Kelly McCormack, The Events Psychologist, explains how psychology can affect how delegates experience your events.
Event psychology is a multifaceted field that delves into the intricate workings of human behaviour, cognition, and emotion within the context of events. Whether brand launch or a corporate gathering, events have the power to shape individual experiences and collective perceptions in profound ways. Event psychology explores the psychological processes underlying how delegates perceive, interpret, and respond to various aspects of events, including why they would attend in the first place, and their memories post-event. By understanding the psychological dynamics at play, event professionals can enhance delegate satisfaction, optimise engagement, and create memorable experiences that resonate long after the event concludes.
Kelly McCormack, The Events Psychologist, is doing the legwork of digging through psychological research around the psychology of events and putting her findings into easily understandable bites on her Instagram: “I’ve been working in Event Management for about ten years now, and I have a degree in Psychology.
I started thinking about my degree and hearing Event Psychology mentioned here and there. I started to look at the research that was out there and find some bits that were applicable to event management and made these into digestible posts that people could easily read. A lot of this stuff is kind of common sense and what people are doing already, but they wouldn’t necessarily know the psychology behind it. This is very much a passion project to support the entire events industry, for anyone to use.”
Elements of psychology can touch on every aspect of the event, from queuing to signage: “There’s a whole range of stuff that can be done! One the main things to recognise is that it’s never one size fits all and they are always multiple opinions. There are many branches of psychology which come into it. For example, social psychology looks at the way people behave and are influenced, or there’s cognitive psychology which is how people process the information at your event, or positive psychology which is people’s attitudes to what they are doing. An example could be they are stressed or annoyed because they’ve had to queue to get in, so how does that affect how they experience the event once they’re inside?”
This research can also help you figure out what went wrong if an event doesn’t exactly have the impact you planned: “The way that people influence behaviour is very relevant to the management of events. If an event doesn’t go as planned, people will often look at the cost, but actually what the research
in terms of the psychology of events is saying is: ‘No, bring it back to your attendees and how people think and behave.’ If you go changing the tech, for example, because you think the problem was there, and it was something to do with how your attendees felt, obviously you’re missing a trick there.”
Considering the psychological effects of each decision you make about your event can draw more delegates in: “One researcher said that it should always be a holistic approach when you’re doing your event design. So rather than thinking about the décor, or entertainment, the agenda has to be holistic and deeper than that, especially now in a post-pandemic world where people’s decision making is different, and delegates are really taking care with how they spend their time.”