Other people's behaviour acts as a cue for what to do, buy, or believe.
More quotesThe letter succeeded partly because it was politely rude. It told selected doctors that nearby colleagues prescribed fewer antibiotics. No national sermon. No vague request to “consider stewardship”. A local comparison placed their own pattern outside the norm, then offered alternative responses for the pressured moment with a patient.
That combination matters. Comparison without an available action merely produces defensiveness. Advice without comparison can be filed beside every other worthy recommendation. Together they say: people facing similar conditions behave differently, and here is a plausible route to join them.
The reference group is where this becomes clever or crooked. “People like you” must mean people facing a genuinely comparable situation. A national average can be dismissed as somebody else’s problem. A carefully selected peer group can illuminate behaviour; a rigged one is statistical theatre.
Norm messages can also backfire when they advertise how common the unwanted behaviour is. Tell customers that thousands steal towels and you may have turned theft into the local custom. The useful norm is truthful, desirable and close enough to matter.
Outside medicine, the structure travels well: energy use compared with similar homes plus one specific change; delayed payments compared with peers plus a simple payment route; response times beside comparable teams plus a workable first step. Most behaviour-change messages drown people in importance. This one supplied social friction and an exit. Seventy thousand fewer prescriptions is a sharp reminder that a cheap letter can outperform a grand campaign when it tells the truth people would rather not hear.