2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup - Paradoxes in a Story that Paradoxically Wasn’t Told

 

1248 players from 48 countries participated in the FIFA Men’s World Cup 2026. Not one of them was publicly gay. That single fact is the real story of this year's Men's World Cup — and paradoxically nobody told it.

A World Cup of Stories – The FIFA Men’s World Cup held in Mexico, US and Canada was one that had some wonderful stories.

     Stories of Hope - The exploits of Cape Verde put a nation of 5 million on the map and brought smiles to millions. The heroics of their 41-year-old Goalkeeper Vozinha who worked as a bus driver and an electrician earlier in his life, gave hope to millions that “nothing is impossible”.

    Stories of Joy – The Tartan Army (Scotland’s fans) provided immense joy to the Boston area including ensuring that the pubs ran dry one weekend, quite literally. They also ensured that their flight from Scotland ran out of beer!!

     Stories of the Power of Influencers – Tim Payne, the New Zealand footballer went from having 4000 followers on Instagram to nearly 5 million in a matter of days. The reason behind it was Argentine influencer Valen Scarsini, known as "El Scarso," who called Payne the "least known" player at the World Cup and asked his fans to boost his following.  

Even without getting into the political shenanigans around visas there were enough stories that were not uplifting.

Stories of the Invisible Hand – Folarin Balogun of the US, got a red card for a foul on Tarik Muharemović during the game against Bosnia Herzegovina. It mysteriously got rescinded before the next game against the Belgians after the President of the United States asked the President of FIFA to “review” the decision.

Stories of Greed – The “hydration breaks” were widely derided by the fans as being an attempt to allow broadcasters to monetise more time. And then there was the issue of insanely high stadium ticket prices and even more ridiculously priced public transport.

The Story that Wasn’t Told – I had followed the previous edition of the FIFA Women’s World Cup in 2023 very closely. So, I noticed a story that was missing at the 2026 Men’s World Cup.

There were a lot of stories around LGBTQ+ in the last Women’s World Cup. By contrast, at the Men’s World Cup, the conversation around LGBTQ+ was conspicuous by its absence with the exception of the conversation around the pride match being held between Egypt and Iran – two countries where homosexuality is outlawed.

According to Outsports, 13% of all players in the 2023 Women’s World Cup were publicly out as being Lesbian, Bi-sexual, Trans or Queer. In addition, the head coaches of Brazil (Pia Sundhage), Canada (Bev Priestman) and Norway (Hege Riise) were also publicly members of the LGBTQ+ community. 22 of the 32 teams had at least one player belonging to the LGBTQ+ community and 8 of the captains are from the community. 8 out of the 23-person English squad was a lesbian or bisexual. These are amazingly statistics for a competition at the highest level especially considering these do not include players who are not publicly out and accounting for the fact that homosexuality is still illegal in a number of the countries that played in the World cup. 

There were a number of couples playing for different countries – Sam Kerr (Australia) & Kristie Mewis (US); Ellie Carpenter (Australia) & Danielle van de Donk (Netherlands); Pernille Harder (Denmark) & Magdelena Eriksson (Sweden); Ann-Katrin Bergen (Germany) & Jess Carter (England).

A study done by IPSOS in 2021 across 27 countries found that 3% identified as gay or lesbian while 4% identified as bisexual. Each of the 48 countries fielded 26 players. Using the IPSOS estimate of 3%, there should be around 37 gay players representing the 48 countries. Even if we remove the players from the 14 countries where being gay is illegal, we would expect 19 players to be gay. Alas, there is not one single player who has come out as being gay.

Unpeeling the Paradox –We live in a world where there is seemingly an openness to accepting the LGBTQ+ community. Research from Pew Research and Gallup would suggest this to be the case.

Football, especially during a World Cup, is a microcosm of the world as almost everyone watches it (22% claimed to watch Football only during major tournaments like World Cup). So, football gives us a microcosm to pressure test this assertion of openness to accepting the LGBTQ+ community.

I partnered with the team at Bolt Insight to unpeel this onion. This is a complex issue where no one research methodology by itself would give us the full picture. So, we used a combination of Quantitative research, Social Listening and Qualitative research. Given the sensitive nature of the conversation, we used AI moderation for the Qualitative research. We did this across three countries UK, US and Brazil with a quantitative sample size of 3000, 150 Qualitative AI interviews moderated by an AI and Social listening that analysed more than 89,500 posts.

The Paradoxes – To start with we looked at the hypothesis that maybe there are no gay players in men’s football and the hypothesis does not hold true.  

