowledge in the same way in what I read in the book and seeing the value of both. Can you share a little bit about, you know, how that all works?

Yes. So my mother used to say the world is divided into two kinds of people. Those who divide the world into two kinds of people and those who don't. That's my mother and it's a little bit funny. But let's, let's be the kind of person who divides the world into two kinds of people. Some people are exploiters, not in a bad sense, but in the sense that they exploit what they have meaning, knowledge or opportunity or neighborhood or things. So think of an exploiter as someone who when they get a week off thinks a staycation sounds really great or someone who thinks when the question is where to go out to dinner. Let's go to that place we know, we've been there a few times, it's terrific. Let's try it again. We know it's going to be good. They're exploiting existing things. Then there are people around, explorers who think we had a week off. Let's go to Virginia or Hawaii or the North Pole. Let's try something really new. And they might think let's go to the new restaurant that opened that nobody's been to. Let's explore that. Or they might think there's nothing better than meeting a new friend whom you not a friend yet, but a new maybe friend, let's go see them rather than the person with whom you've had lunch a hundred thousand times. I am an exploiter, I confess with respect to life. I like the idea of a staycation. A restaurant that's familiar and I know to be good is like a magnet for me. My wife is an explorer. She was a war correspondent and she was in a bunch of unfamiliar nations in the very recent past. She also works for the government and she's someone who doesn't exploit existing, she explores. And people are different in this way and it's not, I think that one is better. Sometimes opposites attract here. But you can consider an explorer as typically someone who habituates in a hurry so they think I'm used to that restaurant or that neighborhood or that spot, I want to try something new. So the exploiter tends not to be habituating quite so quickly. So the old familiar restaurant has its delight as well as its familiarity. And the tendency to explore is associated with rapid habituation. And of course, some people are, you know, I'm explorer with respect to reading. I'll explore anything. And that may be because I habituate to stuff that's familiar with respect to words on a page or a laptop.

Yeah, I know. You gave the example of Bill Gates and his reading list compared to Warren Buffett, I think. Right. As the. For the explorer and the exploiter.

It's very funny that Gates, if you look at what he recommends reading, it's a new book about the history of dogs and new science about climate change and a book about the decline and fall of the Roman Empire and something about South Korea's economic miracle and then a novel about anything and Warren Buffett, it'll be the Little Book of Investing, the Big Book of Investing, the Medium Sized Book, revised edition of all three of those books on investing, investing for you, investing for amateurs, investing for professionals. So Buffett's recommendations, they're very, very focused on investing and Gates is all over the place.

Yeah, well, I, I am all about learning in that way and the disparate things that seem like they shouldn't be connected and bringing them together. That combinatorial thinking I've talked about on the show a lot. I used to edit books a thousand years ago, it feels like. And you know, I'd be editing something about how to use the lighting in dressing rooms in, in retail there, there's a whole book on that, FYI. And I'd be thinking about how this applies to what I'm doing in banking. Right. Or whatever, and all the crossover of things. And so I'm a big fan of that. I get the impression that you are as well. Are you reading anything interesting or do you have any book recommendations that are maybe off the, the beaten path?

Well, I, I have a few. I'm reading rereading a book called Radical Uncertainty, which is a book from a couple of years ago by two people in business contending that often we know much less than we think we do about events. We don't know the probability that in a certain way, so we can't calculate expected values. The claim is that what Frank Knight and John Maynard Keynes referred to as uncertainty as opposed to risk, when you can't assign probabilities to outcomes, is everywhere. Radical uncertainty of that kind is everywhere. And it's a romp. It's an improbable romp. This book I don't agree with it really, but I'm learning from it. And I'm learning from it. Not least because I don't with agree agree with it entirely and rereading right now because the author recently died. My favorite novel in any language. I only really have one but of all the translated languages, this is the my favorite novel. It's called possession by A.S. byatt and I reread it every couple of years and buy it. Recently died. And this is an extremely beautiful behavioral economics and romantic book.

Wonderful.

Well, thank you for sharing those. They will be linked in the show notes for everyone so we can read like cast.

I'm sure everybody will be delighted for that.

If I may ask one more, maybe different question than you get. I kind of hope so. I like to mix things up a little bit. So we have a lot of aspiring authors and or people who have written and even if we think about, you know, writing content, not just books, but you write a lot of books and co author a lot of books. Do you have tips for people who are thinking about writing both? You know, what's the difference of writing on your own versus with co authors? You know, what are your thoughts on any of that?

