Do you snack every night in front of the television?  Do you drink a little too much when you are out with your friends?  Do you ever find that you’ve smoked a whole pack of cigarettes, bitten off half your nails, or eaten an entire bag of Doritos without realizing you were doing it?

That’s the real problem when it comes to ridding yourself of bad habits – back in the beginning, when the behavior was new, it was something you did intentionally and probably consciously. But do anything enough times, and it becomes relatively automatic. In other words, you don’t even need to know that you are doing it. 

In fact, as new research shows, you don’t even need to want to do it. If you develop the habit of snacking in front of your TV at night, how hungry you are or how tasty the snack is will no longer determine whether or how much you eat. 

Many bad habits operate mindlessly, on autopilot.  They are triggered by the context (e.g., watching TV, socializing, feeling stressed), rather than by any particular desire to engage in the behavior. So the key to stopping a bad habit isn’t making a resolution – it’s figuring our how to turn off the autopilot.  It’s learning to disrupt the behavior, preferably before it starts.

Take for example a recent study of movie theater popcorn-eating.  Researchers invited a group of people to watch fifteen minutes of movie previews while seated in a real movie theater.  They gave the participants free bags of popcorn, and varied whether the popcorn was fresh or stale. (The stale popcorn was actually a week old. Yuck.)  Then they measured how much popcorn each person ate.

Not surprisingly, everyone who got the stale popcorn reported liking it less than those who got fresh.  And people with a weak popcorn habit (i.e., those who didn’t usually eat popcorn at the movies) ate significantly more fresh popcorn than stale.  But here’s the kicker – for people with a strong popcorn habit (i.e., those who always ordered popcorn at the movies) it didn’t matter how stale the popcorn was!  They ate the same amount, whether it was an hour old, or seven days old.

That’s worth thinking about for a moment – people with a strong habit were eating terrible popcorn, not because they didn’t notice it was terrible, but because it didn’t matter.  The behavior was automatic, not intentional.  So if tasting like Styrofoam won’t keep you from eating something, what will?

The researchers found that there were, in fact, two effective ways to disrupt the automatic popcorn-eating.

First, you can disrupt the habit by changing the context.  When they conducted the same study in the context of a conference room, rather than a movie theater, people with strong popcorn habits at the movie theater stopped eating the stale popcorn.  The automatic popcorn-eating behavior wasn’t activated, because the situational cues were changed.

If you have a habit you’d like to break, spend some time thinking about the situations in which it most often occurs.  If you snack in front of the TV at night, consider doing something else in the evenings for a while – reading a good book, spending time with friends or family, even surfing the web.  Any alternative activity is less likely to trigger mindless eating.   If you just can’t give up your favorite shows, you might try rearranging the room, or sitting in a different chair – anything that alters the context can help.

Second, you can disrupt a habit by changing the method of performance.  In another study, the researchers found that asking strong-habit popcorn eaters who were in a movie theater to eat with their non-dominant hand stopped them from eating the stale popcorn, too. 

So if you can’t change the situation, you can change the way the habit gets executed.  If you mindlessly eat or smoke with your right hand, try only using your left.  If you mindlessly drink from the glass that the bartender keeps refilling, try sitting at a table instead of the bar so you’ll have to consciously get up and ask for a refill.  Making the behavior a little more difficult or awkward to perform can be a great way to throw a wrench in the works.

Too often, we blame our failures on the wrong things.  When it comes to ridding ourselves of bad habits, we usually chalk our difficulties up to a lack of commitment, or willpower.  But as I’ve argued in my new book Succeed: How We Can Reach Our Goals, conquering your behavioral demons needs to start with understanding how they really work, and applying the most effective strategy.   In this case, success comes from not making it quite so easy for your autopilot to run the show.

According to one theory, people want a leader who is “one of us.”  In other words, they want someone representative of the group or organization to which they belong.  Representative leaders draw their power from successfully conveying the sense that they will protect the group’s core values.  (This turns out to be particularly desirable in “us vs. them” situations, when one group is competing against or is threatened by another.)  They inspire liking, loyalty, and a sense of connectedness.  These are the leaders you “want to drink a beer with.”

