Developing habit-based health behaviour change interventions: twenty-one questions to guide future research

Area of Science:

• Health Psychology
• Behavioral Science

Background:

• Habitual behaviors occur automatically, influencing health outcomes.
• Forming healthy habits and breaking unhealthy ones are crucial for sustained behavior change.
• Gaps in understanding limit the application of habit strategies in real-world interventions.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify key research questions for understanding and applying habit formation and disruption in health behavior change.
• To guide future research at the intersection of habit and health psychology.

Main Methods:

• Expert discussions among health psychology researchers and practitioners at the 2019 European Health Psychology Society 'Synergy Expert Meeting'.
• Identification of research questions based on thematic discussions.

Main Results:

• 21 research questions were identified across four key themes: habit manifestation in health behavior, forming healthy habits, breaking unhealthy habits, and developing/evaluating habit-based interventions.
• Specific numbers of questions were allocated to each theme (3, 5, 4, and 9, respectively).

Conclusions:

• Prioritizing these identified questions is essential for advancing theory and evidence in habit-based behavior change.
• Accumulating knowledge across diverse studies will build a broader understanding of habit change principles for intervention development.
• Further research is needed to effectively embed habit strategies into interventions for long-lasting health behavior change.