The Importance Of Habits

As a student of science, I’ve always been fond of figuring out how the body works. My career choice is solely to prevent the body from becoming in need of repair. This being said, I was always interested in the brain as well. When I was little, I formed the habit of biting my nails. I don’t remember how or why but I clearly remember the process of trying to get rid of it. It started when I was in 6th grade. I would come home with bloody nubs at the end of my fingers. As a child, my teachers always told me it was unhealthy to bite them so much. They warned of bacteria and cooties under my fingernails (I always wondered if that’s why I can eat pretty much anything without “consequences”). My grandpa would always scold me after he picked

As I started to think about my habits, I realized that many of my friends have “bad” habits. Even when I see random people walking down the street, they might be conducting a habit similar to mine. I want to know why we have these habits, and what possible reason our brain thinks is an explanation for these annoying little

I realized that my habit has been going downhill for years, but I’ve never really thought about when it started to form and when it was completely finished forming. A site by James Clear said, habits can take anywhere from 18 days to 256 days to form completely. That’s less than a month, to 3 months short of a year. Clear cites some reliable sources in his article about habits. He uses a man by the name of Maxwell Maltz to show the traditional thought on how long a habit will take to form. Maltz figured that it took 21 days for a habit to be formed because it took his patients 21 days to get used to seeing their reflection after a plastic surgery procedure he conducted. However, another source, researcher Phillippa Lally from University College London, performed her own studies on habit formation supported with more scientific data. So, to verify James Clear’s thoughts and opinions on Phillippa Lally, I searched for her project. I found her abstract, plus the coauthors and her procedures. She stated, “repeating a behaviour in response to a cue appeared to be enough for many people to develop automaticity for that behaviour” (Lally). She took 96 people and conducted a study for 12 weeks. Each variable (person) chose their own habit and reported daily on the outcome of their day trying to form the habit. Her study brought her to the conclusion that repeated behavior can, in fact, bring on a habit in 18 to 256 days. James Clear