Many argue, however, that what people really want is someone exceptional, rather than representative.  They want a bold, charismatic visionary who wants to take the group in a new direction.  Visionary leaders don’t blend in – they stand out.  They are risk-takers and innovators.  They have strongly-held views on what the group should be doing differently.  They offer “change you can believe in,” and can be very inspiring.  

So, which kind of leader rises to the top?  Do people want a leader who focuses on who they are, or who they could be?  Psychologists Nir Halevy, Yair Berson, and Adam Galinsky set out to find the answer in a series of new studies, pitting one style of leadership against the other to see which style is generally preferred, and why.

They found, across five studies, that people overwhelmingly prefer visionary leaders – particularly when there is a crisis creating high levels of stress, like a natural disaster, a recession, or looming takeover. 

Visionary leaders attracted more followers, made people feel more strongly identified with the group, and inspired more collective action.  They also helped group members channel their negative emotions more effectively, and enabled them to find their work more interesting and enjoyable.

For instance, in one study, participants were able to choose from two potential leaders to handle a crisis situation.  Those who chose the visionary (but not representative) leader reported an immediate decrease in feelings of fear and helplessness, while those who chose the representative (but not visionary) leader did not – in fact, they felt even worse after making their choice. 

In another study, participants were asked to imagine that much of their town had just been destroyed by a fire, and were then given one of two statements from the town Mayor. The statement from the representative Mayor talked about being a “proud member of the community,” and stressed the importance of demonstrating “who we are and what we stand for.”  The visionary Mayor wrote that he was “filled with hope for the future, “ and assured the townspeople that “I know where we are headed and I know that we will get there.”  

The researchers then asked participants how many hours (from 0-15) per week they thought they would volunteer in response to the Mayor’s call to action. Visionary mayors inspired nearly two more hours per week on average than representative mayors.

In their final study, MBA students with a minimum of three years work experience reflected on the last business unit leader they worked under.  Those who described that leader as visionary indicated that they were more effective, inspiring, and able to effect change than those who had a representative boss.

So “who we can be” trumps “who we are” when it comes to inspiring action.  Particularly in a time of crisis, people want visionary leaders who will offer up novel solutions.  Of course, as the researchers point out in the conclusion of their paper, we don’t necessarily have to choose one form of leadership over the other.  The most effective leader may well be the one who combines aspects of both, by being representative of who the group is now, but visionary with respect to the future – in other words, someone who is one of us, but believes we can become much more.

Despite the best efforts of today’s educators, women are still woefully underrepresented in the math, technology and science fields (and while we’re at it, women are underrepresented at the highest levels in business and government, too).   A recent review argues that the problem is no longer simply a lack of opportunity or encouragement – in a nutshell, girls just seem to prefer other subjects.  The question is, why?

It’s true that women are still, to some extent, stereotyped as being less capable in these fields, and certainly this (baseless and false) belief plays a role.  But new research suggests that girls may prefer to study language, arts, and humanities over math and science for another reason:  they believe, often on an unconscious level, that demonstrating ability in these stereotypically-male areas makes them less attractive to men. 

Most of us, especially in adolescence, want very much to be romantically desirable.  Girls in particular are socialized to see this as an important goal, and both sexes  attempt to achieve the goal by conforming to cultural norms of what women and men are “supposed” to be like.  Women are expected to be communal and nurturing, and to pursue careers that allow them to express those qualities – like teaching, counseling, and of course, nursing.   Men, on the other hand, are supposed to be dominant, independent, and analytical – qualities well-suited to business, finance, and science. 

Unfortunately, it’s not enough to know that women and men can be equally competent in any field.  Stereotypes exert much of their influence on an unconscious level, as these new studies illustrate.  When pursuing romantic goals, we  automatically (below awareness) inhibit conflicting goals that might interfere. For women, that appears to mean choosing love over math.

