IngentaConnect The goal-dependent automaticity of drinking habits

Authors: Sheeran, Paschal¹; Aarts, Henk²; Custers, Ruud²; Rivis, Amanda¹; Webb, Thomas L.¹; Cooke, Richard³

Source: British Journal of Social Psychology, Volume 44, Number 1, March 2005 , pp. 47-63(17)

Publisher: British Psychological Society

Abstract:

In recent treatments of habitual social behaviour, habits are conceptualized as a form of goal-directed automatic behaviour that are mentally represented as goal-action links. Three experiments tested this conceptualization in the context of students' drinking (alcohol consumption) habits. Participants were randomly assigned to conditions where either a goal related to drinking behaviour (socializing) was activated, or an unrelated goal was activated. In addition, participants' drinking habits were measured. The dependent variable in Experiments 1 and 2 was readiness to drink, operationalized by speed of responding to the action concept `drinking' in a verb verification task. Experiment 3 used the uptake of a voucher to measure drinking behaviour. Findings supported the view that when habits are established, simply activating a goal related to the focal behaviour automatically elicits that behaviour. These findings are consistent with a goal-dependent conception of habit. Possibilities for interventions designed to attenuate undesirable habitual behaviours are considered.

Document Type: Research article

DOI: 10.1348/014466604X23446

Affiliations: 1: University of Sheffield, UK 2: Utrecht University, The Netherlands 3: Sheffield Hallam University, UK

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