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The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business Hardcover – February 28, 2012
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“Few [books] become essential manuals for business and living. The Power of Habit is an exception.”—Financial Times
A WALL STREET JOURNAL AND FINANCIAL TIMES BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
In The Power of Habit, award-winning business reporterCharles Duhigg takes us to the thrilling edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. Distilling vast amounts of information into engrossing narratives that take us from the boardrooms of Procter & Gamble to the sidelines of the NFL to the front lines of the civil rights movement, Duhigg presents a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential. At its core, The Power of Habit contains an exhilarating argument: The key to exercising regularly, losing weight, being more productive, and achieving success is understanding how habits work. As Duhigg shows, by harnessing this new science, we can transform our businesses, our communities, and our lives.
- Print length400 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherRandom House
- Publication dateFebruary 28, 2012
- Dimensions6.29 x 1.15 x 9.53 inches
- ISBN-101400069289
- ISBN-13978-1400069286
- Lexile measure1150L
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What sparked your interest in habits?
I first became interested in the science of habits eight years ago, as a newspaper reporter in Baghdad, when I heard about an army major conducting an experiment in a small town named Kufa.
The major had analyzed videotapes of riots and had found that violence was often preceded by a crowd of Iraqis gathering in a plaza and, over the course of hours, growing in size. Food vendors would show up, as well as spectators. Then, someone would throw a rock or a bottle.
When the major met with Kufa’s mayor, he made an odd request: Could they keep food vendors out of the plazas? Sure, the mayor said. A few weeks later, a small crowd gathered near the Great Mosque of Kufa. It grew in size. Some people started chanting angry slogans. At dusk, the crowd started getting restless and hungry. People looked for the kebab sellers normally filling the plaza, but there were none to be found. The spectators left. The chanters became dispirited. By 8 p.m., everyone was gone.
I asked the major how he had figured out that removing food vendors would change peoples' behavior.
The U.S. military, he told me, is one of the biggest habit-formation experiments in history. “Understanding habits is the most important thing I’ve learned in the army,” he said. By the time I got back to the U.S., I was hooked on the topic.
How have your own habits changed as a result of writing this book?
Since starting work on this book, I've lost about 30 pounds, I run every other morning (I'm training for the NY Marathon later this year), and I'm much more productive. And the reason why is because I've learned to diagnose my habits, and how to change them.
Take, for instance, a bad habit I had of eating a cookie every afternoon. By learning how to analyze my habit, I figured out that the reason I walked to the cafeteria each day wasn't because I was craving a chocolate chip cookie. It was because I was craving socialization, the company of talking to my colleagues while munching. That was the habit's real reward. And the cue for my behavior - the trigger that caused me to automatically stand up and wander to the cafeteria, was a certain time of day.
So, I reconstructed the habit: now, at about 3:30 each day, I absentmindedly stand up from my desk, look around for someone to talk with, and then gossip for about 10 minutes. I don't even think about it at this point. It's automatic. It's a habit. I haven't had a cookie in six months.
What was the most surprising use of habits that you uncovered?
The most surprising thing I've learned is how companies use the science of habit formation to study - and influence - what we buy.
Take, for example, Target, the giant retailer. Target collects all kinds of data on every shopper it can, including whether you’re married and have kids, which part of town you live in, how much money you earn, if you've moved recently, the websites you visit. And with that information, it tries to diagnose each consumer’s unique, individual habits.
Why? Because Target knows that there are these certain moments when our habits become flexible. When we buy a new house, for instance, or get married or have a baby, our shopping habits are in flux. A well-timed coupon or advertisement can convince us to buy in a whole new way. But figuring out when someone is buying a house or getting married or having a baby is tough. And if you send the advertisement after the wedding or the baby arrives, it’s usually too late.
So Target studies our habits to see if they can predict major life events. And the company is very, very successful. Oftentimes, they know what is going on in someone's life better than that person's parents.
