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3 Motivations Strong Enough to Change Your Habits
According to neuroscientists
As a human, I am a weird animal. Some things — like binge-watching Netflix or sleeping in— I can give up overnight and never look back. Other things — like smoking cigarettes or substituting food with sugar — I can’t seem to get rid of no matter what I do.
For most of my life, I tried to combat my bad habits with punishment. I’d make bets with friends. I’d restrict my ‘pleasure time’ based on how much ‘useful time’ I put in — like I can’t watch Netflix until I read for 1 hour. All of those last for about 3 days before I give up.
Turns out, humans are hardwired to reject — or avoid — negative news. For example, people log in to their financial accounts disproportionally more often when stock prices are up (yay, I’m such a smart investor!) and dramatically less often when stock prices are down. It has also been shown that anti-smoking ads simply make people want to smoke more.
In fact, researchers at the National Academy of Sciences found that
“Humans show a natural tendency to discount bad news while incorporating good news into beliefs,” — Human development of the ability to learn from bad news (2013)