Men identifying as LGBTQ+Q+	UK (%)	Brazil (%)	US (%)
Football Players	9	11	7
Non-player	15	14	13

 As unpeeled the paradox, we uncovered five paradoxes.  

·     Paradox of Progress – 92% said it should be safe for a male football player to come out as gay. Yet only 15% encouraged him to come out now. This is unsurprising since the social media sentiment is overwhelmingly negative as exemplified by the post below on X.

In the abstract there is acceptance and a veneer of progress on acceptance. But the reality is that safety doesn’t exist yet. Which is probably why we don’t see a single player in any of the European top leagues being openly Gay.

“Fans will target whatever gets a reaction.” Football fanatic

“If it was that easy, there would already be loads of players out.” Football fanatic

“The fact that nobody does it tells you what players think would happen.” LGBTQ+ participant

People are saying “I have progressed but the world has not” which suggests that progress is more performative than internalized.

Paradox of Acceptance – 89% of people say they are comfortable with a player being gay but only 28% believe other fans are comfortable with a player being gay.

 “I wouldn’t care personally, but you know some fans would use anything.” Football fanatic

“Football likes the idea of inclusion more than the reality of it.” LGBTQ+ participant

People are saying “I am accepting but others are not” which suggests that a lack of acceptance at the subconscious level. 

Paradox of Support – 89% say they are comfortable with a gay player at their favorite football club. 80% say they would in public support a player to come out. However, in private only 14% would support. 45% believe coming out as gay would impact the career of the player negatively. Those who support publicly but not privately would say “wait for the right moment” or “wait till your career is over” or “its your decision, I’m not so sure”.

“I would tell him that it's an opportunity to support other gay people who also like football, but that he would have to think about how this would affect his career, due to prejudice in the male world.” Football fan

“As much as I defend the cause, I would recommend that he not go out and tell the world, as it would bring him and his career a great deal of disdain from colleagues, fans, and national teams.” Football fan

People are saying “I support you” but the support is shallow. They are supportive of the player being gay but not supportive of them coming out as being gay.  

Paradox of Fame – For a male football player, coming out as Gay, it becomes his whole identity. It completely changes the narrative, and becomes the headline. It’s no longer about skills or performance; it’s about his sexuality. In essence, sexuality would replace skills as the story.

 “It’s not that everyone would be openly horrible. It’s that it becomes a thing all the time.”​ Male footballer

“It wouldn’t just be football anymore. Every interview would be about that.” Male footballer

“I’d be more worried about the crowd, the tabloids, and social media than one or two teammates.” LGBTQ+ participant

“Once you come out, you can’t control how the game talks about you.” LGBTQ+ participant

“It’s not just your own supporters. It’s every away ground, every comment section.” Football fanatic

 People are saying “You will become famous” but they mean you will be infamous as “the one who came out”.

Paradox of Stereotypes – The contrast between acceptance of lesbians in the women’s game and rejection of gays from the men’s game is palpable. It’s a testament to how women’s football has accepted LGBTQ+ athletes as many of these players are stars in their countries and we don’t see many big “coming-out” moments.

Women’s football is known to have public displays of affection amongst couples. The scene of Kristie Mewis consoling Sam Kerr after the US beat Australia to the Bronze in the Tokyo Olympics broke the internet. We did have similar scenes during the last Women’s World Cup. In addition, we had a scene from a romantic novel when Ruesha Littlejohn (Ireland) refused to shake hands with Caitlin Ford (Australia) because she had gone on holiday with her ex.

The men’s game seems to operate under a different set of (unwritten) rules to the women’s game. To play in the men’s game there is an, unwritten, expectation that you need to suppress emotions. You need to be tough, be masculine and ideally be a womanizer. 77% of fans agree that male footballers need to be tough, confident and emotionally controlled.

“He has to be a strong man, he can't show vulnerability, he can't show weakness. He has to be like a rock, without feelings.” BR, Female Fan

“The rules are that they have to act like "men," without showing feminine mannerisms, without showing fragility.” — LGBTQ+, Male participant

“Football is still very much ‘be a man,’ ‘be tough,’ ‘don’t show weakness.” Male footballer

“Being gay gets read as not fitting that image, even if that makes no sense.” LGBTQ+ participant

People are saying “You can be you” but they mean as a football player “You can be you, as long as you conform to the macho male stereotype”.

Implications for brands – Any cultural or societal fault line is an opportunity for brands to step in — and the paradoxes above offer several different angles to do it. The aim should be to make coming out as gay, as a male footballer, "non-newsworthy" — normalized rather than remarkable. One way to do this could be to decouple identity from performance, making sure football remains the story. The other could be with nudges to indicate omnipresence of acceptance.