Review
“Few [books] become essential manuals for business and living. The Power of Habit is an exception. Charles Duhigg not only explains how habits are formed but how to kick bad ones and hang on to the good.”—Financial Times
“Entertaining . . . enjoyable . . . fascinating . . . a serious look at the science of habit formation and change.”—The New York Times Book Review
“Cue: see cover. Routine: read book. Reward: fully comprehend the art of manipulation.”—Bloomberg Businessweek
“A fresh examination of how routine behaviors take hold and whether they are susceptible to change . . . The stories that Duhigg has knitted together are all fascinating in their own right, but take on an added dimension when wedded to his examination of habits.”— Associated Press
“There’s been a lot of research over the past several years about how our habits shape us, and this work is beautifully described in the new book The Power of Habit.”—David Brooks, The New York Times
“A first-rate book—based on an impressive mass of research, written in a lively style and providing just the right balance of intellectual seriousness with practical advice on how to break our bad habits.”—The Economist
“I have been spinning like a top since reading The Power of Habit, New York Times journalist Charles Duhigg’s fascinating best-seller about how people, businesses and organizations develop the positive routines that make them productive—and happy.”—The Washington Post
“An absolutely fascinating . . . book [that explores] a startling and sometimes dismaying collision between the increasingly sophisticated scientific understanding of habits—how they’re formed, how they can be disrupted and changed—and, among other things, companies’ efforts to use that knowledge to steer your habits and money their way.”—Wired
“If Duhigg is right about the nature of habits, which I think he is, then trying to get rid of these bad habits won’t work. Instead, what is needed is to teach the managers to identify the cues that lead to these bad habits and rewards, and then learn alternative routines that lead to similar rewards, i.e. business and personal success.”—Forbes
“The Power of Habit is chock-full of fascinating anecdotes . . . how an early twentieth century adman turned Pepsodent into the first bestselling toothpaste by creating the habit of brushing daily, how a team of marketing mavens at Procter & Gamble rescued Febreze from the scrapheap of failed products by recognizing that a fresh smell was a fine reward for a cleaning task, how Michael Phelps’ coach instilled habits that made him an Olympic champion many times over, and how Tony Dungy turned the Indianapolis Colts into a Super Bowl–winning team.”—Los Angeles Times
About the Author
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
THE HABIT LOOP
How Habits Work
I.
In the fall of 1993, a man who would upend much of what we know about habits walked into a laboratory in San Diego for a scheduled appointment. He was elderly, a shade over six feet tall, and neatly dressed in a blue button-down shirt. His thick white hair would have inspired envy at any fiftieth high school reunion. Arthritis caused him to limp slightly as he paced the laboratory's hallways, and he held his wife's hand, walking slowly, as if unsure about what each new step would bring.
About a year earlier, Eugene Pauly, or "E.P." as he would come to be known in medical literature, had been at home in Playa del Rey, preparing for dinner, when his wife mentioned that their son, Michael, was coming over.
"Who's Michael?" Eugene asked.
"Your child," said his wife, Beverly. "You know, the one we raised?"
Eugene looked at her blankly. "Who is that?" he asked.
The next day, Eugene started vomiting and writhing with stomach cramps. Within twenty-four hours, his dehydration was so pronounced that a panicked Beverly took him to the emergency room. His temperature started rising, hitting 105 degrees as he sweated a yellow halo of perspiration onto the hospital's sheets. He became delirious, then violent, yelling and pushing when nurses tried to insert an IV into his arm. Only after sedation was a physician able to slide a long needle between two vertebra in the small of his back and extract a few drops of cerebrospinal fluid.
The doctor performing the procedure sensed trouble immediately. The fluid surrounding the brain and spinal nerves is a barrier against infection and injury. In healthy individuals, it is clear and quick flowing, moving with an almost silky rush through a needle. The sample from Eugene's spine was cloudy and dripped out sluggishly, as if filled with microscopic grit. When the results came back from the laboratory, Eugene's physicians learned why he was ill: He was suffering from viral encephalitis, a relatively common disease that produces cold sores, fever blisters, and mild infections on the skin. In rare cases, however, the virus can make its way into the brain, inflicting catastrophic damage as it chews through the delicate folds of tissue where our thoughts, dreams-and according to some, souls- reside.