In one study, male and female undergraduates saw images related to either romance  (romantic restaurants, beach sunsets, lit candles) or intelligence (eyeglasses, libraries, books), in order to get the students thinking about their romantic or achievement-related goals.  Later, they rated their interest in math, technology, science and engineering.  The researchers found that among men, interest in these subjects was not influenced by the images they had seen.  But among women, those who viewed romantic images expressed far less interest in math and science.  (Interestingly, women who viewed intelligence images expressed the same level of interest as the men!)

A second study activated goals a different way (i.e., by having participants “accidentally” overhear conversations between other undergrads, about either about a recent date or a recent test), and observed the same results.  When women had romance on their minds, they liked math a lot less.

In a third study, female undergrads filled out a daily diary over three weeks, reporting on the goals they pursued each day and the activities they engaged in.  The researchers found that on days when women pursued romantic goals – like being romantically desirable, focusing on a current relationship, or trying to start a new relationship – they engaged in significantly fewer math-related activities, like attending class, studying, or doing homework.  (On days when they pursued academic goals, the opposite was true.)  So women don’t just like math less when they are focused on love – they also do less math, which over time undermines their mathematical ability and confidence, inadvertently reinforcing the stereotype that caused all the trouble in the first place.

Of course, this research has interesting implications for men as well.  In pursuit of romantic love, men may feel discouraged from pursuits that are stereotypically “female” – those that involve being nurturing and communal.  In other words, love doesn’t just make girls bad at math – it may also make boys act like selfish jerks, all in the service of conforming to a (largely unconscious) romantic ideal. 

It’s a little troubling to think about how our past choices may have been influenced in unexpected ways by our desire to loved. (As a former chemistry major who ultimately turned to psychology, this research has certainly given me a lot to chew on.)  But more importantly, I think, it gives us insight as parents and teachers into the kinds of messages our children need to hear.   It’s not just that men and women can succeed in jobs that aren’t “traditionally” associated with their sex – kids today already know that.  What they need to understand is that breaking out of a stereotype won’t keep them from finding the loving relationship they also desire.   Only then will they feel free to go wherever their interests and aptitudes may take them.

Succeed: How We Can Reach Our Goals
Heidi Grant Halvorson
Hudson Street Press/Penguin Group (2010)

Others have their own reasons for praising this book. Here are five of mine.

1. The book is very well written. Heidi Grant Halvorson has accumulated, organized, and then expressed (with uncommon eloquence) an abundance of valuable information, insights, and advice that can help almost anyone achieve almost all the goals they set.

2. Halvorson immediately establishes and then develops a direct and personal rapport with her reader. How unusual to feel that she wrote the book expressly for me. Others tell me that they had the same sense of rapport. Halvorson has created a book that comes about as close as a bound volume can to serving as a mentor and coach, a companion really, during each reader’s lengthy and challenging but ultimately rewarding journey of self-discovery.

3. Halvorson makes skillful use of various reader-friendly devices such as a “What You Can Do” section at the conclusion of chapters. Her focus is always on “how” rather than on “why.” Her advice is always specific (“’Lose five pounds’ is a better goal than ‘Lose some weight.’”) and anchored in the real-world, and dozens of checklists that stress key points and facilitate, indeed expedite frequent review later.

4. Although I do not agree with her, that almost anyone can achieve the goals they set, I realize why she stresses that point throughout her book. She obviously agrees with Henry Ford: “Whether you think you can or think you can’t, you’re probably right.” Those who do not believe in themselves probably need Halvorson’s faith in them and in what they can accomplish. I defer to her optimism without sharing it.

5. Finally, almost everything she recommends is do-able. What she offers is a cohesive, comprehensive, and cost-effective program for (a) identifying what the most important career and/or personal goals, (b) developing a an aggressive but realistic “game plan” for achieving them, (c) enlisting the assistance and obtaining the resources needed, (d) making necessary adjustments along the way, and then (e) continuing the program to ensure that new goals are set as other goals are either achieved or eliminated.

Heidi Grant Halvorson is convinced that she can help almost anyone to achieve the goals they set IF they are willing to make and then sustain a commitment to the program she proposes. According to one of my favorite Chinese aphorisms, the best time to plant a tree is 100 years ago. The next best time is now.

What are you waiting for?