Behavioural Exchange™

AGENDA DAY 1 AGENDA DAY 2

TIME	RED THEATRE	BLUE HALL	BLACK BOX
08:00



09:00
	REGISTRATION & COFFEE


10:00

	10:30 - 10:45 Opening Remarks
	10:45 - 11:05 Nudges: Past, Present, Future
11:00	11:05 - 11:50 What Kind of Evidence about Behavior do Policy Makers Need?



12:00	12:00 - 12:40 Changing Social Norms to Unlock the UAE’s Potential


	12:50 – 13:10 Success Starts at Home
13:00	12:50 – 13:10 Success Starts at Home	13:00 - 13:30 Behavioral Trends across 70 Countries
		13:00 - 13:30 Behavioral Trends across 70 Countries


14:00	14:00 - 14:45 Educational Tools of Tomorrow


	14:45 - 16:15 Human Behavior Meets Artificial Intelligence	14:45 - 15:30 Keeping Antibiotics Workingwith Behavioral Science	14:45 - 15:15 A Theory of Everyone: Navigating our Biggest Challenges
15:00


			15:45 - 16:15 Building Adult Skills
16:00			15:45 - 16:15 Building Adult Skills

	16:30-17:15 Reducing Sludge		16:30 - 18:00 Workshop: Measuring and Transforming Social Norms for Policy Impact
		16:45 - 17:15 Strengthening Bonds across Communities
17:00



18:00
	END OF DAY 1

Chair: Elisabeth Costa Chief of Innovation and Partnerships | BIT

Speakers: Cass Sunstein Robert Walmsley University Professor | Harvard Law School

Chiara Varazzani Lead Behavioral Scientist | OECD

Dilip Soman Canada Research Chair | Rotman School, University of Toronto

David Halpern President Emeritus | BIT

Behavioral science and the ‘what works’ agenda have gone hand-in-hand, but there are inherent tensions. For example, evidence shows that people can react differently to the same interventions in different contexts - and that different groups vary in their responses to the same intervention. With that in mind, is the goal of working out ‘what works’ viable? How much can we rely on a result in one place to also hold true elsewhere? After all, ‘behavioral insights’ rose to prominence by offering general principles about ‘how people behave’. One of the possible answers to this tension is to get better data and keep testing. But is that feasible for policy makers? Can we really expect them to run more trials, when they have got a seemingly clear result from running just one trial?

Presentation: Nikos Nikiforakis Co-director of the Center for Behavioral and Institutional Design (C-BID) | NYU Abu Dhabi

Discussion: H.E. Minister Abdullah Bin Touq Al Marri Minister | Ministry of Economy

Nikos Nikiforakis Co-director of the Center for Behavioral and Institutional Design (C-BID) | NYU Abu Dhabi

How do norms spread? How do you bring an end to existing negative norms? How do you encourage new positive norms? Speakers in this panel will discuss their expertise using social norms interventions to bring about social change. In the UAE, behavioral science has been used to tackle overconsumption norms in energy, food choices, use of water, and the purchasing of luxury goods. This is within the context of wider (and remarkable) normative change in the UAE in recent decades. The question of this panel will be: how can the UAE use social norms to unleash its potential in the 21st century?

Discussion: H.E. Hajer Al Thehli Secretary General | Education, Human Development and Community Development Council

Serene Koh Director, Singapore | BIT

This conversation will share EHCD’s experience with the “Parental Engagement Project” highlighting the role of behavioral insights and how it can strengthen education policies aimed at improving parental engagement. In the UAE public school system, the understanding of parental behaviors through behavior science research uncovered root causes for the observed limited parental involvement, and its critical impact on students’ learning.

As the project is still in progress, the research outcomes that emerged so far highlighted significant potential for behavioral interventions. These interventions will contribute to familiarizing parents on getting increasingly involved in their children’s learning. Building on those behavioral insights, the education system can then design well aligned policies that can improve the core role of parents in driving success for their children from home. The aim for us, as policy makers, is to develop a UAE-homegrown policy framework for parental engagement across UAE schools, that is rooted in the Emirati parents’ value system to drive social change.

Chair: Dr. Jana Flemming Director, Early Childhood Development | Salama bint Hamdan Al Nahyan Foundation

Speakers: Hamda Mohammad Al Suwaidi Head of Research and Continuous Development, Knowledge & Impact Sector | Abu Dhabi Early Childhood Authority

Dana Suskind Co-Director | TMW Center for Early Learning & Public Health - University of Chicago

Andreas Schleicher Director of Education and Skills | OECD

Laura Litvine Director, France | BIT

As technology becomes increasingly embedded in children’s lives, educators, policymakers, and parents face a complex challenge: how can we use technology to enhance learning without compromising children’s well-being? This session will explore evidence-based strategies, drawn from behavioral science, that help balance the benefits and risks of technology use for children. We will consider how personalizable and interactive digital resources can spark imagination, broaden global awareness, and support children’s educational development - as younger generations are being introduced to screens at earlier ages. At the same time, we will examine the potential pitfalls of unregulated or excessive screen time, including impacts on mental health, social skills, concentration, and physical health. Ultimately, this session will highlight how we can leverage behavioral science to guide the thoughtful integration of digital tools into children’s education—enriching learning experiences while safeguarding their developmental well-being.