Eugene's doctors told Beverly there was nothing they could do to counter the damage already done, but a large dose of antiviral drugs might prevent it from spreading. Eugene slipped into a coma and for ten days was close to death. Gradually, as the drugs fought the disease, his fever receded and the virus disappeared. When he finally awoke, he was weak and disoriented and couldn't swallow properly. He couldn't form sentences and would sometimes gasp, as if he had momentarily forgotten how to breathe. But he was alive.
Eventually, Eugene was well enough for a battery of tests. The doctors were amazed to find that his body-including his nervous system- appeared largely unscathed. He could move his limbs and was responsive to noise and light. Scans of his head, though, revealed ominous shadows near the center of his brain. The virus had destroyed an oval of tissue close to where his cranium and spinal column met. "He might not be the person you remember," one doctor warned Beverly. "You need to be ready if your husband is gone."
Eugene was moved to a different wing of the hospital. Within a week, he was swallowing easily. Another week, and he started talking normally, asking for Jell-O and salt, flipping through television channels and complaining about boring soap operas. By the time he was discharged to a rehabilitation center five weeks later, Eugene was walking down hallways and offering nurses unsolicited advice about their weekend plans.
"I don't think I've ever seen anyone come back like this," a doctor told Beverly. "I don't want to raise your hopes, but this is amazing."
Beverly, however, remained concerned. In the rehab hospital it became clear that the disease had changed her husband in unsettling ways. Eugene couldn't remember which day of the week it was, for instance, or the names of his doctors and nurses, no matter how many times they introduced themselves. "Why do they keep asking me all these questions?" he asked Beverly one day after a physician left his room. When he finally returned home, things got even stranger. Eugene didn't seem to remember their friends. He had trouble following conversations. Some mornings, he would get out of bed, walk into the kitchen, cook himself bacon and eggs, then climb back under the covers and turn on the radio. Forty minutes later, he would do the same thing: get up, cook bacon and eggs, climb back into bed, and fiddle with the radio. Then he would do it again.
Alarmed, Beverly reached out to specialists, including a researcher at the University of California, San Diego, who specialized in memory loss. Which is how, on a sunny fall day, Beverly and Eugene found themselves in a nondescript building on the university's campus, holding hands as they walked slowly down a hallway. They were shown into a small exam room. Eugene began chatting with a young woman who was using a computer.
"Having been in electronics over the years, I'm amazed at all this," he said, gesturing at the machine she was typing on. "When I was younger, that thing would have been in a couple of six-foot racks and taken up this whole room."
The woman continued pecking at the keyboard. Eugene chuckled.
"That is incredible," he said. "All those printed circuits and diodes and triodes. When I was in electronics, there would have been a couple of six-foot racks holding that thing."
A scientist entered the room and introduced himself. He asked Eugene how old he was.
"Oh, let's see, fifty-nine or sixty?" Eugene replied. He was seventy- one years old.
The scientist started typing on the computer. Eugene smiled and pointed at it. "That is really something," he said. "You know, when I was in electronics there would have been a couple of six-foot racks holding that thing!"
The scientist was fifty-two-year-old Larry Squire, a professor who had spent the past three decades studying the neuroanatomy of memory. His specialty was exploring how the brain stores events. His work with Eugene, however, would soon open a new world to him and hundreds of other researchers who have reshaped our understanding of how habits function. Squire's studies would show that even someone who can't remember his own age or almost anything else can develop habits that seem inconceivably complex-until you realize that everyone relies on similar neurological processes every day. His and others' research would help reveal the subconscious mechanisms that impact the countless choices that seem as if they're the products of well- reasoned thought, but actually are influenced by urges most of us barely recognize or understand.
By the time Squire met Eugene, he had already been studying images of his brain for weeks. The scans indicated that almost all the damage within Eugene's skull was limited to a five-centimeter area near the center of his head. The virus had almost entirely destroyed his medial temporal lobe, a sliver of cells which scientists suspected was responsible for all sorts of cognitive tasks such as recall of the past and the regulation of some emotions. The completeness of the destruction didn't surprise Squire-viral encephalitis consumes tissue with a ruthless, almost surgical, precision. What shocked him was how familiar the images seemed.
