The Science of Making & Breaking Habits

Huberman Lab

Scicomm Media

Science, Health & Fitness, Life Sciences

4.8 • 26.2K Ratings

🗓️ 3 January 2022

⏱️ 110 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this episode, I review the science of habit formation and habit elimination and how the process of neuroplasticity (brain rewiring) underlies these processes. I describe two new systems for habit formation. The first system is grounded in the neuroscience of brain states and our ability to perform (and to avoid) certain tasks at different phases of the 24-hour day. The second system focuses on 21-day habit formation and consolidation. I also discuss "task bracketing" as an approach to enhancing habit formation and eliminating unwanted habits and the neural circuits that underlie task bracketing in the basal ganglia (a brain region for generating and stopping behaviors). I also review the science of dopamine rewards and how to apply that knowledge to shaping habits. The science and tools in this episode ought to be helpful for anyone looking to build better habits and eliminate unwanted habits for school, work, fitness, relationships, creative endeavors, and more—indeed for any person or situation where behavioral changes are needed. For the full show notes, visit hubermanlab.com. Thank you to our sponsors AG1 (Athletic Greens): https://athleticgreens.com/huberman InsideTracker: https://insidetracker.com/huberman Thesis: https://takethesis.com/huberman Supplements from Momentous https://www.livemomentous.com/huberman Timestamps (00:00:00) Introducing Habits; New Programs (00:02:30) Sponsors (00:06:52) Habits versus Reflexes, Learning, Neuroplasticity (00:08:51) Goal-Based Habits vs. Identity-Based Habits (00:11:40) How Long It (Really) Takes to Form a Habit; Limbic-Friction (00:16:07) Linchpin Habits (00:18:55) Mapping Your Habits; Habit Strength, Context-Dependence (00:22:55) Automaticity (00:24:03) Tool 1: Applying Procedural Memory Visualizations (00:27:48) Hebbian Learning, NMDA receptors (00:31:00) Tool 2: Task Bracketing; Dorsolateral Striatum (00:37:08) States of Mind, Not Scheduling Time Predicts Habit Strength (00:38:16) Tool 3: Phase-Based Habit Plan: Phase 1 (00:46:29) Tool 3: Phase-Based Habit Plan: Phase 2 (00:55:24) Tool 3: Phase-Based Habit Plan: Phase 3 (01:01:34) Habit Flexibility (01:04:57) Should We Reward Ourselves? How? When? When NOT to. (01:10:30) Tool 4: “Dopamine Spotlighting” & Task Bracketing (01:18:22) Tool 5: The 21-Day Habit Installation & Testing System (01:28:26) Breaking Habits: Long-Term (Synaptic) Depression (01:35:49) Notifications Don’t Work (01:37:50) Tool 6: Break Bad Habits with Post-Bad-Habit “Positive Cargo” (01:44:26) Addictions as Habits: https://hubermanlab.com/dr-anna-lembke-understanding-and-treating-addiction (01:45:28) Conclusion & Synthesis (01:48:27) Zero-Cost Support, Sponsors, Supplements, Instagram, Twitter Title Card Photo Credit: Mike Blabac Disclaimer

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Huberman Lab podcast where we discuss science and science-based tools for everyday life.
0:08.7	I'm Andrew Huberman and I'm a professor of neurobiology and
0:12.1	Ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine. Today we're talking all about habits. In particular, we're going to discuss the biology of
0:20.3	habit formation and the biology of how we break habits.
0:24.4	I think we can all appreciate the value of having habits.
0:27.8	Habits organize our behavior into more or less reflexive actions, so we don't have to think too much about
0:34.3	performing the various behaviors that for instance allow us to brush our teeth or
0:39.1	Which side of bed we roll out of in the morning and then of course habits can be more elaborate too
0:44.2	We can be in the habit of exercising at a particular time of day
0:47.1	We can mean the habit of eating certain foods. We can be in the habit of saying or not saying certain things
0:52.3	But of course there are many habits that don't serve us well or that perhaps even undermine
0:57.4	Our immediate and long-term health goals and psychological goals and even some habits that can really undermine our overall life goals
1:05.1	So today we're going to talk about making meaning forming and breaking meaning stopping various habits
1:11.6	There's a lot of information out there about habits
1:14.3	You'll find this in the popular sphere. There are books there are articles there are workshops and so forth
1:19.6	However, lesser known is that there's a whole neuroscience of habit formation and habit breaking and there's a whole field of
1:25.6	Psychology devoted to understanding habit formation and habit breaking and within those scientific literatures
1:31.9	I think there are some real gems that at least to my knowledge
1:35.1	We haven't paid too much attention to in the popular sphere
1:38.2	So today we're going to talk about the biology of habit formation and habit breaking
1:41.8	I'm also going to spell out two specific types of habit formation and habit breaking programs
1:47.3	I'm going to boil these down to some very explicit steps that anyone can use
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