However, campaigns treated as a single creative moment — including tokenistic gestures like a rainbow armband — are unlikely to move the needle, and are the most exposed to backlash. Brands that treat this as ongoing infrastructure instead — grants, allyship programs, recurring campaigns — are better placed to absorb it. Rainbow Laces' 2026 shift from a single annual matchday activation to a sustained, longer-term footing is a case worth drawing inspiration from.

What does this mean for the World of Insights – There are three learnings for insights

·     1. Always have a Human in the Loop – The absence of the story on LGBTQ+ at the world cup was not spotted by an LLM. The “unexpected surprises” like Febreeze’s insight that “A messy home can be clean but a smelly home cannot be clean” will only come from humans observing things (in Febreeze’s case people’s homes). AI has a role to play in the research process but it needs to be human led, AI enabled.

2. Use AI led moderation for sensitive topics – For sensitive topics like sexual orientation, people are more comfortable speaking to a “bot” than they are to speaking with trained moderators. A good AI moderator should be able to ensure that you are able to probe appropriately. What we lose in terms of depth of probing, we more than make up for in the generosity of responses.

3. Use variety of methodologies and sources – The best insights come from looking at a variety of methodologies and sources. Each methodology has its strength and weaknesses but when looked together across methodologies you are able to paint a more holistic picture.

 

My Sincere Thanks to Vatsala and Melek from Bolt Insight for their partnership on the research.

If you would like to receive a copy of the report, please reach out to marketing@boltinsight.com

 

Polls can’t be Trumped

 

Note – The views expressed here are my personal views. 

All market research has an element of “margin of error” with one exception – elections. There is no margin of error associated with polls and hence they can’t be trumped.

Psephology is a super specialized subset of market research that attempts to forecast election results. I don’t envy psephologists since they don’t have the cover of “margin of errors” to hide behind. A lot has been written about  predictions from polls having been wrong in the US (yet again!!) though at least one large agency has claimed its predictions were accurate.

With due humility I must say that I predicted correctly that Trump would win. In January 2024 an ex-colleague, Bill Marshall and I predicted that Trump would win the election. Through the course of the year, I obsessively read through every detail available on the polls and listened to as many podcasts as I could. Armed with my knowledge, in mid-August, I made the same prediction to a bunch of friends. In October 24, I upset a colleague of mine, Lucy Hovey, over dinner with the statement that “my professional reading of the poll results is that Trump will win”. I continued to pore over opinion poll data published and on the eve of the election I upset another American colleague over breakfast with the prediction that Trump would win.

My objective here is not to critique the opinion polls since I do not have the expertise to do so. Neither is my objective to provide a political view of the results. The intent of this blog is to share my learning’s from having gotten my prediction right and lessons for the market research industry.

There are three big learning’s for me

“Signals always come with noise: It is trying to separate out the two that makes the subject interesting.”- David Spiegelhalter

1. Identify Isotropic Signals – In January 2024, Bill and I made the prediction that Trump would win the election based on election results in 2023.

In October 2023, the center left Labor party was defeated in New Zealand in the elections. In November 2023, in the Netherlands the right-wing populist Party for Freedom won the most number of seats and all four parties of the incumbent coalition government suffered losses. Geert Willers, the leader of the Party of Freedom is a known ally of Trump. In November 2023, Javier Miller won the Presidential election in Argentina. It was a sign of discontent with status quo in the face of inflation of over 140% and 40% poverty.

The signals I take from these are a rise in anti-incumbency because of the cost-of-living crisis and an increased acceptance of right wing policies. Both these signals point to a Trump victory. The signal also played out in the UK elections where anti-incumbency led to the Conservative party being voted out after 14 years in power and the right wing Reform Party got 14% of the votes.

In August, I made the prediction by looking at the poll of polls and comparing the results to 2016. In August 2024, Kamala Harris was leading by 2% (Source: FiveThirtyEight Interactives). In August 2016, Hillary Clinton was leading by 7.5%. 

Looking at the past poll data with an anchor to real life events that followed allowed me to read the poll results alongside the biases in response survey patterns. The signal I took out was that the margin of lead of Kamala Harris was insufficient to lead to a win as the same biases of 2016 should be expected to play out again.

In October, the poll of polls showed, Kamala Harris still in the lead though the lead had dropped to 1.7%. I was confident in my prediction of a Trump victory because the poll lead was narrower than in 2016 and, the prediction market had diverged. By Mid-October on Polymarket, Trump had a 60% chance of winning vs. 40% for Harris.

The three signals – consistent pattern around the world, consistent pattern in the US over time and inconsistent pattern between polls and polymarket – are all isotropic and pointed to Trump winning. The signals came from looking beyond the poll data and connecting the dots across data sources.

