The Power of Habit

            The Power of Habit

Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business

by Charles Duhigg

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             THE SUMMARY IN BRIEF

In The Power of Habit, Charles Duhigg, award-winning business reporter for 

The New York Times, takes us to the thrilling edge of scientific discoveries that 

explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. 

Along the way, we learn why some people and companies struggle to change, 

despite years of trying, while others seem to remake themselves overnight. We 

visit laboratories where neuroscientists explore how habits work and where they 

reside in our brains. We discover how the right habits were crucial to the successful 

promotion of Pepsodent; to Tony Dungy who led his team to a Super Bowl win 

by changing one step in his players’ habit loop; and to Alcoa when it turned itself 

around by changing just one routine within the organization.

At its core, The Power of Habit contains an exhilarating argument: The key to 

exercising regularly, losing weight, raising exceptional children, becoming more 

productive, building revolutionary companies and social movements, and achieving 

success is understanding how habits work. By harnessing this new science, we can 

transform our businesses, our communities and our lives.

IN THIS SUMMARY, YOU WILL LEARN:

• Why the brain tries to make routines into habits.

• How cravings create and power new habits.

• How to apply the golden rule of habit change.

• What “keystone habits” are and the importance of them 

in creating a new routine..

When you woke up this morning, what did you do first? Did

you hop in the shower, check your email or grab a dough-

nut from the kitchen counter? Did you brush your teeth

before or after you toweled off? Which route did you drive

to work? When you got home, did you put on your sneakers

and go for a run, or pour yourself a drink and eat dinner in

front of the TV?

“All our life, so far as it has definite form, is but a mass of

habits,” William James wrote in 1892. Most of the choices

we make each day may feel like the products of well-consid-

ered decision making, but they’re not. They’re habits. And

though each habit means relatively little on its own, over

time, the meals we order, whether we save or spend, how

often we exercise, and the way we organize our thoughts

and work routines have enormous impacts on our health,

productivity, financial security and happiness. One paper

published by a Duke University researcher in 2006 found

that more than 40 percent of the actions people performed

each day weren’t actual decisions, but habits.

James –– like countless others, from Aristotle to Oprah

–– spent much of his life trying to understand why habits

exist. But only in the past two decades have scientists and

marketers really begun understanding how habits work ––

and, more important, how they change. At one point, we all

consciously decided how much to eat and what to focus on

when we got to the office, how often to have a drink or when

to go for a jog. Then we stopped making a choice, and the

behavior became automatic. It’s a natural consequence of

our neurology. And by understanding how it happens, you

can rebuild those patterns in whichever way you choose.

The Habit Loop: How Habits Work

Within the building that houses the Brain and Cognitive

Sciences department of the Massachusetts Institute of

Technology (MIT) are laboratories that contain what, to

the casual observer, look like dollhouse versions of surgical

theaters. There are tiny scalpels, small drills, and miniature

saws less than a quarter inch wide attached to robotic arms.

Even the operating tables are tiny, as if prepared for child-

sized surgeons. Inside these laboratories, neurologists cut

into the skulls of anesthetized rats, implanting tiny sensors

that can record the smallest changes inside their brains.

These laboratories have become the epicenter for a quiet

revolution in the science of habit formation, and the ex-

periments unfolding explain how we develop the behaviors

necessary to make it through each day. The rats in these

labs have illuminated the complexity that occurs inside our

heads whenever we do something as mundane as brush our

teeth or back the car out of the driveway.

Toward the center of the skull is a golf ball-sized lump of

tissue that is similar to what you might find inside the head

of a fish, reptile or mammal. This is the basal ganglia, an

oval of cells that, for years, scientists didn’t understand very

well, except for suspicions that it played a role in diseases,

such as Parkinson’s.

In the early 1990s, the MIT researchers began wondering

if the basal ganglia might be integral to habits as well. They

noticed that animals with injured basal ganglia suddenly

developed problems with tasks, such as learning how to

run through mazes or remembering how to open food

containers. They decided to experiment by employing new

micro-technologies that allowed them to observe, in minute

detail, what was occurring within the heads of rats as they

performed dozens of routines. Ultimately, each animal was

placed into a T-shaped maze with chocolate at one end.

The maze was structured so that a rat was positioned

behind a partition that opened when a loud click sounded.

