A neuroscientist reveals how subtle design choices influence behaviour, spending and loyalty — and why golf clubs must rethink their environments.
This article is part of GCMA Insights – topical content for golf industry professionals, discussing the things that matter to those who work in golf clubs.
Golf clubs spend significant time discussing pricing, service standards and facilities, yet far less attention is paid to the environments that quietly influence how people behave the moment they arrive.
Stephen Smith is a neuroscientist and one of only six professionals worldwide fully registered as both a sport psychologist and a business psychologist. Smith works with organisations across multiple industries to improve performance and commercial outcomes by understanding how people really make decisions.
Drawing on research from neuroscience, psychology and behavioural science, Smith explained that while people believe they act logically, the vast majority of decisions are driven subconsciously.
“We all like to think that we are logical and sophisticated, but when you open up the skull and look inside, it’s far more complex than that,” he said on the Golf Club Talk UK podcast. “What we have is millions and hundreds of millions of years of evolution still in there.”
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Smith described how the human brain is layered, with the conscious ‘thinking brain’ sitting on top of much older emotional and instinctive systems that evolved to help humans survive.
“Daniel Kahneman showed that 98% of our decisions are driven by these lower brains,” he said. “They’re quick, they use shortcuts, and they’re emotionally driven — but our upper thinking brain then tells us we made a logical decision.”
For golf clubs, the implications are profound. Smith argued that clubs are not just places to play sport; they are environments that instantly trigger feelings of safety, comfort, threat or exclusion — often without people realising why.
He explained: “When we go into any venue, we’re subconsciously asking one question: is this a safe place? That comes from predator and prey being hardwired into us.”
If a visitor feels even slightly uncomfortable, the instinctive response is not confrontation, but departure.
“As soon as I feel uncomfortable, my default reaction is flight. I move on to another territory where I feel safer, and that’s usually my car.”
Crucially, people rarely articulate this discomfort accurately. Instead, they search for rational explanations to justify the feeling.
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“They don’t say, ‘I left because I felt uncomfortable.’ They’ll say the service was slow or the atmosphere wasn’t right. That’s confirmation bias — people look for something to explain how they feel.”
Smith highlighted how common design choices within golf clubs can unintentionally trigger unease, from dark entrances and unclear routes through clubhouses to imagery that suggests exclusivity rather than inclusion.
“Golf clubs are actually brilliant at making people want to go away. They’ve been built around asking visitors, ‘Are you sure you should really be here?'”
He contrasted this with sectors such as retail and hospitality, where environments are carefully engineered to make people feel relaxed, welcome and inclined to stay — and spend.
“If you make people feel like relaxed predators, they will stay longer and they will spend more. If you put them into prey mode, they will leave.”
The key is to recognise that the emotional experience of a venue matters as much as its facilities. Small changes in layout, lighting, signage, imagery and flow can have an outsized impact on member satisfaction, visitor retention and secondary spend.
“It’s not about manipulation,” Smith concluded. “It’s about understanding how humans actually work and designing environments that fit that reality.”
Key takeaways
- People decide emotionally, not logically
Most decisions to stay, spend or leave are made subconsciously within seconds of arrival.
- Environment drives behaviour
Lighting, entrances, signage, imagery and layout can either create comfort or trigger avoidance.
- If visitors don’t feel safe, they won’t spend
Discomfort leads to departure — and lost food, beverage and retail revenue.
This article is part of GCMA Insights – topical content for golf industry professionals, discussing the things that matter to those who work in golf clubs.
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