Too often in market research, we are satisfied looking at a single source of information. In a dynamic, multi-faceted environment that is dangerous, naïve and potentially misleading.

“I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination. – Jimmy Dean”

2. Focus on what matters – As per Statista, the most important issues for voters in the US were inflation / prices (24%), immigration (13%), jobs & the economy (11%), abortion (9%), healthcare (8%) and climate and environment (8%).

It is unsurprising that the most important factor, by a large margin, was prices, as the US had seen an inflation of 4.1% in 2023 on the back of 8% in 2022. On this dimension, Kamala Harris had the burden of incumbency that plays against her. The quotes below from a New York Times article basis a focus group they did in October 24 is emblematic.

“Teri, 44, Wisconsin, independent, white, systems analyst - Even though we have well-paying jobs, we’re definitely cutting back a little more than we’re accustomed to — thinking twice about a vacation, trying to limit grocery costs. Seeing the price of things makes you wonder how families that aren’t as fortunate are making ends meet.”

“Gaylin, 31, Georgia, independent, white, stay-at-home mom - Kamala Harris is the current administration. She’s already a part of the problem that we’re having now.”

With jobs and economy again the anti-incumbency hamstrung Kamala Harris. Immigration has been a strong point for Trump.

Abortion is an interesting point to look at. It was on the ballot in 10 states and won in 7 of the 10 (In Florida a majority voted in favour but it did not meet the threshold of 60% for constitutional change in the state). It even won in four Republican states – Arizona, Nevada, Montana and Missouri. In all four of these states Trump won showing that it is not what matters most to people. I quote again from the New York Times article

“Traci, 54, Michigan, independent, white, case analyst - I think that Harris will continue to make abortions available for women in this country, which I think is a good thing. But abortions, to me, are not so much a political issue. They’re a social issue. I appreciate that Trump gave that right back to the states to deal with. For me, it’s not really a political issue or a voting issue.”

Too often in market research we focus on overall opinion and even worse we are often reductionist in using “archetypes” in describing results. In my opinion that is the lazy way out. The devil is in the detail which we must not gloss over. We must focus on what matters to people and not artificial constructs of “overall opinions and archetypes”.

“There is no such thing as public opinion. There is only published opinion.” Winston Churchill

3. Beware of factoids – The Oxford English Dictionary defines a factoid as “an item of unreliable information that is reported and repeated so often that it becomes accepted as fact”.

“Celebrity influencers” are a big craze in the world of marketing. If one went by the number of celebrities supporting candidates Kamala Harris, she would have won. After all she had all the A listers endorsing her -   Oprah Winfrey, Megan Thee Stallion, George Clooney, Leonardo DiCaprio, Bruce Springsteen, Winfrey, Ricky Martin, Beyonce, Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez, George Clooney, Lizzo, Katy Perry, Jon Bon Jovi, Cardi B and the biggest cultural icon of 2024 Taylor Swift. But people were not choosing which chocolate brand to buy but rather who they trusted to bring down prices. Indeed, the endorsement by celebrities lent an aura of being “out of touch” with the realities of ordinary people.

Then there is the debate that Trump won because he used “social media’ by going on a “podcast”. Well yes Trump did go on the Joe Rogan podcast (which got 40 million views on YouTube in just 3 days) but similarly Kamala Harris went on Call her Daddy with Alex Cooper. According to a USA Today / Suffolk University poll, of those who saw the Kamala Harris podcast only 34% were more likely to vote for her and 51% were less likely to vote for her. The equivalent numbers for Trump were 50% more likely to vote for him and only 28% less likely to vote for him. The issue is not the participation in social media and podcasts but rather appeal of the content. 

As researchers, we must try to gauge the mood of citizens by poring over media articles and social media. But we need to be aware of our biases and biases in media and social media. I quote from the New York Times article again

“Gaylin, 31, Georgia, independent, white, stay-at-home mom -I follow a lot of people on Instagram. You see all these celebrities posting their support for Kamala Harris. And then when you look at the comments, it’s “Go, Trump,” “Trump 2024,” all of this stuff. It seems more people are voting for Trump than you would believe. But then it seems like they want you to believe that Kamala Harris is in the lead. If it doesn’t go the way that it seems like it’s going to go, then it makes you think that there’s going to be something off with it.”

In summary – I offer three lessons for the market research industry

1. Don’t take a myopic view via one source of information. Look for patterns from multiple sources across time. Look for weak signals, particularly contradictory signals to help complete the jigsaw.

2. Look at the data holistically. Avoid the temptation of going with headline summary measures but rather cut to what really matters.