Thirty years earlier, as a PhD student at MIT, Squire had worked alongside a group studying a man known as "H.M.," one of the most famous patients in medical history. When H.M.-his real name was Henry Molaison, but scientists shrouded his identity throughout his life-was seven years old, he was hit by a bicycle and landed hard on his head. Soon afterward, he developed seizures and started blacking out. At sixteen, he had his first grand mal seizure, the kind that affects the entire brain; soon, he was losing consciousness up to ten times a day.
By the time he turned twenty-seven, H.M. was desperate. Anticonvulsive drugs hadn't helped. He was smart, but couldn't hold a job. He still lived with his parents. H.M. wanted a normal existence. So he sought help from a physician whose tolerance for experimentation outweighed his fear of malpractice. Studies had suggested that an area of the brain called the hippocampus might play a role in seizures. When the doctor proposed cutting into H.M.'s head, lifting up the front portion of his brain, and, with a small straw, sucking out the hippocampus and some surrounding tissue from the interior of his skull, H.M. gave his consent.
The surgery occurred in 1953, and as H.M. healed, his seizures slowed. Almost immediately, however, it became clear that his brain had been radically altered. H.M. knew his name and that his mother was from Ireland. He could remember the 1929 stock market crash and news reports about the invasion of Normandy. But almost everything that came afterward-all the memories, experiences, and struggles from most of the decade before his surgery-had been erased. When a doctor began testing H.M.'s memory by showing him playing cards and lists of numbers, he discovered that H.M. couldn't retain any new information for more than twenty seconds or so.
From the day of his surgery until his death in 2008, every person H.M. met, every song he heard, every room he entered, was a completely fresh experience. His brain was frozen in time. Each day, he was befuddled by the fact that someone could change the television channel by pointing a black rectangle of plastic at the screen. He introduced himself to his doctors and nurses over and over, dozens of times each day.
"I loved learning about H.M., because memory seemed like such a tangible, exciting way to study the brain," Squire told me. "I grew up in Ohio, and I can remember, in first grade, my teacher handing everyone crayons, and I started mixing all the colors together to see if it would make black. Why have I kept that memory, but I can't remember what my teacher looked like? Why does my brain decide that one memory is more important than another?"
When Squire received the images of Eugene's brain, he marveled at how similar it seemed to H.M.'s. There were empty, walnut-sized chunks in the middle of both their heads. Eugene's memory-just like H.M.'s-had been removed.
As Squire began examining Eugene, though, he saw that this patient was different from H.M. in some profound ways. Whereas almost everyone knew within minutes of meeting H.M. that something was amiss, Eugene could carry on conversations and perform tasks that wouldn't alert a casual observer that anything was wrong. The effects of H.M.'s surgery had been so debilitating that he was institutionalized for the remainder of his life. Eugene, on the other hand, lived at home with his wife. H.M. couldn't really carry on conversations. Eugene, in contrast, had an amazing knack for guiding almost any discussion to a topic he was comfortable talking about at length, such as satellites- he had worked as a technician for an aerospace company-or the weather.
Squire started his exam of Eugene by asking him about his youth. Eugene talked about the town where he had grown up in central California, his time in the merchant marines, a trip he had taken to Australia as a young man. He could remember most of the events in his life that had occurred prior to about 1960. When Squire asked about later decades, Eugene politely changed the topic and said he had trouble recollecting some recent events.
Squire conducted a few intelligence tests and found that Eugene's intellect was still sharp for a man who couldn't remember the last three decades. What's more, Eugene still had all the habits he had formed in his youth, so whenever Squire gave him a cup of water or complimented him on a particularly detailed answer, Eugene would thank him and offer a compliment in return. Whenever someone entered the room, Eugene would introduce himself and ask about their day.
But when Squire asked Eugene to memorize a string of numbers or describe the hallway outside the laboratory's door, the doctor found his patient couldn't retain any new information for more than a minute or so. When someone showed Eugene photos of his grandchildren, he had no idea who they were. When Squire asked if he remembered getting sick, Eugene said he had no recollection of his illness or the hospital stay. In fact, Eugene almost never recalled that he was suffering from amnesia. His mental image of himself didn't include memory loss, and since he couldn't remember the injury, he couldn't conceive of anything being wrong.
