• The Developing Architecture of a Child’s Brain

    New science changes how we look at the link between brain development and a child’s environment... more

  • Arts and Community

    The arts thrive best with broad public support, but for that to happen people need to see the arts as a public good... more

  • Sustainable Food Systems

    Most Americans prefer not to look too closely at the damaging and unsustainable aspects of their food supply system... more

  • Public Structures in American Life

    Topos research shows that Americans’ dim view of Government is due in part to a conceptual blindness... more

  • Communicating Climate Change

    Despite decades of news coverage that uses the simplifying idea of a greenhouse effect, most Americans still don’t get it... more

  • Nuclear Weapons Proliferation

    Attitudes about proliferation change when we come to see our own nuclear weapons as a liability rather than an asset... more

  • Privatization

    There are serious consequences when we hand over control of public goods and institutions to private companies... more

Topos Partnership

When traditional tools aren’t enough

The Topos approach is designed to go beyond conventional research and strategy — which has often led advocates to a “plateau” of support that they can’t seem to get beyond — by taking into account the cognitive and cultural foundations of a public interest issue… more

  • Our Approach

    Transforming the landscape of public understanding

    Our Approach

  • Reframing Privatization Schemes

    At the 14th Conference of the National Association of State Highway and Transportation Unions (NASHTU), Axel Aubrun screened one of Topos Partnership’s ReFrame Videos, which demonstrates how people’s thinking about privatization changes when the topic is reframed as “handing over control.”

    Minimum Wage: Presidential Words and Media Reports

    It’s important for advocates to continue the framing of minimum wage as good for the entire economy, or “all of us”. As it becomes entrenched, the idea that higher wages advance workers, communities and the economy, will inoculate against “job killer” attacks and allow progressives to be on offense, not defense.

Topos is a wonderful new resource for those who want to better understand change in order to create change for the future. The Topos partners combine seat of the pants cognitive science with unconventional wisdom and innovative public opinion research to create state of the art change.
Lawrence Wallack, Ph.D.
Dean, College of Urban and Public Affairs, Portland State University;
Emeritus Professor, Public Health, University of California, Berkeley;
Co-Founder, The Longview Institute