Habit (Sociology)

Introduction
The concept of habit refers to routine behavior which is based on repeated exposure to same kinds of environmental cues. These cues lead to an automatic association with the cue and the behavior that follows irrespective of whether a desired goal is reached. The basic idea thus is that when actions are repeated often enough, they tend to habituate and routinize, which takes them out of the spotlight of conscious reflection. Instead of conscious intentions, contextual cues become important because they activate the related habit. Habits can be explicitly taught or implicitly learned but often a combination of both kinds of incorporation is involved. Habits have been studied in psychology since the end of the 19th century. The stimulus–response model of classical behaviorism comes close to the idea of habits, as both contain the idea that action results from responses to environmental stimuli. However, classical behaviorism denied that inner motivational states, such as valued goals, would have any role in explaining behavior, whereas most contemporary psychologists and cognitive scientists think that habits refer to inner dispositions rather than their overt manifestations. The latter are sometimes called routines to distinguish overt behavior from inner dispositions. Whether habits are dispositions or routines may sound like hair splitting but treating habits as the dispositions that give rise to (or may fail to do so) routine behavior leaves the door open for the option that habits do not cease to exist when their manifestation is blocked for some reason. The can still exist as potentialities for action, waiting for the right environmental conditions to activate themselves. The concept of habit has traditionally also figured in philosophy and more recently in social sciences. Psychological discussions often focus on the ways in which habits reveal the workings of the unconscious, whereas social scientists are keener on analyzing the role of habits in the reproduction of social structures. For social scientists and social theorists, this kind of analysis makes it possible to take into account both the bodily basis of action and the fundamental sociality of our being. Sociological and anthropological perspective on habits underscore enculturation and socialized dispositions. The concept of habit is accordingly used to show how collectively held culture is linked to individual action. Popular science also refers to the idea of habits—often discussing ways to get rid of so-called bad habits.
General Overviews
The theme of habits is probably too specific to draw the attention of book-length academic discussions or journals that would be exclusively devoted to the topic. However, the situation is somewhat different in the field of popular science. The following articles do a good job in highlighting different aspects of habits. Camic 1986 is almost a classical statement on the way in which the concept has figured in sociology. According to Camic, the meaning of habit refers to a continuum: on the lower levels one finds dispositions to perform elementary and specific activities, whereas on the upper reaches habits relate to conduct of life and/or the idea of character. Neal, et al. 2006 gives a short overview of the issues involved from the view of psychologists. Kilpinen 2009 outlines the terrain when the concept of habit is taken as formative for action and social theory.
Camic, Charles. 1986. The matter of habit. American Journal of Sociology 91:1039–1087.
DOI: 10.1086/228386Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This article is a thorough review of the history of the habit concept in social sciences. It shows that classical sociologists referred to habits (although not very often). The concept was eventually written out of the history of social theory by Talcott Parsons. The main reason for this loss had to do with an exaggerated aversion to behaviorism.
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Kilpinen, Erkki. 2009. The habitual conception of action and social theory. Semiotica 173:99–128.
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An insightful discussion on the social sharing of habits. Kilpinen argues that rather than viewing habits and practices as something that one possesses as an individual, it is more fruitful to follow a participatory notion: habits are not necessarily exactly similar for everyone involved in a social activity. Rather, a working agreement about the basics of the activity is more to the point.
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Neal, David T., Wendy Wood, and Jeffrey M. Quinn. 2006. Habits—A repeat performance. Current Directions in Psychological Science 15:198–202.
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8721.2006.00435.xSave Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This is a short and general introduction into the psychological mechanisms behind habitual responses. Based on empirical evidence, the authors conclude that especially the direct-context-cuing model receives support. This model argues that a repeated co-activation of a particular context and the representation of a response forge a direct link in memory, thus leading to the formation of a habit.
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Sparrow, Tom, and Adam Hutchinson, eds. 2015. A history of habit. From Aristotle to Bourdieu. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.
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A collection of articles rather than a systematic presentation of the history of the idea of habits. The book includes chapters on the philosophical forefathers of the idea (Aquinas, Montaigne, Hume, etc.) and also chapters on more modern authors, such as Dewey and Bourdieu. The psychological side of things seems a bit underrepresented.
