habits / breaking habits Flashcards
1
Q
what did William James say about habits?
A
- most of our behaviour (about 99%) is habitual
- product of habits and becomes routine
2
Q
why study anything else?
A
- maybe researchers are biased towards ‘agentic’ accounts of behaviour
- Mazar and Wood (2022) suggest people are
- we like to believe we act on conscious decision making
- but really a lot behaviour could be due to habits (more automatic than conscious)
3
Q
what are habits?
A
- strong associations (in memory) between contexts and response
- have developed through repetition
- don’t just appear
–> build up and are created over time - and by consequence:
–> relatively automatic responses to contexts that are insensitive to changes in the value or contingency of response outcomes
4
Q
what are habits? (Verplanken, 2006)
A
- habit should not be equated with frequency of occurrence
- but rather should be considered as a mental construct involving features of automaticity
–> such as lack of awareness, mental efficiency, and being difficult to control
5
Q
evidence for habits being strong associations between contexts and responses (Adriaanse et al., 2011)
A
- identify habits:
–> what would you usually snack on at home? (habitual response)
–> what snack would you eat if this was not available? (alternative response) - primed lexical decision task:
–> decide if a letter string is a word or non-word
–> prime = home
–> targets = responses that the participants had generated + filler items (e.g., stairs, clock, saddle, wheels)
6
Q
results of Adriaanse et al. (2011)
A
- faster response time when habitual snack good was presented, compared to alternative snack food
- cue/prime word was ‘home’
- the prime word ‘home’ was associated with the habitual snack foods and so time to respond was quicker
7
Q
do associations develop through repetition? (Wood, Quinn and Kashy, 2002)
A
- experience sampling
–> participants recorded what they were doing at the moment of the watch chime
–> the frequency with which they had performed the behavior in the past month
–> the extent to which they performed the behavior in the same physical location each time
–> the involvement of other people in the behavior (others involved vs. others not involved)
8
Q
results of Wood, Quinn and Kashy (2002) - results
A
about 43% of actions were performed almost daily and usually in the same context
9
Q
to what extent are habitual responses ‘automatic’?
A
- (some) criteria for establishing automaticity:
–> do not require deliberation
(i.e. are efficient)
–> occur outside conscious awareness
–> insensitive to changes in the value of the response
(i.e. are not dependent on people’s goals
–> are difficult to control
10
Q
Aarts et a. (1997) - methods
A
- so strong habits remove the need for deliberation?
1. measure strength of cycling habits for 82 students
–> decide, as quickly as possible, how to travel for nine trips
–> the frequency of mentioning the bicycle served as a measure of habit
2. 16 descriptions of travel situations, each with 4 attributes:
–> weather conditions
–> weight of luggage
–> departure time
–> distance to the destination
3. favourability of using the bicycle in each travel situation
–> 1-10 scale
4. the number of attributes used to make decision were recorded
–> operationalised as how predictive attributes were of decision
11
Q
results of Aarts et al. (1997)
A
- when cycling was a strong habit, less attributes are used
- more attributes used for weaker habits
–> people who aren’t habitual cyclists deliberate more, use available info and evaluate the specific context/scenario - less deliberation for stronger habits
12
Q
Wood, Quinn and Kashy (2002)
A
- same study as before but with A NEW QUESTIONS
- what were you thinking about during this activity?
- whether they considered each behavior to be a habit
–> yes / no
13
Q
results of Wood, Quinn and Kashy (2002) - new Qs
A
- for non-habitual behaviours = 70% of the time people are thinking of the behaviour
- for habitual behaviour, a lot less thinking of the behaviour is done
–> more likely to think of something else
–> 40% of the time we think of the habitual behaviour - think more for non-habitual behaviour
14
Q
Neal et al. (2011) - are habits insensitive changes in the value of the response?
A
- ask about habit strength
- how frequently do you eat popcorn in the cinema? - study context
- cinema or meeting room
- either rate movie trailers in a fake theatre
OR
- rate adverts in a meeting room (bright lights etc…)
- EVERYONE gets a bag of popcorn - value of the response was manipulated
- popcorn was either fresh or stale (7 days old) - DV = how much popcorn do Ps eat?