Okay, great. Well, couple thoughts. Some projects I get something like a tingle down the back of the neck, and that's excitement. And for this book that happened, the topic of habituation and not noticing the great and the not so great that the more you think about it, it's, I think, a thrilling idea. And if you get a tingle of excitement about a project, then go for it. And if you don't get that tingle, then either see if it eventually starts to sneak up on you or if it's nonetheless worthwhile because you're liking it, even if you're not thrilled by it. So idea number one is tingle. Idea number two is you can't edit a blank page. So often with writing, I find for myself that the first paragraph or the first page is the hardest. And once you have a paragraph or a page, maybe you have some sense of where to go and if you don't, to keep going in the hope that you'll have something you can edit is, I think, liberating. Knowing that if you're doing something that you don't like very much, that that's okay. So I sometimes say to myself when I'm thinking these paragraphs are awful, I say to myself, assume it's good. I tell myself, assume it's good. And it's sometimes very hard to do that. But it won't be good. But then if I'm lucky, the fifth page will be good and then you can go. Collaborating with Tally Sharat was complete joy. She's fun, she's incredibly smart, she's funny, she's very good at seeing where her co author's ideas might not work. And she's nice about it. And whether she's figured out how to be nice about it or whether she just intuitively is like that, I don't know. I should ask her. And she's also very good at synthesizing her ideas with her co author's ideas. She's also a spectacular writer. So she's a better writer than I am. And to see my prose coming back with more energy and life because of her, that's fantastic. So find a co author like her is great. I would recommend that any co author is someone you're going to spend a lot of time with. So to make as any project is something you're going to spend a lot of time with, so make sure it's someone with whom you like spending a lot of time. All my collaborations have been a joy for me, but they've been differently joyful. Danny Kahneman, for example, is an adventure as a co author. He's extremely critical of everything, most of all himself. Part of his genius is his ability to improve on his own. What I would have thought was fantastic work. And he makes. Makes it better. He's. He's the type who stays up late at night thinking, are we there yet? How do we get there? Dick Thaler is just really fun. He's super high standards, but he thinks if it's not working, we'll try something else. And to find someone like any of those people is great.

That is such wonderful advice. And as we've already said and you highlighted there, you've definitely worked with some really amazing co authors and I love, as you said, they're different and there are really great things to see about each of them. And I think it's kind of an exercise in, you know, dis. Habituation in the way that you're writing and working on projects to have different co authors. So I just, I really enjoy it and to see the different way it comes out in the writing, like you said, is really cool. So thank you again so much for joining me on the show. For everyone who is looking to learn more and to connect, you know, do you have what's the best path for them to learn more? And of course we'll link to the book in the notes as well.

I think they connect with any work on habituation. I think Look Again is the only book on that topic, but we have lots and lots of footnotes. So there is fantastic work in multiple fields, psychology and neuroscience, some in economics that you can find. Anything related to behavioral science at nudging is kind of adjacent to this. So Dick Thaler and I have a new edition of our book Nudge. We call it the final edition, which was the behavioral trick we're playing on ourselves. So it was not to do another edition. We'll see if it's really had fun with that book that has a lot of references to behavioral science. I strongly recommend a book called Scarcity by Sendhil Molanathan and Eldar Shafir, which is about cognitive scarcity. It's closely related in some ways to the Look Again problem. And of course I'm sure the viewers listeners know Thinking Fast and Slow by Danny Kahneman is must reading.

Wonderful.

Well, thank you again for joining me.

On the show, Cass.

It was wonderful to finally meet and.

Be able to chat with you here today.

Great, great pleasure. Thank you.

Thank you again to Cass Sunstein for joining me on the show today. What got your brain buzzing in today's conversation? For me, I am just bursting about how delightful it was for me to be able to talk with Cass for this episode. Of course, Look Again is a fascinating and phenomenal book, full of wonderful insights and opportunities to make lives better and more sparkly, which I love. And beyond that, I've been a fan of Cass and his work for as long as I've been in this field and I'm so sure it is the case for many of you listening today as well. So finally being able to meet him was a real honor. Those who say never meet your heroes aren't in the field of behavioral economics and behavioral science. Let me tell you, everyone I've had the privilege of meeting is so generous and kind and thoughtful. And of course, Cass was no exception to that. So wonderful and I hope you enjoyed those writing tips. As I said in the intro, Cass is attributed with being the nation's most cited legal scholar who has written dozens of books in addition to the teaching he does and his work in the White House and around the world. It's truly amazing and I've quoted him to many since recording this episode with the fabulous tip that has really stuck with me of you can't edit a blank page. Just get started, write something, do something, and know that you can edit and move forward from there. Getting started is so important. There's always time to edit. That goes for books, emails, articles, blog posts, podcast episodes, and journeys in life. We love a good metaphor around here. What are you inspired to get started with today that you can edit tomorrow? Come share it with me on social media. You'll find me as the Brainy Biz pretty much everywhere and Melina Palmer on LinkedIn. As we close out the show, don't forget about those show notes which include links to all those related past episodes and books including Look Again, Nudge, Sludge and more. It's all waiting for you in the app you're listening to and at the brainy business.com371 and thank you again to Cass Sunstein for joining me on the show. You thank today it was a delight to chat with and learn from you. Join me Tuesday for another Brainy episode of the Brainy Business Podcast. It's going to be a lot of fun. You don't want to miss it. Until then, thanks again for listening and learning with me and remember to be thoughtful.

Thank you for listening to the Brainy Business Podcast. Melina offers offers virtual strategy sessions, workshops and other services to help businesses be more brain friendly. For more free resources, visit thebrainybusiness.com.