We Are All Creatures of Habit

By Jeffrey M. Bowen

 

Every day at 3 p.m. on the dot our black lab named Goose appears in the doorway expectantly, ears cocked, tail wagging, vigorously panting, all for one purpose – dinner!  He has trained us to respond rather early to these signals.  A wave of our hand and he races to the kitchen and waits impatiently to down his bowl in about 15 seconds flat.  Then he insists on going out to defend his territory.

Why does this particular pattern repeat so regularly?  Not really because of instinct; not all dogs do this.  Goose seems to have an internal alarm clock.  He is faithfully well fed, and surely, he could wait a bit.   Instead this happens because he is a steadfast creature of habit.  We are too, because we respond habitually to his habit.

This serves as a preface to my message that all sentient beings are governed by habits.  These may be good or bad, but they are always strangely powerful.  Volumes of anecdotal advice give us ways to break or create habits.  Understanding and using them calls for more scientific scrutiny.

When situations repeat themselves during our daily activities, research tells us that, on average, 45 percent of the time we react the same way not as an actual decision, but almost automatically.   Up to 88 percent of our morning hygiene is subconsciously routine, as is about 55 percent of activity at work.  If you live to 80, according to another estimate, about 36 years of your life is spent on autopilot!   

Sometimes we think of these happenings as positive learning when the steps produce good results.  Extended habits yield comfort and stability, even when no obvious rewards are involved.  We call them rituals or traditions.  In contrast, habituation may produce a physical or psychological dependency and become an addiction.   Habits are mostly convenient; no need to think much about them.  No executive decision or concentrated self-control is required.  A cue leads to a routine, which then leads to an anticipated reward. 

Changing a habit is quite another story.  My own experience, and probably yours, confirms that habits can be very stubborn creatures.  An area in the prefrontal cortex of our brains sort of scripts out a memory to ensure that a given context will cue the same behavior each time.  With each repetition, less thought is given to the rational intention or goal, and more is given to the contextual cue.  Our subconscious mind seems to declare, “Do what you’ve always done, so you’ll get what you’ve always gotten!” 

What’s wrong with that?   No problem, unless we decide, or are pressed by circumstances, to change intentions quickly, or to give what we do a lot of forethought.  Remember those cartoons where Donald Duck faces a fiendish choice and realizes two little ducks are sitting on either shoulder.  The one with a halo says “stop” while the other one, holding a pitchfork, whispers, “Oh go ahead.”  The guardian angel is our rational mind, the source of conscious willpower, and typically he wins when a single decision is to be made.   The devilish duck is our nonconscious mentality, and if the pitchfork is applied repeatedly, he morphs into a habit. 

 Most purposes can become almost intuitive preferences when repeated often enough.  Psychologist Wendy Wood, after decades applying neuroscience to the issues, concludes that habits are almost like a second self.  Without realizing it, we reconcile ourselves to choices we have already made, cave in to the repetitive settings or context in which previous decisions were made, and perpetuate automatic steps even after taking a break from the situation or getting only an infrequent reward from doing so.

I have always praised those who exercise great self-control or self-denial since they seem to accomplish great things by means of grit.   It turns out that most self-controllers are just better at automating their patterns of behavior.  They meet goals without serious struggles because they have acquired the right habits.  Beneficial actions become their default choices.  Repetition and efficiency reinforce those choices.

Environmental changes have a dominant effect on both good and bad habits.   The current COVID pandemic provides a case in point.  For all kinds of safety or economic reasons, according to a new Pew Research Center survey, about one in five adults say they either changed their residence because of the pandemic, or they know someone who did.  Like it or not, such moves produce a change of scenery that can declutter your habitual landscape and provide fertile ground for new and hopefully better habits.  Meanwhile, when confined to our current home environments, daily routines may be altered drastically.  Everything from hygiene to technology, and from home-school connections to organizing closets is changed.  As a result, the virus may be moving us toward new habits that no reforms could ever mandate.  

Unfortunately, there is ample data to suggest that old habits die hard.   When change is forced upon us, we may revert to thinking without thinking.  Feelings of vulnerability, depression, and poor assessments of risk begin to distort our perspective.

Habits can be curse or a benefit, but they are not a fixed destiny.  Simply put, they are embedded in a loop that begins with a cue and ends with a reward.  In between lie routines.  The best route is to examine the routine, develop a plan to shake it up with a new goal in mind, and you will start to like your life a lot better. Soon you won’t even have to think about it.