Habits and Goals in Human Behavior: Separate but Interacting Systems

Abstract

People automatically repeat behaviors that were frequently rewarded in the past in a given context. Such repetition is commonly attributed to habit, or associations in memory between a context and a response. Once habits form, contexts directly activate the response in mind. An opposing view is that habitual behaviors depend on goals. However, we show that this view is challenged by the goal independence of habits across the fields of social and health psychology, behavioral neuroscience, animal learning, and computational modeling. It also is challenged by direct tests revealing that habits do not depend on implicit goals. Furthermore, we show that two features of habit memory—rapid activation of specific responses and resistance to change—explain the different conditions under which people act on habit or pursue goals Finally, we test these features with a novel secondary analysis of action-slip data. We find that habitual responses are activated regardless of goals, but can be performed in concert with goal pursuit.

Illusory Feelings, Elusive Habits: People Overlook Habits in Explanations of Behavior

“…Indeed, in daily life, habits often align with moods, goals, and feelings. However, once formed, habitual responses are triggered directly by context cues, and inner states provide limited input (Wood et al, 2022).…”

An fMRI meta-analysis of the role of the striatum in everyday-life vs laboratory-developed habits

“…Other definitions point more to the acquisition of habitual behaviours (Gardner, 2015), where the role of statistical regularities within tasks and the necessity of repetition are emphasised. Further, more recent analyses consider the way ultimate goals and motivation can influence habitual performance (Wood et al, 2021; Wood and Neal, 2007). However, due to the descriptive terminology used in different literatures, where the extent of conceptual overlap is unclear, inconsistencies and discrepancies between the previous studies of habitual behaviour should be expected (De Houwer, 2019).…”

The Role of Goal-Directed and Habitual Processes in Food Consumption Under Stress After Outcome Devaluation with Taste Aversion

“…To explain suboptimal behavior, researchers frequently invoke traditional dual-process models in which behavior can be the result of either a goal-directed or a habitual process. A widely held view is that suboptimal behavior is the result of increased reliance on habits, especially when operating conditions are poor (Wood et al, 2022;Wood & Rünger, 2016). The condition that has arguably received the most attention in empirical studies of traditional dual-process models is stress, which is supposed to cause a switch to habitual processing (Hartogsveld et al, 2020;Schwabe & Wolf, 2009, 2010Smeets et al, 2019;Smeets & Quaedflieg, 2016;Wirz et al, 2018).…”