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Classic Works
Pragmatist philosophers, for example John Dewey and George Herbert Mead, were the first ones to place the concept of habit centre stage in their theories of human behavior at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century (Dewey 2002, Mead 2015). William James is typically taken as a psychologist but he was also a part of the pragmatist movement in philosophy (James 1975), which was initiated by Charles S. Peirce (Peirce 1877). James occasionally took the good of believing something as a measure for truth in a manner that does not give empirical evidence due credit. This has given the false impression that pragmatists would think that “anything goes.” The name of Peirce (pronounced akin to purse) is usually unfamiliar to others than specialists in philosophy but he stands out as one of the truly original thinkers in the history of modern philosophy. Peirce’s starting point was that Cartesian doubt is empty because it is merely doubt on paper; it is impossible in reality to doubt all of one’s beliefs at the same time. Thus, doubt is situated in concrete action situations—in the crises of our habits. There are also other names in the canon of classical pragmatism, such as Thorstein Veblen (Veblen 2002) and Charles Cooley (Cooley 1983). Both applied pragmatist ideas of action in the context of social science. All pragmatist thinkers thought that action is a process and one of the phases of action is characterized by reliance on habits. However, they did not see habitual action and conscious reflection as necessarily opposed to each other since reflection is in the business of guiding habits. Thus, habits and reflection work in tandem. Mead 2015 and Dewey 2002 are both interesting exposures of the relationship between habits and social structures—in addition to the fact that they make the case for the intersubjective constitution of human agency in a very modern manner. All classical pragmatists argued that habit is a reasoned routine in the sense that habitual and intelligent aspects of action interact during the course of action. Thus, habituality of action does not necessarily exclude goal-directedness (as behaviorists would argue).
Cooley, Charles. 1983. Human nature and the social order. Rev. ed. New Brunswick, NJ, and London: Transaction.
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Originally published in 1922. Cooley’s discussion of the social nature of selfhood—the looking-glass self—brings to mind Mead’s ideas on the intersubjective nature of human action. Furthermore, Cooley shares with Mead and Dewey a pragmatist view of action in which action is a process punctuated by phases of habits and reflection.
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Dewey, John. [1922] 2002. Human nature and conduct. New York: Dover.
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Originally published in 1922. Dewey forcefully argues that habits are dispositions rather than particular actions; the essence of habit is thus in an acquired predisposition to modes of responding. Dewey is also a forerunner of many modern views in that he sees the changing of habits being made possible by indirectly modifying the contexts of action. Habits do not only restrict action because they are positive agencies for making different lines of conduct possible.
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James, William. 1975. Pragmatism: A new name for some old ways of thinking. Cambridge, MA, and London: Harvard Univ. Press.
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Originally published 1907. William James’s book on pragmatism is probably one of the most influential books in philosophy in the United States. He argues, as do other classical pragmatists, for the fallibilism of beliefs, which is a maxim that states that the practical consequences of beliefs are the measure for their truth. However, James can be credited with being responsible for the (mistaken) impression that pragmatism is about wishful thinking. This edition also contains The Meaning of Truth: A Sequel to Pragmatism (originally published in 1909).
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Mead, George Herbert. 2015. Mind, self, and society. The definive edition. Edited by Charles W. Morris. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226112879.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This book is the most well-known collection of Mead’s writings but it is actually a compilation of lecture notes published after Mead’s death in 1934. Mead argues that our individual impulses, the “I,” are confronted with the attitudes of other people. The latter are internalized into our social habits, which Mead labeled the “me.” However, rather than being confined into always taking the attitudes of our immediate social surroundings, a generalized other develops. This edition contains a forward by Hans Joas and insightful textual notes by Daniel Huebner.
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Peirce, Charles S. 1877. The fixation of belief. Popular Science Monthly 12:1–15.
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This article is a classic account of pragmatism’s doubt–belief theory of enquiry. Peirce argues that beliefs are in essence habits. Doubt arises in problematic action situations and it is an uneasy feeling that we tend try to get rid of by establishing a new belief. This belief then eventually becomes the basis for a revised habit.
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Veblen, Thorstein. 2002. The place of science in modern civilization and other essays. New Brunswick, NJ and London: Transaction.
