Cognitive and Behavioral Sciences Laboratory of Statistical Center of Iran: Basics and Applications

Abstract. With the development of new technology; its use in business processes is expanding rapidly. Accordingly, in recent years the National Statistical Organizations (NSOs), by the recommendations of international statistical organizations in the form of modernization of official statistics, have applied new sciences and technologies in statistical business processes. One of the new sciences and technologies is cognitive and behavioral sciences and technologies.  Cognitive science is the study of the mind and how processing environmental information. Official statistics are produced and used from the interaction between the human and statistical production system and it is necessary to study this interaction by laboratory and field methods. The interaction between the human and the statistical production system consists of two parts: respondents-statistical production system interaction and users- statistical production system. In the first session, statistics production, design and development questionnaire, the usability of data collection tools, methods to increase respondents' participation (behavioral insight unit) and professionalization of statisticians, and in the second session, statistics users, promotion of statistical literacy, data dissemination and accessibility, needs users, the value of statistics produced and the level of public trust are examined. In this article, based on studies conducted in national statistical organizations of other countries, the proposal of using cognitive and behavioral sciences and technologies in the Statistical Center of Iran is presented. The lab aims to conduct laboratory and field studies of human- statistical production system interaction. This proposal includes infrastructure and application fields.