The Internet is gaining relevance as a platform where extremist organizations seek to recruit new members. For this preregistered study, we developed and tested a novel online game, Radicalise, which aims to combat the effectiveness of online recruitment strategies used by extremist organizations, based on the principles of active psychological inoculation. The game “inoculates” players by exposing them to severely weakened doses of the key techniques and methods used to recruit and radicalize individuals via social media platforms: identifying vulnerable individuals, gaining their trust, isolating them from their community and pressuring them into committing a criminal act in the name of the extremist organization. To test the game's effectiveness, we conducted a preregistered 2 × 2 mixed (pre–post) randomized controlled experiment (n = 291) with two outcome measures. The first measured participants’ ability and confidence in assessing the manipulativeness of fictitious WhatsApp messages making use of an extremist manipulation technique before and after playing. The second measured participants’ ability to identify what factors make an individual vulnerable to extremist recruitment using 10 profile vignettes, also before and after playing. We find that playing Radicalise significantly improves participants’ ability and confidence in spotting manipulative messages and the characteristics associated with vulnerability.

In a large study that involved 2637 participants recruited from a representative UK and US sample, we tested the influence of four behavioural interventions (versus control) on a range of behaviours important for reducing the spread of COVID-19 a day after the interventions were administered. Even if people largely complied with social distancing measures, our analyses showed that for certain subgroups of the population the interventions made a positive difference. More specifically, for those who started practising social distancing relatively recently, an information-based intervention increased general compliance with social distancing and reduced both the number of times people went out and the number of hours they spent outside. However, for people who started practising social distancing relatively early, the interventions tended to backfire and, in some cases, reduced compliance with social distancing. Overall, this research has various policy implications and shows that, although behavioural interventions can positively impact compliance with social distancing, their effect may depend on personal circumstances.

Aims of the study The current study evaluates the effectiveness of an opportunistic mobile screening on the percentage of people who are aware of whether they may be hypertensive (in an observational study) and the effectiveness of reminder prompts on the percentage of people who seek further medical attention (in a randomised controlled trial). Methods used to conduct the study The screening of 1227 participants (529 female) was conducted during the registration period of the 2018 Beirut International Marathon in Lebanon. Next, 266 participants whose screening indicated hypertension (64 Female) were randomly allocated to a treatment group or a control group in a 1:1 fashion. The treatment group received a reminder prompt to seek further medical attention for their potential hypertension and the control group did not. The overt nature of the text message meant that participants in the treatment group could not be blinded to their group allocation. The primary outcome is participants’ self‐reports of whether they sought further medical attention. Results of the study For the opportunistic screening, a 25% prevalence rate and a 24% awareness rate of hypertension was indicated. A McNemar analysis suggested that the screening increased participant awareness (X2(N = 1227) = 72.16, P < .001). For the randomised controlled trial, 219 participants provided follow‐up data via a phone call (82% retention). A Chi‐squared analysis suggested that the reminder prompt successfully encouraged more participants to seek further medical attention, 45.5% treatment group vs 28.0% control group (X2(1, N = 219) = 7.19, P = .007, φ = 0.18). Conclusions drawn and clinical implications Extra support in the form of a brief reminder message can increase the percentage of people who seek further medical attention after attending an opportunistic screening at a marathon event. The discussion reviews how the results align with previous research, strengths and limitations of the current study, and implications for future research and practice.

Background: The rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine represented more than logistical challenges. Lebanon, despite benefitting from the COVAX initiative that made vaccines more accessible to everyone residing in the country, faced considerable challenges encouraging the Syrian refugee population to register for a vaccine. The reasons behind refugees’ reluctance to get vaccinated were mainly behavioral in nature: fear of side effects, doubts about the vaccine’s effectiveness, and even the belief that the vaccine was unnecessary. Methods: An RCT was conducted in order to test the impact of dissonance induction on the level of willingness of Syrian refugee survey respondents who had not been vaccinated (n=1,569). The survey also collected data on refugees’ knowledge, attitudes, and practices regarding the vaccine. Results: Results revealed that dissonance induction significantly reduced vaccine hesitancy, with more pronounced effects detected among women, middle aged adults. Conclusion: These findings have important implications on rethinking the behavioral aspect of the delivery of public health services to the refugee population in Lebanon and vulnerable populations elsewhere.

This paper presents the development and implementation of experiential behavioral economics course in three Middle East universities. Experiential learning has proven to have many benefits for students because of putting them at the center of the learning process and allowing them to learn by doing. More specifically, as part of the practical sessions, students were tasked to design, implement and report on one field experiment conducted in collaboration with a nudge unit. We believe that this approach whereby students apply their knowledge through experimentation to address issues relevant to their communities and environment can be more effective and impactful than traditional teaching or relying only on classroom-based experiments. In this paper, we share the lessons learned from the journey of delivering several experiential behavioral economics courses.