In the months after meeting Eugene, Squire conducted experiments that tested the limits of his memory. By then, Eugene and Beverly had moved from Playa del Rey to San Diego to be closer to their daughter, and Squire often visited their home for his exams. One day, Squire asked Eugene to sketch a layout of his house. Eugene couldn't draw a rudimentary map showing where the kitchen or bedroom was located. "When you get out of bed in the morning, how do you leave your room?" Squire asked.
"You know," Eugene said, "I'm not really sure."
Squire took notes on his laptop, and as the scientist typed, Eugene became distracted. He glanced across the room and then stood up, walked into a hallway, and opened the door to the bathroom. A few minutes later, the toilet flushed, the faucet ran, and Eugene, wiping his hands on his pants, walked back into the living room and sat down again in his chair next to Squire. He waited patiently for the next question.
At the time, no one wondered how a man who couldn't draw a map of his home was able to find the bathroom without hesitation. But that question, and others like it, would eventually lead to a trail of discoveries that has transformed our understanding of habits' power. It would help spark a scientific revolution that today involves hundreds of researchers who are learning, for the first time, to understand all the habits that influence our lives.
As Eugene sat at the table, he looked at Squire's laptop.
"That's amazing," he said, gesturing at the computer. "You know, when I was in electronics, there would have been a couple of six-foot racks holding that thing."
Product details
- Publisher : Random House; 1st edition (February 28, 2012)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 400 pages
- ISBN-10 : 1400069289
- ISBN-13 : 978-1400069286
- Lexile measure : 1150L
- Item Weight : 2.31 pounds
- Dimensions : 6.29 x 1.15 x 9.53 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #29,976 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #48 in Workplace Culture (Books)
- #107 in Popular Social Psychology & Interactions
- #667 in Personal Transformation Self-Help
- Customer Reviews:
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About the author
My name is Charles Duhigg, and I'm a reporter for The New Yorker Magazine and the author of The Power of Habit, Smarter Faster Better, and Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection (coming out on February 20, 2024!)
While I worked at the New York Times, I won a Pulitzer Prize for a series about Apple named "The iEconomy". Before that, I wrote about the 2008 financial crisis, how companies take advantage of the elderly, and reported from Iraq. (For those and other articles, I won the National Journalism Award, the Investigative Reporters and Editors' Medal, the National Academies' reporting award and other recognitions.)
But let’s be honest, you aren’t visiting this page so I can brag about series and awards. (Unless you’re my mom. Hi mom!)
I’m also a native of New Mexico. I studied history at Yale and received an MBA from Harvard Business School. I now live in Santa Cruz, CA with my wife and two children and, before becoming a journalist, was a bike messenger in San Francisco for one terrifying day.
I would love to hear from you.
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Learn more how customers reviews work on AmazonCustomers say
Customers find the book interesting, compelling, and revealing. They appreciate the great job of explaining habits from a fact-based point of view. Readers also mention the book is well-researched and has valuable exercises. Opinions are mixed on enjoyment, ease of use, and clarity. Some find it entertaining and engaging, while others say it's boring and has too much filler.
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Customers find the book interesting and compelling. They say it's approachable, easy to understand, and well worth reading. Readers also mention the author demonstrates in a fluid narrative that there is a growing body of research on personal habits.
"...The flush of winning, free travel feel good. You also end up gambling away your life savings...." Read more
"...A big part of the value in this book is its parade of human stories about how people have succeeded in replacing old habits with new ones...." Read more
"...It is a fascinating book, and especially so when it focuses in on the habits that make our lives what they are...." Read more
"...This focus lead Alcoa to become very profitable, and successful. This Keystone habit played a critical role...." Read more
Customers find the book informative and interesting. They say it has valuable exercises and is well-researched. Readers also appreciate the fascinating examples rooted in brain science.
"...The training not only gives them great work skills some of which can be used for college credit but they also give you life skills...." Read more
"...Habits can be simple or more complex, making short work of such activities as: brushing one's teeth while thinking about the workday ahead; driving..." Read more
"...Habits allow behavior to unfold automatically and without thinking, so that once we set them in motion, they unfold along established pathways. “..." Read more
"...bed every morning is correlated with better productivity, a greater sense of well-being, and stronger skills at sticking with a budget...." Read more
Customers have mixed opinions about the book. Some find it entertaining, engaging, and interesting. However, others say it's boring, disappointing, and has too much filler.
