What is the human factor?

In psychology, the human factor covers “the mechanisms that exist between what humans perceive and the conscious or unconscious reactions that result from it.” Exploring these mechanisms shows how to act better.

In the 1950s, economists sought to measure the human contribution to economic development and introduced the concept of human capital. The positive effects of attention to people proved hard to measure, so the human contribution was folded into innovation, and the human factor came to stand for human error. The focus moved to preventing unwanted events and to why risk prevention is so hard to carry out. The astrophysicist Hubert Reeves spoke of the “putain de facteur humain”, roughly “the damn human factor”: what keeps us from moving from what we know to what it implies.

William Schutz, author of The Human Element, saw untapped human potential as a source of extraordinary achievements: what happens to us depends first on ourselves, because each person can choose to become aware of their behaviors, feelings, thoughts and beliefs. For Jacques Fradin, of the International Panel on Behavior Change (IPBC, GIECo in French), the network of behavioral scientists and a partner of the fresk, knowledge of our own psychological functioning is the knowledge we need most.

The fresk rests on a theoretical foundation drawn from four disciplines: cognitive science and psychology (decision-making, biases, attention, memory, motivation), social psychology (influence, social norms, group dynamics and cooperation), the sociology of practices (habitus, social representations, how actions are structured) and behavior change (the stages of change and the levers adapted to each).

Why is pro-environmental behavior change so hard?

In companies and local authorities alike, being convinced of the need to change in the face of ecological issues is a first step, and change takes more. Behavioral scientists show that conviction and motivation open a long road, with many attempts along the way. Succeeding requires a deep understanding of the factors, often unconscious, that limit our capacity to change: emotions, cognitive biases, beliefs, habits.

This holds even when people are convinced of the need to change, even when there is a clear, shared action plan, even when many resources are mobilized and the path is technically clear. Because we are human. Our behaviors are shaped at three levels: the individual, the social group and the environment. The ecological transition rests on technical and regulatory choices, and just as much on human, social and cultural drivers.

Changing behavior takes individual effort, and that effort becomes collective in an organization. Carrying out a transformation plan requires a specific posture of support for change.

Why does ecology run into the human factor?

An Ipsos survey run with Nous Sommes Vivants (in French) for the Human Factor Summer University shows what the French are ready to change to be green. Low-cost gestures come first: recycling and limiting packaging (40%), cutting water and electricity use (40%), changing diet toward seasonal, local, organic food with less meat (34%). Gestures that touch comfort trail far behind: reducing car use (17%), giving up long-distance travel (10%). The human factor sits exactly there, between what we know and what we agree to change in our daily lives.

This gap grows when ecology is experienced as a list of renunciations, an ecology of constraint perceived as a punishment. A popular ecology (in French) takes the other path: a way of life that is responsible and desirable, rooted in daily life. Ecology then becomes a matter of relationships, with ourselves, with others and with nature: the fresk teaches each person to take care of themselves, of others and of their environment.

Which human factors shape our behaviors?

The fresk explores the factors that influence our behaviors, often below our awareness, and makes them visible and actionable. Two of them have a fresk of their own: emotions, with the emotions fresk, and representations, with the imaginaries fresk, which works on our relationships with nature.

How does the human factor fresk work?

The fresk helps participants become aware of the factors of change and resistance that often act below their awareness, from emotions to cognitive biases and beliefs, and turn them into levers everyone can use to adopt new behaviors. It is thematic: participants choose a behavior to progress on, such as taking responsibility, mutual aid so that collaboration becomes the norm, energy sobriety, or taking care of nature. It concludes with a five-step action plan, individual and collective, that guides change leaders in companies, organizations and local authorities.

Each session produces concrete deliverables at every stage:

What is the five-step action plan?

The behavioral scientists James Prochaska and Carlo DiClemente modeled the stages of change from their work on addictive behaviors. Nous Sommes Vivants integrated their model into the fresk as a practical landing module, so that each person can get moving, or support a group toward a new behavior, in five steps, from energy sobriety to taking care of nature.

Following these five steps, in sequence or as each person needs, anchors new pro-environmental behaviors over time, for the biodiversity of land and seas, for the climate or for better consumption. Our article on five years of change in French behaviors (in French) reads the evolution of the French through these five steps.

Who uses the human factor fresk?

We run the human factor fresk in companies and local authorities to support behavior change within a cultural transformation.

In companies, for HR and CSR departments, managers, project teams and transition leads: cooperation across departments, a CSR approach on its social, environmental and governance dimensions (CSRD, ISO 26000), innovation and eco-socio-design projects. In local authorities, for elected officials, staff and citizens, in mixed sessions: mobilizing around climate, biodiversity and health plans, cooperation between officials, staff and residents, and sustainable practices across the territory.

Format: three hours, up to twelve participants per facilitator, in person by preference, remote possible. The fresk was designed by Humans Matter, with contributions from Jérémy Dumont; training is provided by the association L’Université du Facteur Humain (in French). Watch our masterclass on the human factor (in French).

The fresk has also been run with Expanscience, as part of its regenerative transformation (in French).

Sources: James Prochaska and Carlo DiClemente, the stages of change · William Schutz, The Human Element · Jacques Fradin, International Panel on Behavior Change (IPBC) · Hubert Reeves · Hélène Schetting · Ipsos and Nous Sommes Vivants, survey for the Human Factor Summer University (2021) · ADEME · Humans Matter and L’Université du Facteur Humain.