Breaking the Code

As new technologies emerge with the promise of personalization, safety, or constant connection, some are beginning to feel surveilled, watched in the moments where they don’t want to be seen. In this episode we discuss the growing value of anonymity, allowing people to engage at a distance at first and building trust over time.

This is a great listen for any brands looking to thoughtfully integrate themselves into their audience’s community or way of life.

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Click here to read the team's whitepaper: "Where Culture Meets AI: Scaling the Human-Centered Healthcare Experience"

As we continue growing our understanding of AI's role in our business, it's crucial to discuss why scale without cultural intelligence risks doing more harm than good. In this episode, we're joined by Eirasmin Lokpez-Cobo and Mark Makuch to discuss reactions to their recently published whitepaper and their efforts to infuse cultural intelligence into AI to have a more relevant and equitable impact.

This is a great listen for anyone trying to elevate their work with AI, while keeping humanity at the center. 

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This Rare Disease Month, the team is shifting its focus to the caregivers.
 
Caregiving is often seen as the ultimate display of love. It's a role that needs more recognition, but when we start thinking about caregivers as heroes, we risk no longer seeing them as people who could need support from others. In this episode, Sonika and Gabe are joined by Raregivers' founder Cristol Barrett O'Loughlin, Havas Health's Global Rare Disease Lead Afshan Rizvi Hussain, and Social Strategist Binaka Norris to discuss the emotional pain caregivers endure and the global PSA they're launching for Rare Disease Day to bring that pain to light. Their illuminating conversation examines how idealized narratives of strength can unintentionally deepen stigma and suppress vulnerability. Through the lens of caregivers of people with rare diseases, they explore the emotional complexity of long-term care and the psychology of self-sacrifice.

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Every January, millions of us resolve to reset and become a better version of ourselves. But where did New Year’s resolutions come from, and why do they so rarely stick? 

As the fervor behind the new year quiets, Sonika and Gabe take a moment to trace the evolution of the New Year’s resolution, from ancient Babylonian promises to the gods to today’s culture of self-optimization and burnout. They unpack how modern goal-setting became tangled with fear of failure and misplaced faith in willpower, and explore a radically simpler way forward.

Tiffany Teng also joins the discussion! Tiffany was a key contributor to Havas' recent GLP-1 report and shares insights on goal setting around the holidays. Check out our report Holidays in the GLP-1 Era here: https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=V1Xtx8ilNUSfq62nq83AG8XJvg801jdPt_lTqxsrFANUM0V…

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In this episode, Sonika and Gabe explore how pain is experienced differently across bodies and interpreted differently in conversations, with a focus on people living with Sickle Cell Disease. This conversation dips into acute and chronic pain, highlighting the challenge health communicators face in bringing the unseen aspects of someone's pain to light. This episode was recorded in October 2025.

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In Breaking the Code's 50th episode, we are joined by our 2025 summer intern, Gabriel Robinson (GR), not to be confused with Gabriel Allen-Cummings (GA). This conversation began because of GR's curiosity about social media being used for self-diagnosis, and it evolved to cover HCPs on social media, generational nuances in social media use, and the emergence of AI as a comprehensive caregiver.

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"Ripped From The Headlines" is a new series for Breaking the Code, where Sonika and Gabe react to a news story with a medical anthropology lens. On this edition, they react to Anixa Biosciences' breast cancer vaccine completing phase one of clinical testing. The notion of a cancer vaccine sparked a variety of conversation topics from women's health to vaccine culture. If you love to listen to rich, fast-evolving conversations, then give this a listen and let us know what you think!

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Behavioral inertia has become a buzzword in marketing, often associated with the stubborn action (or inaction) of a target audience. As anthropologists, Sonika and Gabe are often approached with the challenge of designing interventions that break inertia; however, there's more to inertia than simply recognizing it and knowing how to overcome it. In this episode, they break down the emotional motivators of inertia, the possibility of leveraging and rewarding inert behaviors, and why it's paramount to focus first on what a target audience is doing as opposed to what they aren't.

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Thinking holistically is easy to say, but hard to do, especially when designing strategies to change behavior within a specific role like patient, HCP, or caregiver. In this episode, Sonika and Gabe unpack how they disrupt their own thinking to uncover culturally resonant insights and drive more impactful behavioral strategies. 

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The biggest health story of the year has been how GLP-1s like Ozempic are reshaping everyday life. As the holidays approach, we take a closer look at an unexpected cultural shift—the shape of Santa Claus. For nearly a century, Santa has been celebrated as a holly jolly figure with a long white beard and a big round belly. But this year we've seen depictions of Santa hitting the gym, counting calories, and even taking Ozempic.

In this episode, we explore what Santa’s transformation says about society. Why are people so invested in changing Santa’s iconic image? What does it mean that even Santa cares about his weight? And what’s gained—and lost—as Santa transitions from "fat and jolly" to "Hot Santa"? We are joined by Jennifer Tsitsopoulos, Practice Lead of the Medical Anthropology team, to explore these questions through the lens of medical anthropology and holiday traditions.

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