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A collection of essays, originally published in 1919, written by Thorstein Veblen, the economist who is often remembered for his theory of the leisure class. Veblen’s most original ideas had to do with the role of institutions in economics and thus he can be considered the originator of institutional economics. Veblen was influenced by pragmatist philosophy and this influence led him to conclude that institutions are always based on habits.
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Veblen, Thorstein. 2011. Essential writings of Thorstein Veblen. Edited by Charles Camic and Geoffrey M. Hodgson. London and New York: Routledge.
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The book contains essays and book excerpts and it shows that Veblen was a representative of what we would nowadays call social theory. In his theory of action, habits refer to learned dispositions but Veblen also took into account instincts as inherited dispositions. Veblen argued that there is a continuum between instinctual and rational action because instinctual action is also teleological and therefore intelligent.
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Philosophy
Strictly speaking philosophical works on habits are few and far between. Charles S. Peirce can certainly be credited with basing his philosophy and logic on the thesis that consciousness is about the reflection of habits that have encountered problems (see Classic Works). Dewey and Bentley 1949 took further the idea of the mutual constitution of action and its environment, which is inherent in the pragmatist notion of habits. They made this notion a metaphysical postulate, which claims that habits are a way of embodying the environment action in a manner that makes the actor and its environment inseparable. Their book makes a case for seeing (social) reality in terms of relations and it is thus a relationalist manifesto. Carlisle 2014 is a good reminder that the phenomenon of habituation is not entirely unfamiliar to other classical philosophers besides pragmatists.
Carlisle, Clare. 2014. On habit. London and New York: Routledge.
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This book is one of the few contemporary treatments which examine habits from an explicitly philosophical viewpoint. Carlisle goes through the philosophical history of the concept of habit and focuses especially on Spinoza and Hume in addition to the legacy of Aristotle, which can be found in the ideas of several thinkers, such as Hegel and Félix Ravaisson.
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Dewey, John, and Arthur F. Bentley. 1949. Knowing and the known. Boston: Beacon.
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A collaborative effort by John Dewey, the famous pragmatist philosopher, and Arthur Bentley who mainly worked outside the academe. The authors contrast three different views (all written with a hyphen): self-action which sees things as acting according to their own causal powers, inter-action where things are causally interconnected but act independently of the interaction and, finally, trans-action which posits that things do not exist independently of the bigger process that they partake in.
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Kivinen, Osmo, and Tero Piiroinen. 2006. Toward pragmatist methodological relationalism. From philosophizing sociology to sociologizing philosophy. Philosophy of the Social Sciences 36.3: 303–329.
DOI: 10.1177/0048393106289794Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
The context of the discussion of this article borders on both philosophy and social theory. The article examines relational views of social reality and, for example, compares Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of habitus with John Dewey’s understanding of habits. The authors are also influenced by the ideas of Richard Rorty, which can be seen in their anti-realist attitude toward social enquiry.
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Ostrow, James M. 1990. Social sensitivity. A study of habit and experience. Albany: State Univ. of New York.
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This slim volume discusses habits in the contexts of phenomenology, pragmatism, and the theory of habitus presented by Pierre Bourdieu. Ostrow is fond of Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy and argues that we are immersed in social reality by being habitually sensitive to particular situations. This sensitivity provides the behavioral possibilities of experience.
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Psychology
The phenomenon of habitual action is actively researched by recent and current psychologists. A perceived affinity with behaviorism was for some time an impediment to engagement with such concerns but things have changed in recent decades. A common understanding among psychologists nowadays is that contrary to what behaviorists argued, responding to environmental cues is not entirely mechanic. For example, Wood and Neal 2007 examines the manner in which habits and goals of action intertwine in complicated ways. For example, under certain circumstances it is also possible to inhibit the cued response and/or direct the habit into goals different from those that were present in the formation of the habit in question. In addition, it seems to be that goals trigger habitual responses but only when the habits in question are moderately strong; strong habits are thus not affected by goals, as Neal, et al. 2012 shows. There are also “bad” habits that we would rather be without. Tackling these kinds of habits is the subject of the article by Quinn, et al. 2010.
Bargh, John A., and Tanya L. Chartrand. 1999. The unbearable automacity of being. American Psychologist 54:462–479.