15
Q
results of Neal et al. (2011) - adverts
A
- don’t really eat the popcorn
–> doesn’t match the context - habits doesn’t really matter
- little bit more for the nicer popcorn
16
Q
results of Neal et al. (2011) - trailers
A
- eat more than adverts group
- when the popcorn is nice more people eat it
–> habits aren’t really a factor - when it’s stale habits matter
–> habitual eaters eat more (taste doesn’t matter, just carry on as usual)
–> non-habitual eaters eat less for stale popcorn
(taste matters, more conscious, context matters)
17
Q
habits aren’t just behaviour
A
- we also have mental habits
–> e.g. HINT (Habit Index of Negative Thinking) - ‘thinking negatively about myself is something…’
1. i do frequently
2. i do automatically
etc… - way of measuring HINT
18
Q
are habits part of who we are?
A
- the Self-Report Habit Index
–> doing X is something that is typically me
19
Q
Murtagh et al (2012) - self-report habit index
A
- “Being a driver is an important part of defining who I am”
- “In general, how often do you do the following for local journeys?”
–> cycle/Use local bus/Walk/Take a train, tube or tram?’ - rs vary between 0.02 and 0.07
20
Q
Albini et al (2018) - self-report habit index
A
- “How important is it to you to eat two or more portions of fruit a day / vegetables a day?”
- “Eating fruit every day is something…”
–> e.g. I do frequently = self-report habit index - “Eating vegetables every day is something…”
–> e.g. I do frequently = self-report habit index - correlation found for vegetables (r = 0.49), but not fruit (r = 0.06)
–> correlation between self-reported habits and actual behaviour
–> those who report eating more veg, eat more veg
21
Q
Verplanken and Sui (2019) - self-report habit index
A
- how much does this activity reflects who you really are as a person
–> i.e. your “true self”? - how frequently do you do this activity?
- the median correlation between these two measures was r = 0.46.
22
Q
are habits always bad?
A
- for the most part habits are functional
–> they mean that we do not have to deliberate about what to do
–> e.g. getting up and brushing our teeth - but people often use the term habits to refer to “bad” or unwanted habits
–> e.g. biting nails
23
Q
Webb & Sheeran (2006) - possible to break/change habits?
A
- meta-analysis of 47 studies that changed participants’ intentions to do things
- changes in intentions led to larger changes in behaviours that participants performed sporadically (d+ = 0.74) than in behaviors that could be repeated into habits (d+ = 0.22)
- harder to break/change habits
- not enough to intend to do something
24
Q
why do people fail to act on their intentions?
A
- counter intentional habits
–> Intentions have smaller effects on behaviours performed frequently in similar situations (Ouellette & Wood, 1998)
25
Q
why are habits so hard to break?
A
- people may not be aware:
- that habits drive behaviour
- of the cues that trigger habits
- of the habitual responses themselves - habits are also:
- insensitive to changes in the value of the response
- may come to define us
26
Q
3 strategies to break habits
A
- change circumstances
- vigilant monitoring
- make a plan
27
Q
changing circumstances to break habits
A
- if habits are cued by recurring stimuli, then changes in circumstances that remove these stimuli should disrupt habits
28
Q
Wood, Tam & Guerrero Witt (2005) - 1 to 4 weeks pre moving
A
- uni students before moving away asked about:
1. frequency of performance - participants reported how often they:
–> exercised
–> read the newspaper
–> watched TV
2. stability of context
–> Ps indicated whether they typically performed each behaviour in the same location, with the same people (or alone), and whether those around them perform the behaviour
29
Q
Wood, Tam & Guerrero Witt (2005) - 2 to 4 weeks AFTER moving
A
- uni students after moving away asked about:
1. frequency of performance - participants reported how often they:
–> exercised
–> read the newspaper
–> watched TV
2. changes in context
–> Ps indicated whether they typically performed each behaviour in the same location, with the same people (or alone), and whether those around them perform the behaviour - Ps also reported the extent to which the context in which they performed each behaviour at the two universities was similar / different
30
Q
Wood, Tam & Guerrero Witt (2005) - results
A
- watching tv
–> more perceived change (different cues), behaviour changes
–> less perceived change, behaviour is maintained - exercise
–> -> more perceived change (different cues), behaviour changes