3. As “truth tellers” we need to be extra cautious about our biases and not look for “confirmation of our biases”. We need to challenge status quo but we need to be cautious about getting swept up by the latest fads. Do not “smell the exhaust” or “drink the kool aid” depending on which side of the Atlantic you are on.

Unmasking the Mask

We live in an increasingly polarized world. This polarization is resulting in increased politicization of societal issues. COVID 19 was disastrous in terms of loss of human lives. But even the pandemic resulted in a fault line that saw the world polarized along aspects of adherence to social distancing rules, vaccination and indeed mask wearing. All these were not just socially divisive but quickly got politicized exacerbating the social divides.

COVID 19 still lives with us and infact just last week someone who works with me was hospitalized due to COVID. But thankfully the worst is well behind us. Probably the most visible legacy impact of COVID 19 is the “work from home” phenomenon. Another legacy impact, and one that fascinates me, is the issue of mask wearing. 

At the height of the pandemic, mask wearing was mandatory in many countries. This led to a phenomenal growth in the mask market. As you would expect, the market for masks peaked in 2020 and is projected to decline into 2024 but still be three times the market pre-pandemic.

Source : Statista via Twitter	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024
US $ B	1.4	224.1	128	36.5	5.8	4.2

In my home country of Singapore, at the height of the pandemic, mask wearing was mandatory in all outdoor settings except if one was doing physical exercise. Most of the mask wearing mandates have now been withdrawn in Singapore. In fact as of 31^st of May cabin crew on Singapore Airlines are no longer mandated to wear masks. Yet, a large number of people continue to wear a mask in Singapore.

As I travelled around countries over the last year, I observed differing levels of mask usage. A high proportion of people seem to use masks in Thailand, a few but not insignificant number in the UK, the US and Indonesia and practically no one in Spain, Italy and India. There isn’t any obvious cultural bifurcation that would explain this variance.

Decades of training as a market researcher lead me to ask a few people in each country why they wear masks and why they don’t. Using my, arguably “unsophisticated”, research I uncovered 3 broad reasons why people wear masks even when there is no mandate to do so – prevention, protection and vanity.

1.   Prevention – I am not a scientist, but my understanding is that a mask is most effective when the healthy person and the COVID carrier both are wearing a mask. However, even the act of one of the parties wearing a mask reduces transmission.

Source : https://www.nebraskamed.com/COVID/coronavirus-is-not-canceled-wear-your-mask

In a world where COVID is now endemic there are two aspects to prevention – 

a.   Sign of politeness – In many Asian countries, it is considered impolite to pass on infections. Hence, the unwell are expected to wear a mask thereby reducing the risk of passing on the infection. This became ingrained in South East Asia and North Asia after the outbreak of SARS in the early 2000’s.

In Singapore today, if anyone is unwell the expectation is that they would wear a mask and failure to do so is met with societal disapproval. I was recently at the AGM of my condominium in Singapore and 10% of the participants had a mask on. The reason for most of them was they had a runny nose. They had all tested and were COVID negative but they believed the right thing to do was for them to wear a mask.  

b.   Prevent other diseases – I did a passive observation research (yes I am a market researcher after all) on the mask wearing habits of all taxis I have taken over the last two months in Singapore. An overwhelming 70% used a mask. When I ask why the most frequent answer is “coronavirus is not the only virus lah”. Come to think of it, the answer is quite cogent. Taxi drivers work in a closed environment and are exposed to viruses from all their passengers. Wearing a mask protects the taxi drivers from not just the coronavirus but also other viruses.

    In Singapore, now the last mask wearing mandate requires us to wear a mask in medical settings like hospitals. I suspect it works to the same principle of preventing spread of viruses especially in an area where you have people with high virus loads and lower immunity.   

2.     Protection – Apart from protection from viruses, the mask also helps to protect against the  elements in two ways

a.   Shield against pollution – People in Bangkok complain about facing poor air quality which has only deteriorated in recent times. The poor air quality affects the quality of life and makes breathing difficult. So, people in Thailand say they use a face mask as a protection from poor air quality. 

     When smog descended on New York in June (2023), people who had never worn a mask during the pandemic decided to wear one to protect themselves from the poor air quality.

(Source : https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/07/new-york-city-wildfire-smoke-air-quality-mask)

b.   Face shield against cold weather – Coming from the tropics I always “freeze” when I visit London in the winters. I personally wear a mask in London to prevent the cold breeze from impacting my face. Guess what, turns out that a lot of Asians living in London do exactly the same thing.