Initially, when the rat heard the click and saw the partition

disappear, it would usually wander up and down the center

aisle, sniffing in corners and scratching at walls. It appeared

to smell the chocolate, but couldn’t figure out how to find

it. When it reached the top of the T, it often turned to the

right, away from the chocolate, and then wandered left,

sometimes pausing for no obvious reason. Eventually, most

animals discovered the reward. But there was no discern-

able pattern in their meanderings. It seemed as if each rat

was taking a leisurely, unthinking stroll.

The probes in the rats’ heads, however, told a different story. While each animal wandered through the maze, its brain

–– and in particular, its basal ganglia –– worked furiously.

Each time a rat sniffed the air or scratched a wall, its brain

exploded with activity, as if analyzing each new scent, sight

and sound. The rat was processing information the entire

time it meandered.

The scientists repeated the experiment, again and again,

watching how each rat’s brain activity changed as it moved

through the same route hundreds of times. A series of shifts

slowly emerged. The rats stopped sniffing corners and mak-

ing wrong turns. Instead, they zipped through the maze faster.

er and faster. And within their brains, something unexpected

occurred: As each rat learned how to navigate the maze, its

mental activity decreased. As the route became more and

more automatic, each rat started thinking less and less.

It was as if the first few times a rat explored the maze, its

brain had to work at full power to make sense of all the new

information. But after a few days of running the same route,

the rat didn’t need to scratch the walls or smell the air any-

more, and so the brain activity associated with scratching and

smelling ceased. It didn’t need to choose which direction to

turn, and so decision-making centers of the brain went quiet.

The rat had internalized how to sprint through the maze to

such a degree that it hardly needed to think at all.

But that internalization relied upon the basal ganglia, the

brain probes indicated. This tiny, ancient neurological

structure seemed to take over as the rat ran faster and faster

and its brain worked less and less. The basal ganglia was

central to recalling patterns and acting on them. The basal

ganglia, in other words, stored habits even while the rest of

the brain went to sleep.

The Automatic Routine of ‘Chunking’

This process –– in which the brain converts a sequence of

actions into an automatic routine –– is known as “chunk-

ing,” and it’s at the root of how habits form. There are

dozens –– if not hundreds –– of behavioral chunks that

we rely on every day. Some are simple: You automatically

put toothpaste on your toothbrush before sticking it in your

mouth. Some, such as getting dressed or making the kids’

lunch, are more complex.

Habits, scientists say, emerge because the brain is constant-

ly looking for ways to save effort. Left to its own devices,

the brain will try to make almost any routine into a habit,

because habits allow our minds to ramp down more often.

This effort-saving instinct is a huge advantage. An efficient

brain allows us to stop thinking constantly about basic

behaviors, such as walking and choosing what to eat, so we

can devote mental energy to inventing spears, irrigation

systems and, eventually, airplanes and video games.

The process within our brains is a three-step loop. First,

there is a cue, a trigger that tells your brain to go into auto-

matic mode and which habit to use. Then there is the rou-

tine, which can be physical, mental or emotional. Finally,

there is a reward, which helps your brain figure out if this

particular loop is worth remembering for the future. Over

time, this loop –– cue, routine, reward; cue, routine, reward

–– becomes more and more automatic. The cue and re-

ward become intertwined until a powerful sense of antici-

pation and craving emerges. Eventually, a habit is born.

Habits aren’t destiny. Habits can be ignored, changed, or

replaced. But the reason the discovery of the habit loop is

so important is that it reveals a basic truth: When a habit

emerges, the brain stops fully participating in decision mak-

ing. It stops working so hard, or diverts focus to other tasks.

So unless you deliberately fight a habit –– unless you find

new routines –– the pattern will unfold automatically.

According to Ann Graybiel, a scientist at MIT who oversaw

many of the basal ganglia experiments, “Habits never really

disappear. They’re encoded into the structures of our brain

... The problem is that your brain can’t tell the difference be-

tween bad and good habits, and so if you have a bad one, it’s

always lurking there, waiting for the right cues and rewards.”

Without habit loops, our brains would shut down, over-

whelmed by the minutiae of daily life.

The Craving Brain: How to Create

New Habits

One day in the early 1900s, a prominent American execu-

tive named Claude C. Hopkins was approached by an old

friend with a new business idea. The friend had discovered

an amazing product, he explained, that he was convinced

would be a hit. It was a toothpaste, a minty, frothy con-

coction he called “Pepsodent.” This venture, the friend

promised, was going to be huge. If, that is, Hopkins would

consent to help design a national promotional campaign.

Hopkins, at the time, was at the top of a booming industry

that had hardly existed a few decades earlier: advertising.

He had turned dozens of previously unknown products ............

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