[The CINet] Individual-Level Solutions Have Led Policy Astray

"So, what do you think?

In their journal paper "The I-Frame and the S-Frame: How Focusing on the Individual-Level Solutions Has Led Behavioral Public Policy Astray" (summary here with links to abstract and full paper), two previously self-described members of the behavioural science academic community change their view.

'An influential line of thinking in behavioral science, to which the two authors have long subscribed, is that many of society’s most pressing problems can be addressed cheaply and effectively at the level of the individual, without modifying the system in which individuals operate. Along with, we suspect, many colleagues in both academic and policy communities, we now believe this was a mistake..'

The reasons for this about-face are based around the following:

'Results from [i-frame: individual-focused] interventions have been disappointingly modest.'

'The fact that corporations have spent billions of dollars promoting i-frame interventions in the belief that such interventions will fail should make behavioral scientists uneasy.'"

...

https://www.comminit.com/global/content/cinet-individual-level-solutions-have-led-policy-astray 

 

I don't want this to sound like "Told you so!" but I'm not surprised, even as the literature and media often wax lyrical about 'synergy', constantly about 'integration' and more recently 'population health'.

I appreciate too that having a (cognitive) model is just the beginning. I really admire the practitioners in The Communication Initiative Network and other groups who grapple with funding, policy, recruitment, communication, change and outcomes around the globe.

As efforts continue across health, social care and education ... never under-estimate the relevance of conceptual tools, especially the power of not just one lever - but at least two:

Hodges' Health Career - Care Domains - Model

See also: I-dentity: How the Individual-Group runs...