Last week we shared why different strategies for long-term behaviour change are often needed compared to short-term changes.
This week we are focusing on strategies to help you develop new exercise habits.
WHAT ARE HABITS?
When it comes to exercise, people often talk about their habits. Perhaps you have good exercise habits in place, a regular routine and barely have to think about your exercise plans each week. Or perhaps you feel you have inconsistent habits with exercise. It always feels an effort and you struggle to maintain regular physical activity in your life.
But what exactly are habits and how can you use them to help with exercise?
Habits are behaviours or rituals that we carry out automatically. We develop new habits when we repeat a behaviour and over time it’s thought that we start to initiate these actions outside of conscious awareness. They are not consciously controlled and are more easily triggered by our environment.
WHY ARE HABITS HELPFUL?
Dual process models theorise behaviour to be dictated by two regulatory systems:
1) a reflective system that is based on conscious deliberation and
2) a quicker automatic system that responds in line with habits and impulses.
The reflective system is consciously controlled and can override the automatic system. You may often try to govern your physical activity through the reflective system - for example, deliberately deciding to override ingrained habits such as snoozing your alarm by getting up and putting your trainers on.
Whilst you certainly can maintain regular physical activity through ongoing self-regulation, self-regulation draws on finite psychological resources which can be depleted. When your resources, such as time and energy, are low, or you are feeling emotional, self-regulation is harder. For example, perhaps you plan to exercise after work and then come 6pm you can’t be bothered. Your resources throughout the day have been depleted.
In contrast, if you can find ways to create new habits for exercise then, over time, exercise can require less resources to do. This is because habits are governed by the automatic system and require less energy to carry out. This means they are more robust to the effects of fatigue and emotion. In addition, triggers in your environment can automatically activate a habit or urge you to engage in a habit. Desired activities become habitual, taking place outside conscious awareness and therefore more readily. Your alarm goes off and you automatically get up to go for your run. (We know it’s easier said than done!)
How to create new habits
So, what does the research say about creating new habits?
1. START SMALL - when trying to develop a new behaviour, people often try to take on too much. We think we can overhaul our whole lifestyle. Perhaps you try to go from hardly exercising to attempting to exercise everyday. Instead, think about what new habit you want to develop and break it down to something you think you can definitely manage in your current schedule. Don’t try to rearrange your whole life to fit this new habit. It’s more important to start small and get some regular repetition. Once you have developed some consistency then you can start to do more.
2. TAG AN EXISTING HABIT – when it comes to forming new habits, having cues in your environment to remind you of the new desired behaviour is important. It can be helpful to try and tie a new desired habit to an existing habit. For example, if you go to an office each day – can you turn your commute into exercise by walking, running or cycling? If you always plan your work week on a Sunday, can you bring in planning when you will exercise? If you see a friend each week – can you suggest doing some exercise together?
3. FACILITATE YOUR HABIT – for your new desired habit, think of factors in your environment that can help facilitate you to do the new habit/cue you to do the habit. For example, leave your trainers by the door, have your gym class schedule on your fridge. Make a list of all the facilitators. Make what you want to do visible.
4. REMOVE BARRIERS TO YOUR HABIT – on the other hand, think about what barriers get in the way of your habit and try to remove them from your environment. For example, perhaps you often want to exercise before work but then on waking spend half an hour on your phone and you run out of time. To remove this barrier, can you sleep with your phone out of your room?
5.Celebrate your successes – every time you do your new habit, celebrate the fact you have done it. It might sound cheesy but this provides positive reinforcement. You want to feel good about doing the behaviour as you are doing it or straight after. It increases the chance you will want to do the new habit again (and remember we have shown that enjoyment during exercise is more important than enjoyment afterwards) for successful behaviour change.
Chloe & Hannah
The Psychology of Movement
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