You might have seen if you own a pet in your house, you can introduce anything new as long as it becomes habit to it. For instance if you keep a bowl of food infront of it at 9.00 am everyday and one day if you skip, it just crawls around you. To add in if you introduce a bell sound before giving food, another few days just a bell sound can salivate the dog. True isn’t it? It is because of the daily routine/practice it has become a habit.
Beverage & Cola brands drive a habit formation among customers to drink the beverages along with meals or in theatres or in a restaurant. This becomes a substitute of water, and this habit change helps drive business. Even the online shopping sites like Myntra, Flipkart etc. too want to know more about human habits.
How do habits form?
It turns out that every habit starts with a psychological pattern called a “habit loop,” which is a three-part process. First, there’s a cue, or trigger, that tells your brain to go into automatic mode and let a behaviour unfold.
Then there’s the routine, which is the behaviour itself. The third step is the reward: something that your brain likes that helps it remember the “habit loop” in the future.
Measures to make effective habit formation
1.Make a good start:
‘Good beginning is half done’ is a premise. Accordingly to learn a habit we must make a good start. We should have strong motivation and determination of mind. We should not have oscillation of mind. For example, a nursing student decides to start to studying at a fixed time for a fixed length of period. He or she should start as decided and should not hesitate on the first day itself.
2. Keep regular practice:
It is essential to practice the new habit regularly until it becomes a routine in our life. Postponement or interruption should be avoided because it weakens our habit formation. Example, giving some lame excuse like headache, lack of interest or mood and postpone the work- should be avoided.
3. Choose favourable environment
Good habit formation depends upon the encouraging atmosphere also. Example, for a student who wants to work hard, there must be a company of hard working students and not lazy fellows who have no interest in studies.
4. Do not stop till the goal is achieved
Once a habit is formed it is to be strengthened. Hence it should be continued until it is firmly rooted.
Meanwhile we should enjoy the new habit, so that we find more interest to continue practice. For this purpose, we may keep thinking of positive effects of that new habit. Example, understanding the subject matter, scoring good marks, getting good results, achieving good job, etc.