3.     Vanity – A few years ago, the popular K pop band BIG BANG took a selfie with masks setting off a trend of Koreans wearing masks as a face accessory. But outside Korea, the mask did not enter the fashion ensemble with celebrities continuing to use shades to cover parts of their face but not a mask. The unfashionable mask does have two other "vanity" uses

  a.   Hide blemishes – Some people use a mask to hide blemishes like pimple, acne etc. During a dinner time conversation last week, I found out that my teenage sons plan to use masks to hide pimples and it's a done thing amongst their friends.   

  b.    Hide facial expressions – A mask helps to hide full facial expressions. This is a useful feature being tapped into to deal with tricky face to face situations.

To mask or not to mask was a question answered by regulations during the pandemic and guided by personal ideologies. In a COVID endemic world, the question remains but is answered basis personal choices guided by prevention, protection and vanity. 

When it comes to exercising some prefer yoga, some prefer pilates, some prefer weights, some prefer running and some prefer not to exercise. All choices lead to strong views about their relative effectiveness but does not lead to polarisation. In my view, in a post pandemic world on the dimension of mask wearing, the world is not polarised but rather people make individual choice for reasons of prevention, protection or vanity.  

There is no reset button to press at mid-night on 31st December 2020

“The upheaval of our world and the upheaval of our consciousness are one and the same”, Carl Jun - It is fair to say that COVID 19 has universally disrupted lives. Simple liberties like visiting friends and family, attending church, which we take for granted, have been curtailed by lockdowns. As a result, human beings have adapted their behaviors.  

“Consumers don’t think how they feel. They don’t say what they think and they don’t do what they say”, David Ogilvy - What people worry about may not be what they need to worry about and is very likely different from what gets reported in the press. The image below has data which is morbid, and a bit dated, but makes the point. Heart disease is the biggest killer in the US but amongst the least researched and reported.

The business press is awash with predictions of the “new normal” and I will use all my self restraint to resist the temptation to provide another prediction. Instead I will provide a framework for how human behaviors might evolve.

“The world is a contradiction; the universe is a paradox”, Kedar Joshi - As a student of economics, one theory that left an imprint on me was Karl Marx’s theory of dialectic materialism. At its core, it is a philosophical approach to change. In layman’s language it postulates that there is an existing thesis which is challenged by an emergent anti-thesis and the collision of the two results in a new synthesis. I like the framework of dialectical thinking since it is a form of analytical reasoning that encourages one to view issues from multiple perspectives to arrive at a reconciliation of opposing views and perspectives.

Human beings are fundamentally irrational and don’t follow laws of behavior like Newtonian laws. The irony is that Newtonian laws do break down when applied to the complexity of sub-atomic physics. Surely this pandemic is the human behavior equivalent of sub-atomic physics when it comes to complexity.

Not all the behaviors adopted during COVID are going to endure and equally a lot of Pre-COVID behaviors continued through the pandemic and will endure into the future. For instance, even during the height of the lockdowns the married dating site Ashley Madison actually increased its user base. At first glance it is counter intuitive – why join a dating site (and a married data site at that) if you are unable to physically meet people. Clearly, the pressures of working from home have exposed fractures in relationships and people are looking for an outlet or looking for just someone other than the spouse to speak with. It is classic human behavior that has survived the ages and will survive COVID as well.

“If curiosity killed the cat, it was satisfaction that brought it back” Holly Black – My belief is that the recent “new” human behaviors will fall into a spectrum ranging from those that will unwind ASAP to those that will endure. I think that with satisfaction with the current behavior will be the determining factor.

In the immediate aftermath of Singapore going into Circuit breaker, I remember we had a number of “zoom parties”. In fact “zoom drinking” seemed to be a decent thing - you save time travelling to the bar, the drinks are cheaper and you get to interact with friends. If all of humanity computed utility from activities the way Sheldon Cooper in the TV series, The Big Bang Theory does, “zoom drinking” would endure. But alas…..Fast forward to today and even with restrictions of 5 per table, no alcohol served off premises etc all bars and restaurants are packed to capacity. Clearly, “zoom drinking” was way less satisfactory than catching up with friends in person.

Walking around Singapore’s eating hot spots like Amoy street, Arab street I am amazed at the fact that restaurants are back to being full (albeit with social distancing). I was on leave this week and I myself have eaten out 5 times – thrice with the family and twice with friends and on each occasion the restaurant has been full. I would predict that the restaurant business will bounce back as soon as restrictions are eased.

