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Have you made a New Year’s resolution to kick a bad habit, only to find yourself slipping back into old patterns? You’re not alone. In fact, research even suggests 40% of our daily actions are habits — automatic routines that we do without thinking. But how are these habits formed and why are they so hard to break?
Habits can be compared to riverbeds. A well-established river has a deep bed, and the water is likely to be constantly flowing in that direction. A new river has a shallow bed, so the flow of water is not well defined; it can vary the course and be less predictable.
Like water in a river bed, habits help our behavior “flow” along a predictable path. But what we are really talking about here is learning and unlearning.
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During early stages of habit formation, the decision parts of your brain (prefrontal cortices) kick in, and the action is very deliberate (instead of hitting the snooze button, you choose to get out of bed). When you start a new routine, brain circuits, also called neural networks, are activated.
The more often you repeat the new action, the stronger and more efficient these neural networks become. This reorganization and strengthening of the connections between neurons is called neuroplasticity and, in the case of habit formation: long term potentiation. Every time you take the new action while trying to form a habit, you need smaller cues or triggers to activate the same network of brain cells.
Habits get stronger over time. as we form partnerships and earn rewards; For example, not hitting the snooze button makes it easier to get to work on time, so you feel the benefits of your new habit.
Later, as the habits become stronger, the decision parts of the brain no longer need to be activated to initiate action. The habit is now activated in memory and considered automatic: neural circuits can perform the habit without conscious thought. In other words, you no longer need to choose to perform the action.
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Popular media and lifestyle advice from social media influencers often suggest that it takes 21 days to make or break a habit: an idea originally presented in the 1960s. This is generally considered an oversimplification, although the empirical evidence is surprisingly scant.
A seminal study published in the European Journal of Social Psychology it is often cited as showing that habits take between 18 and 254 days to form, with the average being around 66 days.
In that study, 96 people were asked to choose a new health habit and practice it daily for 84 days. Of the original 96 participants, 39 (about 41%) had successfully formed the habit by the end of the study period. The level of success in forming a habit and the time to form the habit seemed to vary depending on the type of goal.
For example, goals related to drinking a glass of water daily were more likely to be successful and accomplished without conscious thought faster than goals related to eating fruit or exercising. In addition, the time of day seemed important, as habits noted earlier in the day became automatic more quickly than those noted later in the day (e.g., eating a piece of fruit with lunch versus at night, and walking after breakfast versus walking after). dinner).
The study was quite small, so these findings are not definitive. However, they suggest that if you haven’t been able to pick up a new habit in 21 days, don’t worry, there’s still hope.
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Most of us will also have habits we don’t like, unwanted behaviors. Inside the brain, breaking unwanted habits is associated with a different form of neuroplasticity, called long-term depression (not to be confused with mental health condition).
Rather than strengthening neural connections, long-term depression is the process of weakening them. So how do you silence two neurons that previously fired close together?
A popular approach to breaking a bad habit is to identify the specific cue or trigger that elicits the behavior and the reward that reinforces the habit.
For example, someone may bite their nails when feeling stressed and the reward is a temporary feeling of distraction or sensory stimulation. Once the person has identified this connection, he can try to break it. For example, using bitter nail polish and focusing on deep breathing exercises when you feel stressed. Once discontinued, the old nail-biting behavior may gradually disappear over time.
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To break a habit:
- identify your triggersand then avoid or modify them.
- find a substitute: try to replace the old habit with a new, healthier one.
- practice self-pity: Setbacks are a natural part of the process. Recommit to your goal and continue.
To form a habit:
- start small: Start with a simple, achievable habit that you can easily integrate into your daily routine.
- be consistent: Repeat the habit constantly until it becomes automatic.
- reward yourself on the road to stay motivated.
If you think about habits like that river bed, what deepens a river is the volume of water that flows through it. With behavior, that means repetition and similarity in repetition: practicing your new habit. Because new habits can be overwhelming, practicing in small chunks can help, so you’re not creating a new riverbed, but perhaps just deepening parts of the mainstream.
find meaning in the new habit is essential. Some studies have reported strong findings that the belief that you can change a habit is also critical. Believing in change and being aware of its potential, along with your commitment to the practice, is key.
