The Power Of Habit By Charles Duhigg

Personally, I did not enjoy the book. It didn't get all that interesting until the last couple of chapters. Before that, it spewed facts in my face and lacked an intriguing plot. I learned a lot from this book, but You would be better off reading a science journal, magazine, or website. Otherwise, it was an okay book.

Imagine a four year-old child having a delicious marshmallow being placed directly in front of them: just waiting to be eaten. The catch? They aren’t allowed to eat it for fifteen minutes, unless they wish to forfeit their chance of getting another one of the yummy treats. In Dont!: The Secret of Self Control by Jonah Lehrer, this is exactly what is done. It was all part of an experiment, conducted by Stanford University, to see exactly how children would handle this kind of stress. Would they be able to resist the temptation to eat the white candy? The results of this study were fascinating: two out of the three children surveyed were not able to show self-control, and whether it was right away or

In the book “The Power Habit,” the author is talking about a woman named Angie Bachmann who was a housewife and who used to clean her home when her husband and kids would be gone during the day until one day she decided that she will change her life totally. Bachmann once sitting at home started to think that she should find something to enjoy her day just like her husband and kids. She wanted to have a story to tell her family at night. Bachmann instead of thinking about doing something good and productive, she chose a wrong path that ruined her life totally. Bachmann chose casino over all the other work because she thought that casino might make her feel good. Angie Bachmann is responsible for her gambling debts because she chose to make her own decision and not stop gambling, even though she knew she is putting herself in trouble.

“The Habit Loop” written by Charles Duhigg explores habits being subconsciously emitted within the brain causing actions to happen without thinking about it or even remembering how to do it. Eugene Pauly suffered from viral encephalitis of which left a hole in his brain, leaving his memory to deteriorate over time. Eugene's memory got worse and worse until he could barely remember anything that had happened 20 seconds ago. Although his memory was disappearing, Eugene could still carry out tasks such as eat or use the restroom, but when asked to explain how he does it, he can not tell you. Habits were embedded into his brain letting him survive merely on instinct rather than memory. Eugene could leave the house and walk up and down streets

The humanizing aspect of the book is what I enjoyed most about the book, because while I love learning about science, colorless scientific histories are rather difficult to read.

The non-fictional novel The Addict offers a current perspective through the author’s eyes, Michael Stein, into the trials and tribulations that one has to go through when being an opiate addict. The processes that addicts go through becomes instantly examinable, offering insight into how individuals become addicted and what they go through while trying to become rehabilitated. Lucy Fields is the main patient described by Michael Stein in this book. Lucy is addicted to Vicodin and has been addicted for a number of years. Despite many social stigmas associated around addicts, becoming addicted to anything does not happen in a short amount of time. The context in which a person is living, their socioeconomic status, their social support and perceived social support are all factors in becoming addicted or rehabilitated. Throughout the book Michael Stein speaks about multiple patients and refers to buprenorphine as the primary prescribed drug for opiate users, he also refers to methadone treatment. The effectiveness of buprenorphine was shown through the book and how it is, with the help of adequate social and medical support, a viable option with regards to treating opiate addiction.

“Human consciousness, that wonderful ability to reflect, ponder and choose, is our greatest evolutionary achievement” (Wilson). In the novel, The Power of Habit, by Charlie Duhigg; it describes how habits affect people in their daily lives both in a positive and negative way. It describes various scenarios of products, or stories of people’s lives to explain how habits are formed and retained. By using the various points of view and experiences from various people, it helps the reader to be engaged and helps the book feel fresh all throughout. The novel has a feeling all throughout its pages by discussing habits, at the same time by only hinting at the idea.

The topics I read about in the first couple of chapters was about the understandings of evolution and DNA. The author pointed out many times the reasons he created his book throughout chapter 1 but other then that it explains some characteristics in a gene which is selfishness and altruism. As the story progresses into chapter 2 the author begins to talk about primordial soup and where life began. The theory of primordial soup is when all of life began in the ocean or some sort of liquid form. I find this theory to be very fascinating as I have always wondered, like many others, how life came to be on earth and this theory demonstrates a very likely and understandable possibility. He starts to teach us of why sexual reproduction is preferable

Overall, I did not enjoy reading this book. Since I knew about most of the information being stated in the book, such as Darwin’s theory and global climate change, it was kind of like listening to a lecture of something that you already know a lot about. Also, the fact that this book was straight facts and knowledge didn’t lead me to liking it either. It was just throwing so much knowledge at you that it had you wondered what you had just read after reading just one page. Because of this, the book got confusing and especially boring. Also the book had no structure and was put into chapters that made the reading more confusing. So in conclusion, I would not recommend this

In daily life, we must be able to filter out the multitude of distractions which any physical environment can impose upon our senses. By creating a tunneled vision approach to moving about the environments which are a part of our everyday existence, we can more efficiently complete the tasks which are required of us in our various roles in society. In his essay “On Habit,” Alain de Botton, writes that people have become habituated in their own daily lives. In his first section he details himself returning from Barbados to London who discovers the weather isn’t what he expected. He expected his mood from the weather of Barbados to stay the same in London. De Botton illustrates that people in general are unhappy when it comes to observing

Life is full of beliefs because people act, speak, and think the way that they believe it. According to chapter 3 of The Power Of Habit by Charles Duhigg, the author talks about changing habits. The key is to keep cue and reward the same, but the routine need to be change (62). It means that the bad routine can change to good routine, but it will give the same rewards. More important, the author talks about belief that can change habits.

Routines, patterns, dependency, fixation, or even compulsion are all derived out of a habit. Habit patterns are hard to break, but knowing how to properly break a bad habit my end up making you healthier, wealthier and can make and impulse behavior nonexistent. Some habits are good, while others are bad. My bad habit is using chewing tobacco. I have used it on and off since 2004, for me I used it to pass time and now it has just become an oral fixation with no reward.

When it comes to the topic of addiction, most of us will readily agree that it is a miserable trait to possess. An addiction is a physical and psychological state of being that if not treated correctly could result into harmful wrongdoing. In The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg, he recounts a story in which a fatigued housewife named Angie Bachmann lost all of her family’s assets, amounting to a million dollars due to a gambling addiction. Every habit has three components: a cue or a trigger of an automatic behavior to start, a routine the behavior itself, and a reward which is how our brain learns to remember this pattern for the future. According to Duhigg, “you cannot extinguish a bad habit, you can only change it” (63). Duhigg

Lifestyle Theory is a theory in Criminology created by Glenn Walters in 1990. Unsurprisingly this theory is just as the name would suggest, a lifestyle choice to be a criminal. This theory focuses heavily on the biological factors that influence a person’s ability to commit crime. Walters wrote three concepts to his theory: conditions, choice, and cognition. To start, I will address conditions. In Walters’s theory, he discusses the environmental and biological conditions that are involved in entering the criminal lifestyle. The environmental condition is based around your environment like the name suggests. What that means is that the decision to commit crime is due in part by your living situations and needs. This

Hear Ye! Hear Ye! The bullshit is coming. Most of the time, it forms a person’s personality. People do it, say it and think about it. Bullshit is obstructive and yet people wear it like a favorite shirt. Acid washed? Definitely! Bullshit hides one’s true color by painting another on top of it. Bullshit is the reasons, the excuses and all the lies being told every day, yet people get away with their poor behavior because they are tricked and manipulated by their own mind. Bernard Roth, the famous author of the book The Achievement Habit: Stop Wishing, Start Doing and Take Command of Your Life points out people’s behavior when it comes to making up excuses and throwing unacceptable reasons in order to cover their shortcomings and justify