David Halpern (psychologist)
David Solomon Halpern FAcSS is a British civil servant, heading the Behavioural Insights Team spun out from the Cabinet Office.Education
Halpern attended King's School, Rochester, before attending St John's College, University of Cambridge achieving a 1st in natural Sciences specialising in experimental psychology. He then went on to complete a PhD in social and political sciences, also at St John's College, Cambridge.Career
Halpern was a research fellow at the Policy Studies Institute, a Nuffield College, Oxford prize research fellow and a lecturer in social human sciences at the University of Cambridge.
From 2001-07 Halpern was chief analyst in the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit. He was then director of the Institute for Government from 2008–10, where he remains a senior fellow.
Since October 2010 Halpern has been director of the Behavioural Insights Team, initially as part of the Cabinet Office and since 2013, as a partially privatised venture.
He currently is a visiting professor at King's College London.
He is one of the 56 individuals named by the UK government as contributing to the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies in response to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom, focusing on behavioural changes such as increased handwashing. On 11 March 2020 he gave an interview to the BBC on the importance of shielding vulnerable people during the COVID-19 pandemic until herd immunity had been achieved.Honours
In 2016, Halpern was elected a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences.Selected works
He has authored or co-authored four books as well as a number of reports:
