What is a habit? Diverse mechanisms that can produce sustained behavior change

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2020.10.002Get rights and content
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Highlights

  • In many field experiments, sustained behavior change is taken as evidence of habit formation.

  • We discuss alternative mechanisms and the importance of being deliberate in designing intervention studies as tests of specific mechanisms.

  • Alternative mechanisms to classic habit formation are elucidated.

  • Degree of intervention effectiveness can be better understood if tied to mechanisms.

Abstract

In the literature on behavior change it has commonly been assumed that sustained changes in behavior means that habits have been formed and that sustained behavior change is achieved through the formation of habits. In this paper we argue that habit formation is often confused with a variety of alternative mechanisms through which sustained changes in behavior can be achieved. These include: learning, information acquisition, status quo bias, taste discovery, technology, commitment devices, social influences, and concomitant changes to choice environments. Understanding these mechanisms is important for determining why specific interventions work or don’t work and for aiding in the design of more effective mechanisms for inducing sustained behavior change.

Keywords

Habit formation
Health behaviors
Behavioral economics

Cited by (0)

This article is an invited submission. It is part of a supplemental issue on “Healthy Habits” edited by Katherine L. Milkman, Dilip Soman, and Kevin G. Volpp and supported by WW. This supplemental issue collects papers by participants in the Roundtable Discussion on Creating Habit Formation for Healthy Behaviors, organized in late 2019 by the Wharton-Penn Behavior Change for Good Initiative (BCFG) and the Penn Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics (CHIBE).