PB205      Half Unit
Individual Differences and Why They Matter

This information is for the 2025/26 session.

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This course offers insight into the nature of differences in the psychological processes of individuals and the implications of such variation for behaviour and behaviour change. While most policies are designed with the ‘average citizen’ in mind, we know there is large variety between people’s thoughts, choices and behaviour. More recently, these differences are leveraged to personalise behavioural intervention, advertising and political communication to target specific ‘segments’ of the population with the aim to enhance results. This course digs deeper into the psychological and behavioural assumptions which underlie how individuals behave collectively and individually in the wider societal context. Sample topics include how individual traits affect cognitive performance, how ideological preferences and voting patterns can be traced to individual and group variation, whether there is use in mapping personality, grit, perfectionism or motivation, and the ethical implications of applying these insights in behaviour change contexts. We will consider sources of individual variation from the micro-level (e.g. temporal variation in one person) to the macro-level by aligning content to sustainability goals (e.g. political decision outcomes, global health and climate change communications or resource distribution). Ultimately, the goal is to understand why and how people differ in their enduring patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving across contexts, and what this means for contemporary societies.

By the end of the course you should:

• Understand the biological and social underpinnings of systematic psychological and behavioural variation between and within individuals.
• Understand the theoretical and methodological approaches used to capture such variation in thinking, feeling and behaviour.
• Understand the implications of such variation in thinking, feeling and behaviour in a wider societal context.

15 hours of lectures and 10 hours of classes in the Winter Term.

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Winter Term.

-POSTnote and Annotated bibliography (90%) in WT
-Essay (10%) in ST

• Rose, T (2017) The End of Average: How to Succeed in a World That Values Sameness London: Penguin
• Bryan, C.J., Tipton, E. & Yeager D.S. (2021) Behavioural Science is unlikely to change the world with a heterogeneity revolution Nature 5(8) 980-989

Essay (10%, 3000 words)

Report (90%, 3000 words)