"...They also make for very entertaining reading on what might be a very dry subject...." Read more
"...and sociology, The Power of Habit is one of the most accessible and entertaining.Readability Light -+--- Serious..." Read more
"......" Read more
"...It's still a fun story and well worth reading. The world may not change, but lots of people will be better off for having read this book." Read more
Customers have mixed opinions about the ease of use of the book. Some mention it's a pleasure to read, with clearly and understandable concepts. They say the habits simplify life and reduce cognitive load. However, others say the book seems simplistic, has a hard time following the logic, and lacks direction from description of habits to application.
"...The one disappointment I find is a lack of chapter summaries and sub-chapter headings...." Read more
"...What actually happened was that the work environment became much more streamlined, efficient, and democratic..." Read more
"...On the negative side, the organization of the book is somewhat muddled, as there is significant overlap in the parts on individuals and organizations..." Read more
"...Well written, easy to understand and apply the recommendations." Read more
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The part of the brain responsible for habits is the basal ganglia, not memory. The habit loop itself is a circular model that starts with a cue,then proceeds with a routine and then finishes with a reward. To create positive habits and /or eradicate new habits one must tweak the elements of the habit loop. The most effective habit changes involve modifying the routine part of the habit loop. In a sense you are already modifying a current habit. So to start a new habit you need to get in a new routine. Before the advent of Pepsodent, people really did not brush their teeth. Yeah that meant bad breath and a film over your teeth. Gross and yuck and yeah the nation suffered from poor hygiene. To sell toothpaste though you needed a new habit and yeah this one caught on. The reward part was manipulated here and thee reward was white teeth (which could be obtained by eating an apple) and that sharps sparkling taste in your mouth when you are done. The lather in shampoo serves the same function. Febreze used it as well. It was discovered on accident in a lab. It did such a great job killing odors that once you used it you put it in the closet and forgot about it. Not great for sales so you tweak the reward. After a good cleaning people liked a heavily perfumed spray just to finish things off. The company modified the formula.
But sometimes changing the routine is not enough. In alcoholics anonymous which is a spiritual program they work with two or three things. One is the inventory which helps you identify the cues that make you want to drink. The second part is belief, you have to believe that things can get better . That is where the belief in a higher power comes in. Another example of belief playing a role was the team called the Bucs, a losing football team. The coach came in and taught them to memorize a few key plays by wrote. They drilled these routines to death until they knew them cold. They were successful all the way until the finals and then they started slipping up. They did not win the super bowl and the coach ended up transferring to another team he repeated the same process but with the new team something changed. The change was a a death in the coaches family of his son. It forced the team to pull together and believe. They won the super bowl. Belief and a support group.
Starbucks has one of the best training programs hands down and they treat their employees right. The training not only gives them great work skills some of which can be used for college credit but they also give you life skills. One worker could not even hold down a job. He was the product of a broken family and his inner anger lead to temper flare ups at work among other things. Starbucks had something called a notebook where you write up a problem that arises then you write down your solution to the problem and then you practice it. This guy ended up getting a position in management. Bravo Starbucks. The book also analyzes how Howard Schultz bought the company and built it up to what it is today.
A new CEO steps up at Alcoa. He totally shocks everyone by telling them he is going to focus on safety. A real turn off because people really care about money not worker safety. The CEO sets up a communication system that allows for employees to communicate with their supervisors and even the CEO himself. It also calls for interdepartmental communication. They end up with a near perfect safety record and they also boost productivity and stock values soar. This shows the power of changing key habits to change the over all scene.
An analysis of how markets work is included by showcasing how Target Dept. Stores use computer to track consumer spending habits so they could determine which coupon they should send to you. They were so accurate that it creeped out the customer. Solution make it appear more random, so instead of sending a pregnant woman a bunch of ads for diapers and baby products they would mix it up with ads and coupons for a lawn mower. Make everything regular and familiar. Of course they use this to sell you stuff you will want in the future even before you know you'll want it. Familiarity and regularizes also help hit songs become successful.
