Cited by 553Behavioral Health and InterventionsDecision-Making and Behavioral EconomicsBehavioral and Psychological Studies

Habits—A Repeat Performance

Neal, David T., Wood, Wendy, Quinn, Jeffrey M.·2006·Current Directions in Psychological Science

Abstract

Habits are response dispositions that are activated automatically by the context cues that co-occurred with responses during past performance. Experience-sampling diary studies indicate that much of everyday action is characterized by habitual repetition. We consider various mechanisms that could underlie the habitual control of action, and we conclude that direct cuing and motivated contexts best account for the characteristic features of habit responding—in particular, for the rigid repetition of action that can be initiated without intention and that runs to completion with minimal conscious control. We explain the utility of contemporary habit research for issues central to psychology, especially for behavior prediction, behavior change, and self-regulation.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1111/j.1467-8721.2006.00435.x

Cites

18 of 18 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Claims the paper makes

This paper’s full text isn’t openly available, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Neal, D. T., Wood, W., & Quinn, J. M.
Affiliations
Duke University (US)
Corresponding author
Neal, David T.
Venue
Current Directions in Psychological Science
Published
2006-08
Volume
15
Issue
4
Pages
198-202
ISSN
  • 0963-7214 (ISSN-L)
  • 1467-8721
OpenAlex
W1976007338
Cited by
553
References
18
Citations by year
2026: 25 · 2025: 22 · 2024: 20 · 2023: 20 · 2022: 26 · 2021: 41 · 2020: 80 · 2019: 31 · 2018: 39 · 2017: 32 · 2016: 31 · 2015: 32 · 2014: 38 · 2013: 23 · 2012: 25
FWCI
15.84
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
Current Directions in Psychological Science (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Behavioral Health and Interventions
  • Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › General Decision Sciences › Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Behavioral and Psychological Studies
Keywords
habit, contextual cues, behavior prediction, behavior change, self-regulation, intention, conscious control

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review