DOI: 10.1037/0003-066X.54.7.462Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
A review of research related to habits, which argues that everyday life is determined not by conscious intentions and deliberate choices but by mental processes that take their cue from features of the environment. Thus, in this view everyday cognition mainly operates outside of conscious awareness. According to the authors, the good thing about habitual cognitive processes is their effortlessness and the fact that they operate very fast and often at any given time.
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Lally, Phillippa, Cornelia H. M. van Jaarsveld, Henry W. W. Potts, and Jane Wardle. 2010. How are habits formed: Modelling habit formation in the real world. European Journal of Social Psychology 40:998–1009.
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This article is one of the few studies that empirically investigates the process of habit formation in a natural setting. The main result indicates that there is considerable variation in how long it takes to reach a level of automaticity. The essential ingredient for the development of automaticity is repetition of a behavior in a consistent context. Eventually a point is reached when further repetition of the behavior in question does not increase its automaticity.
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Neal, David T., Wendy Wood, Jennifer S. Labrecque, and Philippa Lally. 2012. How Do habits guide behavior? Perceived and actual triggers of habits in daily life. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 48:492–498.
DOI: 10.1016/j.jesp.2011.10.011Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
An article that reports results from two different studies. It finds that the contexts of behavioral performance trigger mental representations of habits with little input from explicit goals. Somewhat paradoxically, the more habitual the performance (running in this case), the more strongly people believe that the performance is influenced by goals.
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Noë, Alva. 2009. Out of our heads. Why you are not your brain, and other lessons from the biology of consciousness. New York: Hill and Wang.
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This entertaining and provocative book suggests that deliberation and decision-making take place in a certain context and therefore even higher cognitive functions are thus infused with habits. Even at the level of biology, the brain would not be much use without a central nervous system (which is not restricted to the brain). Furthermore, consciousness is not a feature of our brains but rather of our bodily being in general.
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Quinn, Jeffrey M., Anthony Pascoe, Wendy Wood, and David T. Neal. 2010. Can’t control yourself? Monitor those bad habits. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 36:499–511.
DOI: 10.1177/0146167209360665Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Referring to habits often brings to mind “bad” habits. This article assesses evidence for successful ways to change unwanted habits. Both diary studies and a laboratory experiment conducted by the authors indicate that vigilant monitoring of habits is the most successful strategy. It involves focusing one’s attention on the unwanted response in order to inhibit its performance.
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Wood, Wendy, and David T. Neal. 2007. A new look at habits and the habit-goal interface. Psychological Review 114:843–863.
DOI: 10.1037/0033-295X.114.4.843Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
An in-depth theoretical discussion, which argues that habits are remnants of goals pursued in the past. When habits are acquired, they are performed even in the absence of the original goal and this is what gives habits their automaticity. However, the relationship between goals and habits is more complicated than this. For example, people make inferences about their goals based on their habits.
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Social Science
Most discussions related to the theme of habits by social scientists take place within social theory, although in practice it is not always easy to draw the line between these two disciplines. Social theory is usually taken as a subdiscipline of social sciences but in the context of the topic of habit both disciplinary discussions tend to be more or less theoretical. Social theorists often take issue with the fundamental nature of social reality—what it consists of and what can be known about it—whereas those works that have been delegated into the section on social science deal with more particular issues. The selection of references below is divided into works dealing with social theory on a general level and references that are specifically devoted to either the topic of pragmatism or practice theory.
General Social Theory
As can be seen from the sources below, habit-related discussions open windows into diverse areas. A traditional preoccupation of social theorist is the constitution of society and both Giddens 1986 and Berger and Luckmann 1995 are modern classics of this genre. Giddens identifies habits with routines—with actual conduct—rather than with dispositions for action. Berger and Luckmann, in their turn, identify habits based on their ability to compartmentalize the world into typifications. Habit-based social theories usually do not want to erect huge barriers between action and social structures unlike critical realists. Archer 2000 is a critical realist thesis, which reifies action and social structures into different levels of reality. Mauss 1973 is a reminder that habit-related themes have also relevance for anthropology.
