Emotional Design Psychology & Neuroscience [ED]

2-Day Design Psychology & Neuroscience 

Deepen your understanding of what shapes user emotion and behavior

Over two days, discover how to build emotionally intelligent websites, apps, content, and campaigns based on the psychology and neuroscience of user emotion, motivation, cognition, and behavior.

You’ll develop new skills in building technologies that inspire, motivate, and win customer loyalty. You’ll also learn how to pre-empt your users’ emotional reactions, so you can defuse negative situations before they explode, while upgrading your users' experiences from good to great.

Our training will transform your understanding of what emotions are and how they work, while you learn practical strategies on how to target specific emotions. Plus, we’ll provide you with templates, strategy frameworks, research tools, and techniques that you can take back to the office, and apply immediately.

This workshop is for intermediate-to-advanced level digital media practitioners who are looking for deeper insight into the factors that shape user and consumer behavior. If you’re starting out, you’ll probably benefit by first taking workshop DBC1 and possibly DBC2. If you're not sure, see our FAQ or get in touch.

Skills and knowledge you’ll gain

By the end of this workshop, you’ll be able to:

Workshop modules

Over 2 days, we’ll cover:

1. Intro to emotional design
2. Emotional drivers of online behavior
3. The Emotion–Behavior Model
4. Sense perception and digital triggers
5. Mapping the full spectrum of emotions
6. The emotional quadrants that motivate behavior
7. How to measure emotional reactions to design
8. Shaping user habits with incentive systems
9. Reducing emotional, cognitive, and physical barriers
10. Reverse-engineering emotional strategies
11. Emotion-driven wireframing
12. Designing for different personalities
13. Relating with computers and conversational AI bots
14. Defense mechanisms against manipulation
15. Emotional design strategies for behavior change
16. Neurotransmitters, core emotions, and interactive design
17. Shaping behavior and engineering empathetic content
18. External conversion metrics vs. your internal compass

Behavioral science made easy and practical

What you learn is all based on hard science, but we’ve tailored the content to working professionals who need to get to the point and learn what works, fast. We present the science in clear, jargon-free language, using case studies, examples, and practical exercises that are accessible and easy to pick up, learn, and apply.

Obtain exclusive resources

Your training kit includes our proprietary design resources that will help you develop emotional design strategies, site audits, research studies, and wireframes. You’ll receive:

Who this workshop is for

This workshop is for digital professionals who want to gain true mastery of their craft, by developing a profound understanding of the psychological and neurological traits, that lay behind online engagement. It’s ideally suited to:

The professionals you’ll meet at our workshop

Our training attracts an eclectic blend of professionals from a wide range of sectors. We’ve designed the content to be relevant to those working across a broad range of organizations, including:

Make sure this workshop is right for you

If you’re interested in gaining a deep understanding of emotions and how they shape user behavior, then this workshop is for you.

You can take workshop ED on its own or as a complement to workshops DBC1 + DBC2 as they draw on different areas of science and take a different approach to digital behavior change.

The goal of this workshop is to deepen your understanding of what shapes user/consumer behavior from within, rather than learning empirically validated external behavior change techniques, which is what we cover in workshops DBC1 + DBC2.

For this reason, we do not recommend this workshop for beginners, or people who are interested in learning foundational digital psychology. These groups will benefit more by taking workshops DBC1 and DBC2 prior to taking ED.

Looking to decide whether this workshop is at the right level for you or want more information? Check out our FAQ or give us a shout.

Timing and logistics

The workshop runs 9:00 am – 5:00 pm (but please arrive by 8:50 as we start at 9:00 sharp). There is a 15-minute break in the morning, an hour for lunch, and another 15-minute break in the afternoon.

We’ll provide all the training materials, so you’ll only need to bring a pen, some paper, and, if you’d like to participate in our live polling, bring a smartphone or tablet. We’ll provide Wi-Fi.

Brian Cugelman, PhD (your instructor)

With an extensive career running online projects and studies for industry, non-profit organizations, governments, and the United Nations, Dr. Brian Cugelman has been working as an online behavior change specialist since 1997.

In 2006, Brian launched AlterSpark, with a focus on merging behavioral science with creative design and data science. Over the years, Brian has helped numerous companies and institutions measure and improve their online campaigns for greater understanding and measurable results.

Early on in his career, Brian was honored when the United Nations General Assembly recognized the outcome of his digital campaigning work. He has also acted as an expert advisor for the World Anti-Doping Agency, the Heart and Stroke Foundation, and the annual International Conference on Persuasive Technology.

High-level government officials from both the United States and Canada have invited Brian to educate their personnel. Pentagon officials invited Brian to present his research for their Cyber Influence Project and then cited his research in their strategy to counter online extremism. Government of Canada officials invited Brian to train their team and to run an educational session to a packed house of digital media professionals and behavioral scientists across federal agencies.

Brian obtained his PhD in Online Social Marketing with the Statistical Cybermetrics Research Group, a world-leading Internet research team specializing in large-scale online data science. He has published over 25 papers and studies for the United Nations, global institutions, and scientific peer-reviewed journals.

While completing his doctorate, Brian developed the scientific basis for his behavior change system, which he subsequently published in the world’s top scientific e-health journal and then later adapted to a format that working professionals could quickly learn and apply.

Brian conducts workshops across North America, training individuals and teams—including those from the world’s top companies and brands and from the highest levels of government. Check out his partial list of clients and testimonials on AlterSpark.com to see who has attended his training, as well as what they had to say about it.

Brian’s philosophy is to make his training accessible to students and researchers, regularly donating scholarships to people who use technology to build a better world. Brian welcomes professionals from all disciplines, from beginners to some of the world’s leading behavior change specialists, and especially those who are using technology to build a better planet.

See what Dr. Cugelman has to say about the workshop.