Department of Education and Psychology, Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany.
SWPS University of Social Sciences and Humanities, Wroclaw, Poland.
Br J Health Psychol. 2021 Sep;26(3):807-824. doi: 10.1111/bjhp.12504. Epub 2021 Jan 6.
Habit formation has been identified as one of the key determinants of behaviour change. To initiate habit formation, self-regulation interventions can support individuals to form a cue-behaviour plan and to repeatedly enact the plan in the same context. This randomized controlled trial aimed to model habit formation of an everyday nutrition behaviour and examined whether habit formation and plan enactment differ when individuals plan to enact their behaviour in response to a routine-based versus time-based cue.
Following a baseline assessment, N = 192 adults (aged 18-77 years) were randomly assigned to a routine-based cue or a time-based cue planning intervention, in which they selected an everyday nutrition behaviour and linked it to a daily routine or a time cue.
Participants responded to daily questionnaires over 84 days assessing plan enactment and the behaviour's automaticity (as an indicator of habit formation). Multilevel models with days nested in participants were fitted.
As indicated by asymptotic curves, it took a median of 59 days for participants who successfully formed habits to reach peak automaticity. Group-level analyses revealed that both routine-based and time-based cue planning led to increases in automaticity and plan enactment, but no between-condition differences were found. Repeated plan enactment was a key predictor for automaticity.
Linking one's nutrition behaviour to a daily routine or a specific time was similarly effective for habit formation. Interventions should encourage persons to repeatedly carry out their planned behaviour in response to the planned cue to facilitate habit formation.
习惯形成已被确定为行为改变的关键决定因素之一。为了开始习惯形成，自我调节干预可以支持个人形成线索-行为计划，并在相同的情境下反复执行该计划。本随机对照试验旨在模拟日常营养行为的习惯形成，并检验当个人计划根据基于常规的线索或基于时间的线索来执行行为时，习惯形成和计划执行是否会有所不同。
在基线评估后，将 192 名成年人（年龄 18-77 岁）随机分配到基于常规的线索或基于时间的线索计划干预组，他们在其中选择了一种日常营养行为，并将其与日常常规或时间线索联系起来。
参与者在 84 天内每天回答问卷，评估计划执行情况和行为的自动性（作为习惯形成的指标）。参与者内嵌套的多层模型拟合了这些数据。
正如渐近曲线所示，成功形成习惯的参与者需要 59 天的中位数才能达到自动性的峰值。组水平分析表明，基于常规的线索和基于时间的线索计划都导致了自动性和计划执行的增加，但没有发现组间差异。反复的计划执行是自动性的关键预测因素。
将营养行为与日常常规或特定时间联系起来对于习惯形成同样有效。干预措施应鼓励人们根据计划的线索反复执行计划行为，以促进习惯形成。
