A few years ago, in a paper published in Science, researchers showed that reminders beforehand were more effective in getting criminal defendants to show up for court appearances than the deterrent threat of arrests for failing to appear.

One of the researchers was Anuj Shah, a new associate professor of psychology and public affairs in Princeton School of Public and International Affairs. He was recruited to the project by ideas42, the world’s first nonprofit behavioral science innovation lab, which was working with the New York City’s Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice to increase defendants’ attendance at court appearances.

“It was a pretty ideal partnership,” Shah said. “ideas42 had a lot of expertise on how to find problems where there could be behavioral solutions, and they had an understanding of which academics were also working in the same space, which made it easier for us to find each other to collaborate.”

Thanks to Princeton SPIA’s Kahneman-Treisman Center for Behavioral Science & Public Policy, students and faculty members at the University from a range of disciplines can do as Shah did.

Through the Kahneman-Treisman Center’s Behavioral Science Desk (BSci Desk), Princeton scholar-researchers who want their work to intersect with the insights of behavioral science as well as real-world settings can meet with senior leaders at ideas42 both on campus and virtually.

“SPIA is full of people — faculty, students, and a variety of experts — whose work, at the end of the day, depends on human behavior,” said Eldar Shafir, the Class of 1987 Professor in Behavioral Science and Public Policy; a professor of psychology and public affairs; and the inaugural director of the Kahneman-Treisman Center. “ideas42 is at the forefront of organizations specialized in thinking about behavior, its causes, and consequences, in a variety of policy settings. Having ideas42 at the School, to help us address human behavior in policy settings, is a wonderful development.”

Undergraduate and graduate students can brainstorm research ideas, learn how to include behavioral insights into their research projects, receive advice and coaching on professional skills, and get involved in an ideas42 project.

For faculty members and post-doctoral students, services include advice on setting up and running field research projects, participating in ideas42 research projects, learning how to identify potential collaborators and funders, and coaching in areas useful for academics interested in field research, including networking and fundraising.

Because Kahneman-Treisman serves scholars across campus who are interested in applied science, the Behavioral Science Desk is available to the entire University.

“Because the students who are interested in applied behavioral science come to us from a variety of disciplines and backgrounds and are looking to apply behavioral insights to a similarly broad set of real-world projects, we were looking for an organization that had demonstrated experience in designing, testing, and implementing behavioral science-backed interventions across a wide range of sectors,” said Leslie Jennings Rowley, the center’s associate director. “We found the perfect partner for this pilot in ideas42, who has experience across an array of fields and at a variety of public and private institutions.”

The Kahneman-Treisman Center launched the BSci Desk last spring, when Piyush Tantia, ideas42’s chief innovation and strategy officer, spoke with undergraduate and graduate students in group settings and one-on-one meetings about research ideas and how their work might apply to real-world problems. Tantia also talked with undergrads about their project for the course Psychology for Policy: Design, Leadership, and Communication.

“I helped them think through more psychological barriers, but mainly about how they could better implement the intervention they were considering,” Tantia said.

This spring, ideas42 will return for a workshop for faculty and any interested researchers on applied research in the field, and getting it funded by private foundations. Shah’s Science paper will serve as a case study for the workshop, as the work was funded by the Arnold Foundation.

“We're also kicking around ideas for other workshops for students and early-career researchers on skills such as networking,” Tantia noted.

Those interested in working with the BSci Desk can click here to set up an appointment or email them for more information.