Habit book notes · Wendy Wood · 2019

Good Habits, Bad Habits — the big ideas

A habit researcher’s account of how context, repetition, friction and reward build automatic behaviour — and why willpower is the wrong tool.

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Written by a leading habit researcher. It summarises decades of research showing how much everyday life runs on habit, and why changing context, friction and reward works better than relying on willpower.

The big ideas

Much of life is habitual

A large share of daily actions are repeated in the same context while we think about something else.

Friction shapes behaviour

Small differences in effort — distance, steps, convenience — have outsized effects on what we do.

Willpower is the wrong tool

People who seem disciplined often face fewer temptations because of their routines and surroundings.

Key concepts

• Context cues
• Friction
• Repetition
• Reward timing
• Habit discontinuity

Limits

• Written for a general audience, so it simplifies complex research and debates.
• Some lab findings on habit versus goals are still debated among researchers.

What the research says

• Wood, Quinn & Kashy (2002) — People recorded what they were doing through the day. Roughly four in ten everyday actions were repeated almost daily in the same place, often while their thoughts were elsewhere. Limits: Mostly student samples, and the share depends on how “habitual” was coded.
• Wood, Tam & Witt (2005) — Students moving to a new university: when the context of an old habit (like exercising or watching television) changed, the habit was disrupted and their intentions guided what they did instead. Limits: One kind of life transition, self-reported behaviour.
• Wood & Rünger (2016) — Summarised habit research: habits form through repetition in stable contexts, are cued directly by those contexts, and are not easily changed by information or good intentions alone. Limits: A review; the field is still working out how habits and goals interact in everyday life.

Apply this idea

Find one habit you want and remove one step of friction from it today.

Described in our own words with the source named — not a summary of the whole book.