Behaviour scientists don’t think we are good at considered decision making; we find it very tiring. Rather, we take ‘mental shortcuts’ – like imitating ‘social norms’. By following the crowd, we make ‘good enough’ decisions. We are also heavily influenced by context. We can be ‘nudged’ to do things through a relevant and timely intervention because this is when we are most receptive to influence. Think of our brains as energy saving machines, which explains why we prefer to take the line of least resistance.

Behaviour scientists have also wrestled with how we can be happier – like Paul Dolan in Happiness By Design (2014). The book does, I admit, contain the blindingly obvious. Happiness, he says, comes from finding “the right balance between purpose and pleasure in everyday life.” But how do you achieve this happy state? Dolan does not favour too much navel gazing. His recipe for more happiness could be called ‘action planning.’ Plan and do stuff differently and greater contentment will follow.

Dolan invites us to score what gives us the most purpose or pleasure. Here is his list: More money; new experiences; children; more time with kids; kids leaving home; a new partner; more sleep; more sex; a shorter commute; more time with friends; a new house; a new job; a new boss; new work colleagues; more exercise; to be healthier; to be slimmer; to stop smoking; more holidays; a pet.

The success of any action planning requires us to prioritise and focus on a few transformative things – the easier the better. This is not a list I shall be showing to my wife any time soon, as I think she might recommend a cold shower and a lie down.

If Dolan’s list looks prescriptive, it is vague compared to the work of a sixth century monk, St Benedict, whose ‘rule’ gave precise instructions about how to run a happy monastery. He prescribed a three-way division of every day into: one-third physical activity, one-third private contemplation/reading and one-third in the society of other people (or monks in the case of a Benedictine monastery). I read The Rule of St Benedict 40 years ago (whilst writing a thesis on monasticism) and I have been using my own secularised version of it ever since. I find that following this routine dispels the occasional ‘low mood’. St Benedict was a behaviour scientist before that term was coined – and in my view, a much wiser one than Dolan.

But what of governments? Can they act to improve the general wellbeing of their populations? Dolan’s list includes several areas where public policy can have a big impact – such as employment and health. Now, I am not a fan of the bossiness that often grips some policymakers who think they know what is best for us. Yet, I plead guilty to my part in this project, because I was a UK government adviser in the noughties. There were lots of things that we wanted citizens to stop doing (such as smoking and engaging in unsafe sexual practices) and start doing (exercising more, getting tax returns in on time, and eating more fruit and veg).

In 2008, a highly influential book called Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness was published by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein. They called what I was doing ‘libertarian paternalism’: governments can be a bit bossy but that’s okay, because people do still have a choice.

Nudge brought about a revolution in thought, based on the insight that the context and timing in the way choices are presented are key. Out went advertising and in came design thinking. Take saving for a pension. Years of government advertising had failed to achieve much uptake. Instead, Nudge recommended a design solution: new employees would simply be automatically ‘opted in’ to ‘a workplace pension.’ They called this the ‘default option’ strategy and it trades on our innate laziness.

Behaviour science became a powerful tool for paternalist governments. Yet, it was not a silver bullet. Some ingrained behaviours require a systematic, long-term approach that pulls ‘levers of influence’ at different levels. Change comes about because of ‘an ecology’: the interaction of mutually supporting influences. This was the main idea of my work in government published was published in 2009 as Communications and Behaviour Change.

One of the great successes of the Ecological Model has been ‘smoking cessation’ which I will work through as an example. All levels of influence are in play.

1. The Wider Environment

Discourse in the media and degree of consensus among opinion formers.

Scientific evidence about the harms of tobacco were well established and reported in the media over a long time in spite of the efforts of Big Tobacco to ‘muddy the water.’

2. Local Environment

What is available where you live and where you go.

Because of the ‘cultural consensus’ about the harms of tobacco, the government was able to introduce tough legislation banning smoking in eating establishments and on public transport. Government made social smoking difficult. Shops were required not to display ‘Cigarettes for sale’ above the counter.

3. Social

Norms among family, friends and colleagues. Taboos.

Smoking gradually became less cool. Organisations followed suit and voted against smoking in the workplace. It became a norm to give up smoking. Huddling outside in the rain to have a smoke became a sad affair.

4. Personal

Personal knowledge, priming, tools, incentives (prices).

High taxes made smoking progressively unaffordable. Cigarette packs were required to carry revolting images of the diseases caused by smoking. Both incentives and psychological priming to evoke feelings of disgust were used. Pregnant women were targeted as they proved particularly open to persuasion.

In government, we also worried about childhood obesity. London streets today provide a vivid picture of our failure, as chunky youngsters chow down on chips, burgers, fried chicken and soft drinks. The ecological model provides you with a ‘high level’ explanation of what is going wrong (in what is a fearsomely complex and contested picture). All the factors that are positively aligned in smoking cessation are not when it comes to preventing childhood obesity. Cheap food (to take one powerful influence) tends also to be bad food. Big food is a powerful lobby and governments have yet to take them on.

Personally, behaviour science has made me happier (not least by following St Benedict’s rule). When I left Google in 2016, I was a portly 95 kilograms, having indulged myself on the tasty free food the company gave its staff. So, I ‘designed in’ a series of ‘swaps’ to my daily life. Porridge not cereal for breakfast, walk to work not using public transport, no desserts at lunchtime, eat the evening meal earlier not at nine p.m., no late-night cheese snacks, éclairs only on weekends. Each one of these did not require too much will power – making it easy to act as being a strong predictor of success. But the combination was effective. Today, you would not describe me as a muscle toned athlete, but I am still mobile on the tennis court.

Julian Saunders was CEO of a WPP creative agency, a UK government advisor and helped set up an innovation unit at Google called the Zoo. julians@joinedupcompany.com. www.joinedupthink.com