Archer, Margaret S. 2000. Being human. The problem of agency. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511488733Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Archer is known as a proponent of critical realism in social theory. She argues that action and social structures are different levels of social reality, as they possess distinct causal powers. For this reason Archer also maintains that the concept of habit is often problematic. This is the case when, for example, pragmatists refer to habits, because they are guilty of central conflation—treating action and social structures as if they were on the same level of social reality.
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Berger, Peter L., and Thomas Luckmann. 1995. The social construction of reality. A treatise in the sociology of knowledge. Harmondsworth. UK: Penguin.
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This book, originally published in 1966, is a classic of social constructionist thinking. It is first and foremost a treatise in the sociology of knowledge and this has the unfortunate effect that in Berger and Luckmann’s hands social theory comes down to sociology of knowledge, which narrows the focus of social theory. They explain that if conscious action is repeated often enough, intentions sink below consciousness and action becomes the usage of habitual typifications.
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Crossley, Nick. 2001. The social body. Habit, identity and desire. London: SAGE.
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Crossley’s book is an effort to argue for the crucial place of the concept of habit for embodied sociology. Placing habits center stage has the advantage that reflexive thought and projects are not dispensed with, while a proper place is shown for them. Crossley offers extensive discussions of the ideas of Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Pierre Bourdieu as remedies for brain-centric reductionism.
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Crossley, Nick. 2007. Researching embodiment by way of “body techniques.” The Sociological Review 55:80–94.
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-954X.2007.00694.xSave Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This article is a discussion of Mauss 1973, an essay on body techniques. Crossley argues that Mauss thematizes embodiment without losing sight of the sociocultural variance of action. Body techniques are not mere movements of the body; according to Crossley, they embody knowledge and understanding and are thus embedded in cultural contexts.
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Giddens, Anthony. 1986. The constitution of society. Outline of the theory of structuration. Cambridge, UK: Polity.
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This famous book by Lord Anthony Giddens argues that there are problems in overemphasizing the role of knowledge and discourse in action. Giddens’ proposal for a way out of this situation is the distinction between discursive and practical consciousness. Some critics have objected that Giddens still operates within a framework where knowledge is the metaphor for consciousness because his notion of practical consciousness is based on actors’ “knowledgeability.”
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Lyng, Stephen, and David D. Franks. 2002. Sociology and the real world. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
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This book presents a forceful argument that after the cultural turn much of sociology has lost its connection with human reality. The authors present a relational view of subjectivity and objectivity. This view postulates a transactional relationship between actors and their environments; both are constitutive of each other rather than being independent entities. Bodily involvement with the world thus sets the limits to processes of social construction.
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Mauss, Marcel. 1973. Techniques of the body. Economy and Society 2:70–88.
DOI: 10.1080/03085147300000003Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
His ideas on gift exchange have cemented Mauss as one of the founding fathers of social anthropology, but Mauss also wrote on body techniques. This essay was originally published in 1935 and it highlights the social nature of our bodily being. Mauss used the concept of habitus, which later became a favorite concept of Pierre Bourdieu.
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Shilling, Chris. 2008. Changing bodies. Habit, crisis and creativity. London: SAGE.
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Shilling argues that habits function as conserving agents: they economize and simplify action, but they also have the potential to reproduce social structures. The author also argues that action consists of three main phases: those of habit, crisis, and creativity. These points are illustrated with various topics ranging from sports to transgenderism.
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Pragmatist Social Theory
The habitual nature of action was a unifying theme of classical pragmatism and a preoccupation with this theme has continued among current pragmatist social theorists. Pragmatists vote for a fallibilist view of action, as Joas and Kilpinen 2006 argue. Pragmatist authors are often interested in action as a process and/or the dialectic between the social environment and selfhood. Often these interests intersect, as Joas 1996, Gronow 2008a, Gronow 2008b, and Gronow 2011 show. Joas 1996 made pragmatism topical in social theory at the end of the 1990s by arguing that pragmatism provides a fruitful theory of creativity, in which concrete action situations are instances of creativity. The selection below is devoted to pragmatist writings explicitly discussing habits and, for example, pragmatist works related to political theory are not included. It is also worthwhile to consult classical writings of pragmatism because these feel—unlike many other classics from the same period—surprisingly up to date (see Classic Works). Heiskala 2003 is an ambitious and complicated attempt to build a synthesis of phenomenology, pragmatism, and structuralism. Gross 2009 shows that pragmatism can contribute to contemporary discussions on social mechanisms.
