Resumo

Social marketing has been criticized for always applying the same dominant theories from social psychology (e.g., the Theory of Planned Behaviour) in its interventions. In this study, we present the Behaviour Change Wheel - BCW (Michie et al., 2011) as an alternative model for social marketing interventions, specifically taking into account the health dimension of social marketing. We developed an analysis of BCW configurations based on the Social Marketing Consistency Criteria (French, 2012) and the ten Social Marketing Theory Development Goals (Rundle-Thiele et al., 2019).

The purpose of this article is to explore how the use of distinctive qualities of the BCW can impact research and practice in the social marketing realm. We have developed an analysis of BCW configurations from the Social Marketing Consistency Criteria (French, 2012) and ten Social Marketing Theory Development Goals (goals) (Rundle-Thiele et al., 2019) in order to identify how the distinctive qualities of the BCW model are associated with social marketing. As far as we know, this is the first effort to evaluate the BCW in light of social marketing characteristics.

Most theories used, especially in the health context, tend to highlight individual abilities, with limited references to contextual and social factors that can be described as facilitators or barriers to change (French & Russell–Bennett, 2015). To broaden the comprehension of social marketing interventions, researchers suggest increasing the use of available theoretical foundations and move from behaviour theories to theories that explain the achieved changes (Rundle–Thiele et al., 2019). The Behaviour Change Wheel (BCW) is a theoretical framework which consists of multiple health behaviour.

The BCW proposal is to be a guide to proceeding, step-by-step, based on their extensive experience and expertise, intended for political decision makers, intervention designers, researchers, and practitioners. The BCW is designed to be useful in the replication process of the interventions because it seeks to systematize the theory and the evidence to conceive and evaluate behaviour change interventions (Michie et al., 2015). Multiple BCW interventions have led to significant results in behavioural terms (Michie et al., 2015).

A wide body of social marketing research highlights the use of dominant theories applied to an extremely diversified group of social problems, with an emphasis on behaviours that affect individuals, either on health or other contexts (Andreasen, 1995; Kotler & Roberto, 1989). There are clearly situations for which traditional models of rational choice, such as the TPB, can explain and predict behaviour with plenty of success. However, greater attention to the advance of social marketing theory and practice may be a prelude to a new paradigm of behavioural change.

Michie, S., Richardson, M., Johnston, M., Abraham, C., Francis, J., Hardeman, W., ... & Wood, C. E. (2013). The behavior change technique taxonomy (v1) of 93 hierarchically clustered techniques: building an international consensus for the reporting of behavior change interventions. Annals of behavioral medicine, 46(1), 81-95. Michie, S., Atkins, L., & West, R. (2015). The behaviour change wheel: a guide to designing interventions. 2014. Rundle-Thiele et al. (2019). Social marketing theory development goals: an agenda to drive change. Journal of Marketing Management, 1-22.