–> less perceived change, behaviour is maintained - always a steeper line for strong habits
–> change in context is more disruptive for strong habits - newspaper reading:
–> same results as the other two
31
Q
vigilant monitoring
A
- have to actively try and consciously measure behaviour to break habits
- thinking to yourself ‘don’t do it’
- watching carefully for mistakes
- monitor behaviour in detail
32
Q
Quinn et al (2010) - vigilant monitoring
A
- Ps asked to identify behaviors that they tried to inhibit or change during a typical day
- measure strength of participants’ habits
–> how often they had performed the unwanted behavior in the past
–> the extent to which they performed the unwanted act in the same location each time
33
Q
Quinn et al (2010) - follow up methods
A
- asked to keep a diary for 2 weeks
- reported the strategies they used:
–> vigilant monitoring (e.g. thinking “don’t do it”, watching carefully for mistakes, monitoring behavior)
–> distraction
–> stimulus control (e.g., removing opportunity)
–> nothing - rated the overall success of each attempt to change their behavior
34
Q
Quinn et al (2010) - results
A
- monitoring strategy (vigilant monitoring) was affective in breaking both strong and weak habits
- distraction was less effective in strong habits
- stimulus control (removing access to cues that drive behaviour)
–> not very effective in strong habits
–> could be because people don’t know the cues (so can’t control for them)
35
Q
make a plan
A
- use the implementation intention
- if-then contingent plans
- trying to break an association can involve forming a new intention to replace it
–> i.e. an implementation intention
36
Q
Adriaanse et al (2011) - implementation condition
A
- when asked about their alternative snack choice, half of the Ps were asked to make a plan
–> “if I am at home, and I want to snack then I will take [alternative]” - will they respond quicker to alternative snack in the lexical decision task?
37
Q
Adriaanse et al (2011) - implementation condition (rationale/hypothesis)
A
- forming an implementation intention creates a new association with the critical cue that is then pitted against the habitual association in a ‘horse race
38
Q
results for Adriaanse et al (2011) - implementation condition
A
- if they form a plan, they perform quicker for alternative behaviour
–> e.g. responding to banana - but also slightly slower for habitual response
- more similar response times
–> almost even/level out - could be because prime word ‘home’ now triggers two things when a plan has formed
–> not one thing and so response is slower for habitual, faster for non-habitual
39
Q
Holland, Aarts, & Langendam (2006) - methods
A
- a telecom-company installed recycling boxes for old paperwork and plastic cups, but the amount binned did not seem to be reduced (boxes made it easier)
- one group of employees asked to plan when, where and how they would recycle their paper and plastic cups
- recycling behavior
–> weight of paper and cups in each participant’s dustbin at the end of a working day was measured
40
Q
Holland, Aarts, & Langendam (2006) - results
A
- looked at behaviour pre-measure, 1 week later, 2 weeks later, 2 months later
- no change in control group
- recycled more a week later in the implementation intention
–> this also persisted over time
–> forming plans can break habits
41
Q
Webb, Sheeran, & Luszczynska (2009, Exp. 2) - breaking stronger habits
A
- recruited regular smokers who wanted to quit from high schools
- measured strength of smoking habits:
–> Fagerstrom Test for Nicotine Dependence
– >number of months as a smoker
–> number of attempts to give up smoking - one half form implementation intentions to plan what to do when presented with usual cues
- control condition completed one of three control exercises concerning seat belt use
- one month later, participants’ smoking behaviour was followed up
–> recorded number of cigarettes per day
42
Q
resutls of Webb, Sheeran, & Luszczynska (2009)
A
- planning helped those with weak habit to smoke less cigarettes
- no effects of planning found in those who had a much stronger habits
- there are boundaries
–> perhaps those with stronger habits need multiple strategies
43
Q
summary
A
- habits are generally helpful, but when they become unwanted they are hard to change
- changes in circumstances that reduce exposure to the cues that trigger the habitual response can disrupt habits
- if changes in circumstances are not possible, then vigilant monitoring or forming plans that link the cue with a new, alternative, response may help
