Understanding habit formation in complex tasks

我们的许多日常行为都是由习惯支撑的，我们通常只有在需要改变行为时才会意识到。例如，如果我们在度假时需要切换到驾驶右手驾驶的车辆，我们会发现自己习惯性地看错了后视镜的位置，用错误的手臂去抓手刹。习惯可能是有益的，因为它们使技能在没有太多有意识的思考的情况下表现得很好。然而，习惯也可能是有害的，因为它们限制了我们改变行为的能力。因此，了解我们如何获得和消除习惯是至关重要的。习惯的形成已经被广泛研究，人们通过简单的任务来学习将视觉线索与特定的反应联系起来。这种研究产生了一种“要么全有，要么全无”的习惯观，认为行为要么是灵活的，要么是习惯性的。然而，在更复杂的技能中，我们行为的某些方面可能是习惯性的，而另一些方面则是灵活的。例如，生产设施中的工人可能具有很大的灵活性，能够组装许多不同类型的设备。但是，如果他们的工作空间布局被重新组织，他们可能会习惯性地到达旧的（现在是错误的）位置来检索所需的工具或组件。因此，确保看似灵活的行为不会掩盖潜在的习惯是至关重要的。该项目的目标是开发系统的方法来识别行为的哪些方面是习惯性的，了解复杂技能的不同组成部分如何以及何时通过练习成为习惯，并确定如何根据我们的练习方式形成不同类型的习惯。能够在学习过程中识别和瞄准特定的习惯将有助于改进培训计划，以培养好习惯，避免或消除坏习惯。虽然这个项目将侧重于习惯在学习复杂技能中的作用，但研究结果也将适用于习惯发挥重要作用的其他领域，例如了解消费者行为，促进健康的生活方式，以及制定受伤或疾病康复策略。在这个项目中，人类参与者将学习和练习各种任务，这些任务需要他们使用多个组件过程来确定对视觉刺激的适当反应。在多次练习的过程中，研究人员将追踪行为的不同潜在成分是否以及何时成为习惯。行为的每个组成部分是否会成为习惯，是通过以一种特定于每个组成部分的方式改变任务要求来评估的，然后测量习惯性“行动失误”的发生率，在这种情况下，参与者会回到他们最初练习的行为模式。在进一步的实验中，参与者将在一些条件下接受训练，这些条件旨在促进一种习惯的形成，同时抑制其他习惯的形成。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Much of our daily behavior is supported by habits, which we usually only become aware of when our behavior needs to change. For example, if we need to switch to driving a right-hand-drive vehicle while on vacation, we find ourselves habitually looking in the wrong location for the rear-view mirror and reaching with the wrong arm for the handbrake. Habits can be beneficial because they enable skills to be performed well without much conscious thought. However, habits can also be detrimental because they limit our capacity to change our behavior. It is therefore critical to understand how we acquire and eliminate habits. Habit formation has been widely studied using simple tasks in which people learn to associate visual cues with specific responses. This body of research has given rise to an “all or nothing” view of habits, in which behavior is either flexible or habitual. In more complex skills, however, some aspects of our behavior might be habitual while others remain flexible. For example, a worker in a production facility might have substantial flexibility in being able to assemble many different types of devices. But if the layout of their workspace is re-organized, they may habitually reach for the old (now wrong) location to retrieve a needed tool or component. It can therefore be critical to ensure that seemingly flexible behavior does not mask latent habits. The goal of this project is to develop systematic approaches to identifying which aspects of a behavior are habitual, understand how and when different components of a complex skill become habitual with practice and determine how formation of different types of habits can be shaped based on how we practice. Being able to identify and target specific habits during learning will help improve training programs to foster good habits and avoid or eliminate bad ones. While this project will focus on the role of habits in learning complex skills, the findings will also be applicable to other domains where habits play an important role, such as understanding consumer behavior, promoting a healthy lifestyle, and developing strategies for rehabilitation from injury or disease.In this project, human participants will learn and practice a variety of tasks which require them to use multiple component processes to determine appropriate responses to visual stimuli. Over the course of practice over multiple sessions, the investigators will track whether and when the different underlying components of behavior become habitual. Whether or not each component of behavior becomes habitual is assessed by altering the requirements of the task in a way that is specific to each component, and then measuring the incidence of habitual ‘slips-of-action’ in which participants revert to the pattern of behavior they originally practiced. In further experiments, participants will be trained under conditions designed to promote formation of one type of habit while inhibiting formation of others.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.