The last two chapters focus on societal habits by examining the growth of the Saddle Back Church and the Montgomery bus strike involving Rosa Parks. This first chapter puts the leadership not in the hand of one person but in the hands of the people and it works. The Saddle back Church focuses on small weekday study groups that meet in people's homes with or without the pastor. In the Montgomery Bus strike it showed the power of Personal Connections and also what is called weak links or what I call loose associations. We know it as peer pressure to invoke change.
Finally there is the trick Casinos use.They reward you with all sorts of bonuses to get you to come to their casino. The flush of winning, free travel feel good. You also end up gambling away your life savings. Are you free to stop are you compelled to keep gambling. The story is contrasted to night terrors and sleep walking. Habit happen unconsiously when we sleep. fortunately for most our brain paralyzes us so we cannot move but for other they at function does not works. The subconscious is free to cause you to sleep walk, act out in violent fear. Force of habit.
Habits can be efficient. When a habit is activated, we don't have to think so much about all the steps and breaths we take. Habits can be simple or more complex, making short work of such activities as: brushing one's teeth while thinking about the workday ahead; driving a car while listening to the radio; or tending to customers, fielding their requests, and responding routinely in a warm, appreciative manner. Routines can do a lot of good when it comes to maintaining desirable habits. But things can get challenging when we would like a habit to be changed.
A big part of the value in this book is its parade of human stories about how people have succeeded in replacing old habits with new ones. There are a few stories, too, about people who tried but failed to change a bad habit. Along the way, the author sketches a do-it-yourself model. He talks about people identifying existing "habit loops" which may include external triggers of time, place, people, and situations. Then, the idea is to interrupt and redirect activity toward the desired goals, eventually forming new habits.
In some examples, small "wins" are shown leading to bigger wins as people build skills and confidence in new ways of doing things. And in stories of organizational or cultural habits, positive changes are shown sometimes to set off a ripple effect, where new habits spread to more people in a kind of social contagion.
Charles Duhigg is a New York Times journalist and a graduate of Harvard Business School. He draws together a sampling of psychological research and real-life examples in business and other organizational endeavors. "The Power of Habit" delivers Duhigg's report in the form of a book full of good stories about people who exemplify the concept of "habit" in action, including direct interviews with some of the players in the stories. With this Duhigg presents a psychological concept of habits that a general audience might apply in everyday business and personal life. This book, if it reaches a large readership, may follow in the grooves of what journalist and psychologist Daniel Goleman's books did to popularize "emotional intelligence" and "EQ." (Goleman focuses on business applications of emotional intelligence in his 1998 book, Working with Emotional Intelligence.)
Duhigg's stories are interesting in their own right, easy to understand, and memorable. They run the gamut from sports to neurosurgery, and from marketing toothpaste to overhauling the managerial culture of a heavy industrial corporation.
For example, chapter 2 "The Craving Brain: How to Create New Habits," showcases breakthroughs in consumer marketing (and in one case, the dental health of a whole society) connected to habit changes. The examples cover a variety of marketing obstacles and breakaway solutions including Pepsodent toothpaste, Schlitz beer, and Febreze household deodorizer.
Chapter 5, "Starbucks and the Habit of Success: When Willpower Becomes Automatic," talks about staff training programs that have been credited with enhancing customer service and tuning up whole organizational cultures. Examples besides Starbucks include Deloitte Consulting and the Container Store.
Perhaps the most colorful and intriguing business story in the book is about the managerial successes of Paul O'Neill when he was CEO of the aluminum company Alcoa. (He later went on to serve as U.S. Treasury Secretary.) This is told mostly in Chapter 4, "Keystone Habits, or the Ballad of Paul O'Neill: Which Habits Matter Most." When O'Neill became CEO of Alcoa in 1987, he spearheaded the company on a headlong drive to achieve an error-free standard of employee safety. He rallied employees up and down the hierarchy, and across functions, to the cause of becoming "the safest company in America... [despite that]... employees work with metals that are 1500 degrees and can rip a man's arm off." (p. 98)
At first, Alcoa's investors and employees alike were skeptical, seeing O'Neill's radical quest for superiority in employee safety as too narrow, quixotic, and off-center. O'Neill conceived of the safety charge as a focal point that would trigger all sorts of changes in routines and habits of accountability throughout the company. Preventing employee injuries became a "keystone habit" in Duhigg's lingo, that would set off a ripple effect leading to an upswing in total corporate performance.
