5 science-backed ways to achieve your New Year's goals

The Healthy Nudge

January 2023

Welcome to The Healthy Nudge. Each month, we'll get you up to speed on the latest developments in policy-relevant health behavioral economics research at CHIBE.

1) 5 science-backed strategies to stick to your New Year's goals

A CNN article written by CHIBE-affiliated faculty member Katy Milkman, PhD

CHIBE-affiliated faculty member Katy Milkman, PhD, offers 5 science-backed strategies to sticking to your New Year's resolutions sourced from her book: “How to Change: The Science of Getting from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be.” Read the article here.

2) Dr. Kevin Volpp testifies before Senate subcommittee on "Food as Medicine"

A CHIBE blog post featuring Kevin Volpp, MD, PhD

CHIBE Director Kevin Volpp, MD, PhD, appeared before the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry’s subcommittee on food and nutrition to talk about the connection between chronic disease and nutrition and to call for continued federal support for nutrition research and “Food as Medicine” programs. Read the article here.

3) How to gamify your exercise to make it more enjoyable

An NPR story featuring CHIBE-affiliated faculty member Mitesh Patel, MD, MBA, MS

CHIBE-affiliated faculty member Mitesh Patel, MD, MBA, MS, spoke with NPR about using gamification to make exercise more enjoyable and how different approaches to gamification (such as competition, support, or collaboration) can impact your exercise goals. Read the article here.

4) Using financial incentives for COVID-19 vaccination in South Africa

A BMJ Global Health paper led by Candice Maylene Chetty-Makkan, PhD, with CHIBE authors Harsha Thirumurthy, PhD; Elizabeth Bair, MS; Alison Buttenheim, PhD, MBA, et al.

"Financial incentives for COVID-19 vaccination led to a modest increase in first-dose vaccinations among older adults in South Africa. Financial incentives and expanded access to vaccines may result in higher vaccination coverage." Read the paper here.

5) Making life easier for clinicians: The Nudge Unit’s continued mission

A Penn Medicine blog post featuring CHIBE Associate Director Kit Delgado, MD, MS

"The Nudge Unit — which focuses on designing slight pushes that help people make better, healthier, or just more-optimal decisions — has often gotten attention for its work in increasing exercise , improving prescription practices, and improving health screening rates. In the wake of COVID, Dr. Kit Delgado hopes to push the Nudge Unit firmly into the territory of making health care workers’ lives easier. A heavy focus of that is lessening the load they carry. “There needs to be a focus on interventions that make it easier for clinicians to help patients access the preventive care they need and safely manage their acute care needs outside of the hospital,” Dr. Delgado said. “Solutions in these areas will be difference-makers.” Read the article here.

Top Tweet

two paper with chibe-affiliated authors were named to a journal's top 10 most talked about papers in 2022

Congratulations to Roy Rosin, MBA; Kevin Volpp, MD, PhD; and Srinath Adusumalli, MD, MSHP, MBMI, who were involved in the papers recognized by the journal Applied Clinical Informatics as its most talked about papers of 2022. See the two papers below:

Design, Implementation, and Validation of an Automated, Algorithmic COVID-19 Triage Tool

A Mobile, Electronic Health Record-Connected Application for Managing Team Workflows in Inpatient Care

Events

January 12 from Noon to 1 PM EST

Join us for a Health Policy and CHIBE research seminar on “Systemic Discrimination: Theory and Measurement” with Aislinn Bohren, PhD, Associate Professor of Economics, University of Pennsylvania.

Hybrid Event: In person at 1104 Blockley Hall, 423 Guardian Drive, Philadelphia, PA or virtually via Zoom (https://upenn.zoom.us/j/95353951407). See more details here.

January 26 from Noon to 1 PM EST

Join us for a Health Policy and CHIBE research seminar on “The Role of Neighborhood Characteristics in Pregnancy and Birth Outcomes” with Eliza Kinsey, PhD, Assistant Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health, University of Pennsylvania.

Hybrid Event: In person at 1104 Blockley Hall, 423 Guardian Drive, Philadelphia, PA or virtually via Zoom (https://upenn.zoom.us/j/95353951407). See more details here.

Funding Opportunity

The Pension Research Council (PRC) and Boettner Center, the Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics (CHIBE), the Population Aging Research Center (PARC), and the Population Studies Center (PSC) invite investigators to submit pilot proposals for the annual 2023-2024 Quartet Pilot Research Project competition. Pilot funds are targeted to support small-scale, innovative, or exploratory projects with a duration of one year. Any faculty or researcher with an active appointment at the University of Pennsylvania is eligible to submit a proposal. Colleagues at other universities may be co-investigators as long as a member of the Penn research community is the Principal Investigator. Learn more here.

Job Opening

Way to Health is looking for a senior applications specialist to join its team. Join a team that has launched over 200 research studies and clinical programs, improved the lives of over a million patients, and facilitated top-notch scientific research. Way to Health is based in Philadelphia, PA, and work is hybrid.

The team is open to applicants in the tri-state (PA, NJ, DE) area. Bachelor’s degree is required. Health care experience and/or interest is a plus. Applications analysts implement web-based clinical and research programs like Heart Safe Motherhood, and they collaborate with software developers to design and build new features to support these implementations. Apply at Careers Penn.