HABIT
by Yasushi Kusume
They (habits) create neurological cravings.
The Power of Habit , Charles Duhigg, Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2014
‘Hundreds of habits influence our days.’ So writes Charles Duhigg in his book The Power of Habit. They govern everything from how we dress in the morning, to how we talk to our children, to how we fall asleep at night. We’re continually influenced by the habits we’ve picked up throughout our lives.
But it’s possible, he explains, to create new ones. We do this in three stages, ‘by putting together a cue, a routine, and a reward, and then cultivating a craving that drives the loop.' This works because we associate cues with certain rewards; a subconscious craving emerges in our brains to start the habit loop spinning. ‘Cravings,’ he writes, ‘are what drive habits’.
Everyday habits
Many of our daily actions are actually the product of unconscious habit. Getting up in the morning, for instance, we’ll wash, get dressed, make coffee, eat breakfast. We do it all without thinking. And it’s a good job we can, because it saves us from being overwhelmed by endless daily decisions.
(Habit even plays a role when we do something as mundane as visit a supermarket. Retailers have long been aware that most customers have a habit of turning to the right after entering a store. Therefore they place highly profitable products on the right side of their shops, as well as fresh and healthy food, such as fruits and vegetables. By doing so, they know they also increase the chance of those same customers later purchasing less healthy (junk) foods; they’ll do so because, with ‘good’ food in their carts, they won’t feel so guilty about buying something that isn’t.)
The familiarity loop
Such repetition also creates a comforting feeling within us, what Duhigg calls ‘the familiarity loop’. Take music on the radio, for instance. Duhigg says we don’t choose what to listen to by whether we like or dislike what we’re hearing, because that demands a mental effort. It asks us to make up our minds. ‘Instead,’ he explains, ‘we react to the cues (this sounds like all the other songs I've ever liked) and rewards (it's fun to hum along!), and without thinking, we either start singing or reach over and change the station.’
(It’s an idea I explored further in my articleFamiliarity, in which I wrote that, 'Leveraging familiarity is a powerful approach,' and claimed that cover versions of past popular songs could boost business.)
Rewards are the key
James Clear, in his best-selling book Atomic Habits, goes further than Duhigg. He breaks the 3 stages (cue, routine, reward) into 4 by dividing routine into two phases: desire and reaction. ‘The craving’ he explains, ‘is about wanting the reward. The response is about obtaining the rewards.’ So, if we combine the two men’s models, we can conclude that, in James’ words, the ‘desirability and attractiveness of rewards’ is the key to building or breaking habits. ‘The cue triggers a craving,’ he writes, ‘which motivates a response, which provides a reward, which satisfies the craving and ultimately, becomes associated with the cue.’
Food for thought – for creatives
So what does all this talk of routines and rewards mean for Design? Let me offer a practical example. In the early 1900s, no more than 7% of American households brushed their teeth, or even owned toothpaste. The Pepsodent Company helped change that with clever advertising campaigns that emphasized the benefits of using its toothpaste. (A key slogan was, ‘You’ll wonder where the yellow went when you brush your teeth with Pepsodent!’)
Charles Duhigg describes how the company successfully introduced the USA to the idea of brushing its teeth, and lists four critical phases in the making of a new morning and evening habit. I’ve summarized them below.
1. Create simple, memorable cues (the pleasing feeling of clean teeth).
2. Offer relevant motivations (good-looking teeth).
3. Demonstrate routine/ease-of-use (with plastic containers replacing metal tubes/toothpaste pumps).
4. Offer rewards that will help develop a new desire (for a cool, tingling sensation on tongue and gums).
A new habit
I offer these phases as a guide to how we in Design should approach the introduction of new products, ones not yet in common use. We have to find the relevant, meaningful, ‘rewards’ the product can offer. It’s with these rewards that we’ll create a ‘craving’ that only our new product can satisfy.
We need to create a new habit.