It worked. Within a year, Alcoa's profits reached an all-time high. Over a 13-year run with O'Neill at the helm, profits and the stock price both increased by 400%. Time lost to worker injuries declined to one-twentieth the U.S. average. Duhigg's book cites interviews with O'Neill himself and other Alcoa people who were there, and mentions that Alcoa stands as a case study in business schools.
"The Power of Habit" shines a bright light on organizational habits, but not only that. Duhigg serves up stories that point to individual habits, with relevance for personal success, such as interrupting a snacking habit or ending addictions. I see Duhigg's concept of habit loops as compatible with and complementary to the work of food and marketing psychologist Brian Wansink in his excellent book, Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think (2006). At the other end of the scale, Duhigg talks about habits changing at a societal level of attitudes and behavior, offering an analysis of the civil rights movement's Montgomery bus boycott as an example.
The one disappointment I find is a lack of chapter summaries and sub-chapter headings. While the book certainly is accessible "as is," such aids would make it easier to tie together diverse examples, remember themes and links, and go back to them later. The Audible.com version in particular is harder going without summaries and sub-headings because one is not looking at pages with the chapter heading in the upper right, nor is the listener just a page flip away from glancing at the book's table of contents. The Audible.com version also could do a better job of mentioning the printed book's many visual diagrams for listeners who are interested enough to cross-refer.
The book begins and ends with fitting references to the 19th-century writings of an American philosopher and psychologist, William James, who elucidated the concept of habit before there was much science behind it. James was a prime mover in establishing two major streams of modern social science and philosophy: 1.) behavioral psychology - that is, putting a scientific focus on observable behavior and developing interventions to help people shape their lives according to their better ideals; and 2.) the philosophy of pragmatism - which for James meant evaluating scientific theories according to their "cash-value." In James's pragmatist view, a good theory is one that does good work in the minds of those who use it.
James saw "habit," like Duhigg does, as a core aspect of human nature. Duhigg draws attention to success stories in habit replacement, from dental hygiene to aluminum manufacture. In keeping with the philosophical pulse of James the pragmatist, I give Duhigg's "The Power of Habit" a five-star rating for its eye-opening reports on useful research, chock full of real-world examples. Plus the book is written in a style that is vivid and inviting.
Top reviews from other countries
Lo consiglio, non fa miracoli ma e' una bella lettura :)
Das Buch vermittelt die Zusammenhänge von Gewohnheiten mit unserem alltäglichen Leben und zeigt auf wie man sie zum positiven nutzen kann.
Es ist auf ein Auditorium mit Grundverständnissen über Psychologie ausgelegt, jedoch ist es auch für Laien gut verständlich geschrieben.
Es wird viel mit Beispielen gearbeitet und es ist oft die Rede von Themen die jeder kennt.
Alles in allem ein sehr gutes buch zur Weiterbildung und Krisenbewältigung, es hat mir geholfen aus einer Krise herauszukommen und wieder aufzublühen.
Not anymore.
Or rather, it's starting to actually change. One small change at a time. Using this well explained and well researched little book I was able to put some order into all of the chaos. It's not a huge change right now, at least not from the outside, but being able to breath more calmly because at the very least I can keep some order and do some light cleaning around my life it's a huge deal for someone that has the problems I do. Everyday now I wake up at the same time, I do some light cleaning, cook something healthier and do five minutes of breathing afterwards. Enough to keep me more focused and less prone to sudden mood changes if things don't go great during the rest of the day. And I know this is just the start.
This is the book to change your life. If you are desperate enough to change it and honest enough to recognize you need some extra help (besides medicine and therapy, which also help a lot! by the way, but sometimes we need a little extra).
And I just can't recommend it enough to anyone that is looking to do something else, to get themselves out of a tough emotional situation or that just want a better overall life for themselves and those around them.