At the other end of the human behavior spectrum you have contactless delivery. Before COVID the act of receiving a home delivery from a restaurant involved checking the items were as per order, the food was “warm” and possibly tip the person delivering the food. Fast forward to today and the ringing of the door bell and a text message indicates a delivery has been made at the door and needs to be picked up. The fact is that even if the delivery does not match the order or is cold, the delivery guy can’t do much. Given that most of them belong to syndicated services like Deliveroo or Grab, they can’t or won’t even take the order back. Grievances need to be taken up directly with the restaurant.

Human interaction is important (as seen in the restaurant example) but only if it is has value – even if social or psychological. In the case of home delivery there is no “value” or “utility” to the human interaction. Hence, the new behavior of accepting contactless delivery is likely to stick around. The same extends to vast tranches of ecommerce shopping. I am not suggesting that malls will be ghost towns in Singapore anytime soon but a lot of things will continue to be bought online and ecommerce is likely to continue to grow.

Somewhere in the middle of the spectrum is gym going and fitness. In fact, it is a microcosm that reflects the spectrum. On the one extreme, if you were going to a gym only to attend a spin class, a virtual spin class with your newly acquired peloton is a good option. But if you need a trainer to show you the moves an online class is less than satisfactory. After all instructions on the other end of a call don’t really help you alter your posture.

I have an irrational fear of hurting myself with a wrong posture doing weights or yoga and so have never done an online class. Once circuit breaker was over, I went back to working out with my physical trainer and went back to the Yoga class. It probably explains why gyms offering Muay Thai and Yoga seem to be back to being full. Another reason for going to the gym is to use heavy duty equipment which is impossible to store and use at home. Yes there was a mushrooming of “do it at home” alternatives but none of them were “the real deal” especially for those seriously into pumping weights.

I think gyms will survive but in a different avatar. This new avatar will probably not just survive but thrive alongside the pelotons and other in home fitness programs / mechanisms.

“The future depends on what we do in the present”, Mahatma Gandhi – The old adage of if a behavior sticks for 21 days it will stick has been broken by the extreme turbulence. Remember “zoom drinking” was a habit for circa 6 weeks but came unstuck before you could say abracabada.

I don’t think we should ask people to determine what they are likely to do – no one knows and a rational response may not match actual behavior. A better way to predict the future is to observe current behavior and satisfaction with it.

For instance, I run long distance races as a hobby and register for one a month. (To clarify anything north of 10Km counts as a long distance in my lexicon.) This year the races were initially postponed and finally converted to “virtual races”. The idea is that you cover the distance, send the organizers proof of having done the run and voila you get your medal and other paraphernalia like the finishers T-shirt. But it misses the point of running an organized race. I mean, if I want to run 10Km I can do it on my own. I pay the race organizers not for the medal or t-shirt but for the experience – the joy of running with strangers, the thrill of seeing the timing at the finish line, the feel of the medal against the sweat drenched skin….. none of this is rational but hey what’s rational about wanting to cover 10km, 21 km or 42km on your feet especially on a Sunday morning.

Virtual races don’t offer the same satisfaction and hence I don’t think virtual races will survive in the long run.

Running along the East coast park of Singapore over weekends, I am amazed at just how crowded it is. In fact so crowded are the beaches of Singapore that the government has introduced a mechanism to “book” your slot in advance and yes no booking, no entry. The beaches of Singapore pale in comparison to Bali, Phuket or even Bintan but the fact that they are packed is a sign that people are longing for the beach. I would predict that as soon as air travel opens and the government allows leisure travel, we will see a return to travelling for holiday. Business travel, I am not so sure about.

Predicting which behaviors will stick and wont is a challenge the business world is grappling with. The task is more onerous given the added unknown of the economic impact of the impending recession. One thing is for certain – there is no reset button that is available that can be pressed at mid night on the 31^st of December (while we are enjoying a socially distanced New Year's eve celebration). 

Its 2020 – I still eat food but have not yet had a 3D printed Ice cream; What research needs to do is to Drive Empathy with People rather than Sympathy for People

In 2005, the renowned inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil predicted that by 2020 it will be possible to consume nanabots that will be capable of nourishing human body cells. That would mean that we would no longer need to eat. Having just returned from a holiday in Goa I can tell you that the famous Goan Sausages continue to be consumed in copious quantities while the nanabots are still not on the menu.

“The only function of economic forecasting is to make astrology look respectable”. John Kenneth Galbraith

Predictions gone wrong - Every market researcher knows that making predictions is a difficult task and fraught with risks. It’s made even more difficult when you throw in factors like development of the technology, the legislative environment, whether you have an entrepreneur with the ability to commercialize the technology etc. That’s probably why futurists prefer round numbers like 2020 or 2025 which are ideally around a decade out – not too far out but reasonably far out.

