A habit loop is a repetitive pattern that helps your brain create habits. Habit loops are what drive you to consistently wash your face every morning or go to the gym.
Without habit loops, starting and sticking to new habits is nearly impossible. Establishing habit loops is essential to building positive habits that will help you maintain your health and wellness goals—and avoid quitting after a few weeks.
Starting a new habit requires more than willpower; it involves training your brain. A habit loop is a repetitive brain cycle that recognizes and continues a habit. Think of a habit loop as your brain set to autopilot when it continues a specific routine.
Journalist Charles Duhigg popularized the concept in his book The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business. The three-part habit loop model describes the formation of habits through a cue, routine, and reward.
This model was inspired by research from Ann Graybiel, an MIT researcher and expert on habit formation. Graybiel’s research identifies that social encounters, emotions, and actions help the brain program behavioral routines.
Table of Contents
Cue
A cue is any trigger that tells your brain to start a specific behavior. Cues can be an emotion, time of day, location, previous action, visual item, or the people you encounter.
If you wash your face every morning after you wake up, walking into the bathroom could be the cue to start your morning routine.
Routine
The routine is the actual habit or behavior that happens after a cue. The routine of a face-washing habit would be the act of washing your face.
Continuously performing a behavior creates a neural pathway in your brain. Neural pathways are instructions that tell your brain to start a habit after encountering a particular cue.
Reward
The reward is the positive response of completing a habit. For example, with the face-washing habit, the reward could be feeling refreshed after washing your face or noticing that your skin looks brighter. The reward is what reinforces you to continue a behavior in the future.
The reward is a powerful part of creating a habit loop because it helps your brain release dopamine. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter, or chemical messenger in your brain, that makes you feel pleasure or happiness. Your brain will notice what makes you feel good and program itself to keep chasing that feeling.
Habit loops also apply to bad habits. It can be hard to break a bad habit because your brain is trained to keep doing it. To break a bad habit loop, you must replace the bad habit with a new habit that involves the same cue and reward.
Say you have a habit of drinking a late afternoon coffee to feel more energized, but it’s wrecking your ability to sleep at night. The cue of this habit is that you feel tired in the afternoon, the behavior is drinking coffee, and the reward is you feel more awake.
To break this habit loop, you need to replace drinking coffee with a different wake-promoting habit when you feel tired, like taking a walk or drinking a large glass of water. When you feel tired (the cue), taking a walk (the routine) may help you feel energized (the reward). The more you practice this positive habit, the more likely your brain will recognize the shift to the new behavior.
Forming a habit loop can help you develop and stick to positive habits, such as consistent exercise or drinking more water. To make these habits regular, you need to make them part of your routine.
Here are some ways to get started with a new habit loop and train your brain to make positive routines:
- Start small: Choose an easier habit to add. If you’ve never worked out, don’t try an intense strength training routine daily. Instead, try walking for just 10-15 minutes every day. Once it’s going well, you can increase the difficulty of your habits.
- Choose one habit at a time: It may be too much to simultaneously build positive habits like consistently working out, cooking all your meals at home, and reducing cell phone use. Start with one habit at a time. Once you’re managing one habit, start working toward multiple habits.
- Identify your cues: Think about what prompts you to start a behavior. Visible items, phone alerts, time of day, and location can be good visual reminders to help your brain spring into action. Setting an alarm at the same time every day may push you to work out, or finishing your lunch may trigger you to go for a walk.
- Choose a motivating reward: The reward is what keeps your brain in a habit loop. If you want to start a new habit, you need a reward that will motivate you. Some people may be motivated to exercise because they feel more physically fit and energized. Others may be more motivated to exercise if they get a post-workout smoothie or catch up with their friends at the gym.
- Be consistent: Stick with your new habit, like a scheduled event on your calendar (which can be a cue!) or a hard rule. There is no specific number of days it takes to form a habit. Research shows that the time it takes to stick to a habit depends on the individual, the actual habit, and the environment. It may take you a month or six months to make a habit loop routine.
It may seem daunting to train your brain, but even little habit loops can make a big impact on your health and wellness. Some habit loop changes you can make right now include:
Staying Hydrated
- Cue: Leave an empty drinking glass by your coffee machine
- Routine: See the drinking glass, fill it with water, and drink a full glass before making your coffee
- Reward: You feel more hydrated and awake before drinking your morning coffee; you could also consider the coffee your reward for drinking water
Avoiding Bedtime Scrolling
- Cue: Before bed, place your phone inside your side table drawer and get out a book, magazine, or e-reader
- Routine: Read your material of choice until you’re ready to sleep
- Reward: You feel entertained and tired before bed, without your phone’s blue light disrupting your sleep from watching videos or doomscrolling
Choosing Healthier Snacks
- Cue: Open your pantry containing fresh fruit and nuts in a designated snack area
- Routine: Eat fruit and a handful of nuts instead of a processed sweet treat
- Reward: You satisfy that sweet craving with natural sugars while feeling full and satiated with the added fiber, fat, and protein
Exercising Daily
- Cue: Set an exercise alarm on your phone that notifies you to exercise at the same time each day
- Routine: See the alarm and immediately go for a walk or start a strength training session
- Reward: You feel less stressed and stronger, or you get to enjoy a delicious post-workout protein shake
Habit loops are how our brains create habits through cues, routines, and rewards. Cues trigger your brain to start a routine, and the reward reinforces your brain to continue a habit loop.
Habit loops can be good or bad, and kicking a bad habit loop requires replacing a negative routine with a positive one that uses the same cue and reward.
If you want to start a new habit loop, start with small habits first and stay consistent with the cue, routine, and reward. Eventually, a positive habit loop can become second nature.
