Department of Psychology, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.
Br J Health Psychol. 2011 Feb;16(Pt 1):189-200. doi: 10.1348/2044-8287.002005. Epub 2010 Nov 22.
The objective of the current study was to examine the cognitive processes that make it possible to use intentions to change one's habitual health-related behaviour.
The study used an idiosyncratic approach to investigate personal existing habits and non-habitual behaviours in a within-participants experiment.
Participants first generated habitual and non-habitual behaviours for various daily-life goals (e.g., having lunch, playing sports). Next, they formed intentions to perform non-habitual behaviours in order to attain these goals. Finally, we measured the cognitive accessibility of participants' habitual and non-habitual behaviours with a behaviour recognition task.
The findings showed that habitual behaviours were more accessible than the non-habitual behaviours when no intentions were formed (control goals), showing that habits are more readily accessed in mind. However, when participants had formed intentions to use non-habitual behaviours, habitual behaviours for the same goals were inhibited in mind. This could be the cognitive mechanism that shields intentions from habit intrusion and thus enables the pursuit of non-habitual behaviours.
The current study demonstrates the role of inhibitory processes in shielding non-habitual intentions in memory. These findings are discussed in the context of success and failure in changing health-related habits.
本研究旨在探讨使人们能够利用意图改变习惯性健康相关行为的认知过程。
该研究采用特殊方法，在参与者内实验中调查个人的现有习惯和非习惯性行为。
参与者首先为各种日常生活目标（如吃午餐、进行运动）生成习惯性和非习惯性行为。接下来，他们形成了执行非习惯性行为的意图，以实现这些目标。最后，我们使用行为识别任务测量了参与者的习惯性和非习惯性行为的认知可及性。
研究结果表明，在没有形成意图（控制目标）时，习惯性行为比非习惯性行为更容易被认知，这表明习惯在思维中更容易被触及。然而，当参与者形成了使用非习惯性行为的意图时，同一目标的习惯性行为在思维中受到抑制。这可能是阻止习惯干扰意图并因此能够追求非习惯性行为的认知机制。
本研究证明了抑制过程在记忆中保护非习惯性意图的作用。这些发现将在改变与健康相关的习惯的成功和失败的背景下进行讨论。
