Exploring the applicability of the established, Western behavioural theories in a Middle Eastern, Arabic world

Summary:

As an international community of behavior change practitioners our collective understanding of behavioral theory and economics originates from a large body of published research carried out predominantly in Western countries. As we apply these theoretical models to decode behavior and make predictions about potential behavioral influence, assumptions are implicitly made about their applicability to various population audiences. Kantars Behavioral Framework is based on a model developed over a decade ago that synthesizes the main behavioral and anthropological theories and categorizes influences around costs and benefits, efficacy, norms, legitimacy, morality, habit, heuristics, context and emotion. We use the Framework to understand behavioral influence and unlock behavioral insights on topics such as obesity, alcohol, tobacco, domestic violence, parenting, recycling, etc. However, until recently it has been used mostly in the same Western democratic countries that the theories themselves were developed and validated. Kantar recently applied the Framework to behavioral insight research in the UAE and Saudi Arabia, where the differences in cultural and religious framing led us to question how transferable the Framework was to societies founded on Islamic beliefs and laws and, in the UAE, with populations that are uniquely transient and without the legitimacy of citizenship. This presentation will share the process we undertook to re-validate the applicability of the widely-accepted theories of behavior in a Middle-Eastern, Arabic cultural context, and will draw attention to the main areas of behavioral influence that required reconsideration and adaptation - namely the lines of inquiry that fall into 'morality' and 'norms'.

Background/Objectives:

The objective of this presentation is to share with the audience the hypotheses formed and the steps of due diligence that our research team felt were required before embarking on the adoption of theoretical behavioural models that had not been validated in countries with radically different cultural underpinnings. Whilst we had absolute confidence that our Behavioral Framework was an exhaustive tool for exploring behavioural influence in Western and mostly Christian-based democratic cultures, we were not confident that the same assumptions would hold up in Islamic nations.

Description of Intervention and/or Methods/Design:

1. a global literature review to establish a basis for our hypothesis (that the majority of behavioral theories are founded in Western cultures) and to identify any examples where the theoretical models have been applied in the Arab world, and to assess if that was sufficient evidence to confidently apply our model in Islamic cultures.
2. mapping of what was known and gaps from the literature that required investigation.
3. workshops with qualitative researchers in the UAE and Saudi Arabia to retrospectively apply our existing Framework to recent qualitative projects that did not use a BI approach, and to identify where adaptations would be required and what the new lines of inquiry would be (mapped to the areas of influence on the Framework).
4. trial of the 'new Arabic' Behavioural Framework on a live project (project underway in Sharjah early 2020, with results presented as part of this paper). 

Results/Lessons Learned:

1. Many of the substantive and most commonly referenced and used models of behaviour, particularly in the public health space are highly applicable in the Arab world. Similarly, models that use common heuristics and context/settings are applicable. 
2. Theories that are grounded in 'moral judgement' and deterrence principles (legitimacy) and social norms are somewhat applicable, but need re-framing with new lines of inquiry that take the influence of Islam, Sharia Law, family and tribe and 'shame' into account. 
3. The role of heuristics, nudges and incentives requires considerable re-consideration and new approaches of 'discovery' in non-democratic communities where people are highly transient, expat, or lack a sense of cultural/country permanency or legitimacy.

Discussion/Implications for the Field:

Our conclusion is that radically different behavioural disciplines or new behavioural theories for the Arab world are not required by practitioners to carry out behavioural insight research, but adaptations in the lines of inquiry are necessary for the application of those theories to be useful for governments to develop or adapt social policy and services. As a substantial amount of BI research is designed and/or conducted in Arab nations by Western-minded and trained practitioners, this paper can offer learnings and insights to confidently progress BI research in the Middle East.

Abstract submitted by:

Donna Van Bueren - Kantar