Introduction: Dr Najwa Aaraj CEO | Technology Innovation Institute

Speakers: John List Distinguished Service Professor in Economics | University of Chicago

Iyad Rahwan Director | Max Planck Institute for Human Development

Sanjog Misra Charles H. Kellstadt Professor of Marketing | University of Chicago Booth School of Business

This session will introduce some emerging uses of AI to accelerate social science research in public policy, such as rapidly generating new policy proposals or testing policy proposals using synthetic audiences. The session should demonstrate that more (and more ambitious) behavioral research projects are increasingly possible, while at the same time stressing that AI can pose new challenges to effective policy-making. Other questions touched on in the session will focus on the relative roles for humans and AI in ‘doing’ behavioral science (i.e. will AIs actually be behavioral science innovators, or repositories of knowledge?), whether AIs will change the kind of questions behavioral scientists ask, and the danger of bias in AI systems.

Chair: Wardah Malik CEO | BEworks

Speakers: Michael Muthukrishna Professor of Economic Psychology | London School of Economics

Michael Bailey Founder of Social Capital Lab | Meta

The UAE is home to more than 200 different nationalities living side-by-side as neighbors, and the peaceful cohabitation of these groups has been a bedrock of the UAE’s success to date. To guarantee the flourishing of all residents now and in the future and to ensure that this diversity continues to contribute to the UAE's success, this panel will ask how the UAE and other diverse societies can build even closer relations across communities using a deep understanding of human behavior and behavioral insights.

Speakers: Nikos Nikiforakis Co-director of the Center for Behavioral Institutional Design (C-BID) | NYU Abu Dhabi

Ernesto Reuben Global Network Professor of Economics | New York University

Policymakers and organizations often assume that individuals worldwide respond similarly to nudges and incentives, yet growing evidence challenges this notion. At the same time, behavioral research remains scarce in many regions of the world such as in MENA. Using the newly collected World Behaviors & Stereotypes Dataset, this session explores behavioral diversity across 70 countries, focusing on key behavioral traits, examining the origins of the diversity and variation across demographic groups. We highlight key factors that affect human behavior across cultures, offering insights into how behavioral policies may need to adapt to different contexts.

Chair: Michael Hallsworth Chief Behavioral Scientist | BIT

Speakers: Dr. Najiba Abdulrazzaq Co-Chair | UAE National AMR Committee

Francis Meyo CEO | Busara

Farrah Alshash Director CSR | PureHealth

Rasha Attar Director | Behavioral Science Group

Antimicrobial resistance is one of the greatest health challenges of our time. Ineffective antimicrobials are projected to claim 40 million lives in the next fifteen years and cost $159 billion if radical action isn’t taken. At its core, the problem of antimicrobial resistance is driven by human behaviors, such as antibiotic overprescribing, inappropriate prescribing, and the indiscriminate use of antibiotics in animal agriculture.

While R&D into finding new antibiotics is one way of tackling this issue, the behavioral drivers of AMR need to be addressed. If not, any new generation of antimicrobials will also become ineffective over time. This session will place the spotlight on behavioral interventions to keep antibiotics working across the world, including projects being launched by the BSG and partners in the UAE and abroad.

Chair: Chiara Varazzani Lead Behavioral Scientist | OECD

Speakers: H.E. Saeed AlMulla Executive Director of Customer Experience | Department of Government Enablement - Abu Dhabi

Dilip Soman Canada Research Chair | Rotman School, University of Toronto

Cass Sunstein Robert Walmsley University Professor | Harvard Law School

Victor Dominello CEO | Future Government Institute

Elisabeth Costa Chief of Innovation and Partnerships | BIT

Cass Sunstein Robert Walmsley University Professor | Harvard Law School

Government processes are often burdened by sludge - unnecessary complexity that frustrates citizens and reduces access to effective public services. Whether it’s convoluted forms, overly-bureaucratic procedures, or digital interfaces that are difficult to navigate, sludge is a major barrier to streamlined governance. This session will draw on the work of our speakers in assessing and reducing sludge in government processes - always with the aim of creating simpler and more accessible public services.

Discussion: Andreas Schleicher Director for Education and Skills | OECD

David Halpern President Emeritus | BIT

As the world continues to evolve through technological advancements, economic shifts, and demographic changes, the ability of adults to acquire and apply new skills is more important than ever. The OECD’s latest findings highlight the growing gap in essential skills, particularly in digital literacy, problem-solving, and workplace adaptability. This session will delve into the current landscape of adult skills development, explore the policies and programs that can drive meaningful change, and discuss how individuals, businesses, and governments can work together to enhance productivity in a rapidly changing world.

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