A systematic review of behavioral public policy research: origins, mechanisms and outcomes

Purpose This study aims to identify the origins, mechanisms and outcomes of applying behavioral insight in public policy research. Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted a systematic literature review to answer three research questions. The authors identified 387 primary studies, dated from January 2000 to April 2021 and coded them through a thematic analysis. Related studies were obtained through searching in Emerald, ScienceDirect, Sage, Springer, Wiley and Routledge. Findings The results identified eight themes for origins, 16 themes for mechanisms/techniques and 13 outcome-related themes. Through the thematic analysis, the major mechanisms of behavioral approach were found to be social marketing, information provision, social norms, incentives, affect, regulation design, framing, salience, defaults, simplification, networking, environment design, scheduled announcements, commitments, attitude-preference-behavior manifestation and combining behavioral and nonbehavioral mechanisms. Practical implications The findings of this review help policymakers to design or redesign policy elements. Originality/value This review provides the first systematic exploration of the existing literature on behavioral public policy.