So come 2020 and there are plenty of predictions with expiry dates looming. A leading management consultancy had predicted that by 2020, 3D printing would spur a second industrial revolution with print at home food and a range of products including toys. Well this Christmas I had to make do with toys from “Toys R Us” (its still up and running in India) since 3D options are not available. And yes, while I continue to enjoy Ben & Jerry’s Ice cream, I am yet to taste a 3D printed Ice cream. The failure of 3D printers taking off seems to be attributed to them being not user friendly. Irrespective, 3D printing is still not leading to a second industrial revolution.

There are some predictions that have proven even more woefully off target. In 1967, the American Noble Laureate Glenn Seaborg predicted that “by the year 2020 it may be possible to breed intelligent species of animals such as apes that will be capable of performing manual labor”……….

Missed predictions should not be taken as a failure. Inventors should absolutely continue to dream of a better future. Because we don’t have perfectly smart homes or haven't complexly figured out driver less cars does not mean we never will. Technology has indeed made rapid progress – just look at the field of medicine and the number of life threatening diseases from the last century that have now been tamed. Technology crawls forward at a steady pace – look at the development of mobile phones over the last 20 years. It is only once in a while that we see a giant leap forward like the i-phone that then spurs new innovation.

“Predictions are very difficult. Especially if they are about the future”. – Niels Bohr, Noble Prize Winning Physicist.

Market Research missed a prediction - In the last decade, the Market research industry has, quite rightly, invested a lot of resources (manpower and financial) into adopting the latest technologies. The industry has made massive progress – look at the adoption of neuro techniques ranging from EEG to Skin conductance to facial coding to IAT’s.

Despite all the technology at play no one predicted two of the biggest global (democratic) political events of the last decade – Trump and Brexit.

The American society has seen increased inequality over the decades. The average pretax income of the top 10% of Americans has more than doubled since 1980 while that of the bottom 50% has remained flat. This means that four decades of growth has had no impact on the salaries of half the Americans. The American dream of getting ahead is now restricted to the those at the top end of the income ladder who have a 70 percent chance of achieving the dream. On the other hand those at the bottom end of the income ladder have only a 35% chance of doing better than their parents. Back in the 1940’s the chances of getting ahead were not dependent on where you started on the income ladder.

This rising inequality led to a feeling that the “system was broken” and hence Trump. Ironically, Trump (like Brexit) is the reduction ad absurdum of a culture that tasks elites with reforming a system that they themselves created and benefitted from. Just look at the fact that post the tax changes the 400 riches families paid lower taxes than the bottom 50% of households.

“…the research evidence keeps piling up and points strongly to the conclusion that a high degree of empathy in a relationship is possibly the most potent factors in bringing about change…” American Psychologist Carl Rogers

Research needs to drive empathy with people not sympathy for people - I would argue that empathy with the masses would have helped predict the rise of Trump or Brexit. Research today helps to generate Sympathy for people. By highlighting the suffering and angst of people it generates concern and even sadness for their plight. But it falls short of helping marketers to “feel their feelings”. The problem with sympathy is that it will result in solutions with “tools that caused the issues”. To provide real solutions we need empathy with people.

“…the worst slave owners were those who were kind to their slaves, and so prevented the horror of the system being realized by those who suffered from it, and understood by those who contemplated it…” Oscar Wilde

Driving empathy for people - At its core, empathy requires putting yourself in someone else’s shoes and feeling their feelings. Psychologists define two kinds of empathy – cognitive empathy and emotional empathy. Cognitive empathy is about being able to look at the world through someone else’s eyes – a bit like how an actor visualizes a character. Emotional empathy on the other hand is about being able to experience the same emotions as the other person leading to compassion and subsequent action.

Psychologists have found two factors that can hinder empathy – (1) pressure and stress which stimulate the amygdala thus crowding out empathy (2) “rich persons malady” – it is very difficult for the well to do to understand the feelings of the less well off.

Researchers have extremely busy lives. We can develop cognitive empathy by exploring the world outside the office, observe people in their natural habitats, try new experiences….. Remember my earlier blog titled “Long live insights – its now time for outsights” - click here to read.

Emotional empathy is more nuanced and will require the industry to embrace diversity well beyond the normal dimensions of gender, age and sexual orientation (though we seem to still struggle with gender diversity at the upper echelons – see my earlier blog “Is the market research industry – unconsciously conscious or consciously unconscious of gender bias” - click here to read). The industry will need to embrace “cognitive diversity” and ensure we have people from all backgrounds. This is the only way to foster emotional empathy.

Ultimately we must drive empathy with people, not sympathy for people.

“Hope smiles from the threshold of the year to come whispering, “it will be happier”.” – Lord Tennyson, British Poet