Baldwin, John D. 1988. The matter of habit and G. H. Mead: Comment on Camic. American Journal of Sociology 93:952–957.
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This very short but interesting piece is a commentary on Charles Camic’s essay (Camic 1986, cited under General Overviews). Baldwin disagrees with Camic who argues that G. H. Mead uses the term habit only to refer to the lower levels of the so-called habit continuum. Pragmatists think of habits also in a broader sense, as bases for complex chains of activity.
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Gronow, Antti. 2008a. The over- or the undersocialized conception of man? Practice theory and the problem of intersubjectivity. Sociology 42:243–259.
DOI: 10.1177/0038038507087352Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This article is a defense of the views of George Herbert Mead. Margaret Archer has criticized Mead for presenting an oversocialized conception of selfhood, as Mead argues that people tend to incorporate the attitudes of others into their habitual reactions. Gronow postulates that there is an interplay between our individual impulses and our social habits rather than selfhood being colonized by the social side of things.
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Gronow, Antti. 2008b. Not by rules or choice alone: A pragmatist critique of institution theories in economics and sociology. Journal of Institutional Economics 4:351–373.
DOI: 10.1017/S1744137408001124Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This piece presents a four-fold distinction between different types of institutional theories and the aspects of institutions that each theory concentrates on. Gronow argues that habitual institutionalism, which is based on the ideas of Thorstein Veblen, is able to steer away from the problems associated with other institutional theories. However, different types of theories still have a place in our theoretical arsenal.
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Gronow, A. 2011. From habits to social structures. Pragmatism and contemporary social theory. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
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This is a collection of previously published articles and a longer introduction, which explains the way in which the classical pragmatist social theory of John Dewey and George Herbert Mead builds on the notion of habit in explaining the reproduction of social structures. The general insight is that more traditional sociological views, which underscore norms or discourse, are too mentalist in the light of what we know about human cognition.
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Gross, Neil. 2009. A pragmatist theory of social mechanisms. American Sociological Review 74:358–379.
DOI: 10.1177/000312240907400302Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
The novelty of Gross’s article is the proposal that social mechanisms should be thought of as chains or aggregations of problem situations and the ensuing effects that come about as a result of the habits actors use in resolving these problems. Thus, the author is building on the pragmatist idea that problematic action situations are crises of action, which can lead to novel responses. However, a reliance on habits is likely also in these cases.
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Heiskala, Risto. 2003. Society as semiosis. Neostructuralist theory of culture and society. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
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This is an ambitious and abstract book which discusses three different sociological analyses of meaning: action theory, phenomenological sociology, and structuralism. It also builds a reconstructive synthesis out of these conceptions, which Heiskala calls neostructuralism. This synthesis marries Saussure with C. S. Peirce’s semiotics. According to Heiskala, a sign has a solid identity insofar as it is habitually interpreted.
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Joas, Hans. 1996. The creativity of action. Cambridge, UK: Polity.
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This book by the German sociologist Hans Joas was originally published in German in 1992 and it is one of the reasons behind the renaissance of pragmatism in social theory. Joas does not make the concept of habit his special focus in explicating pragmatism but he stresses the embeddedness of people in praxis and sociality prior to conscious action.
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Joas, Hans, and Erkki Kilpinen. 2006. Creativity and society. In A companion to pragmatism. Edited by John R. Shook and Joseph Margolis, 323–335. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
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This relatively short piece presents the main ideas of Hans Joas in a concise manner. Erkki Kilpinen adds into the mix his point that it is the concept of habit that unites the whole pragmatist tradition. This is a fallibilist view of human action: reflective monitoring is in the business of supervising action and reconstructing the process if all else fails.
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Kilpinen, Erkki. 2003. Does pragmatism imply institutionalism? Journal of Economic Issues 37:291–304.
DOI: 10.1080/00213624.2003.11506576Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
The article discusses the affinities between pragmatism and institutional economics. A traditional critique of neoclassical economics states that human beings are not separate individuals and thus an exclusive focus on the action of individuals is problematic. Kilpinen goes further and sees human activity not as a sequence of separate actions but as a unified and ongoing process.
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Whitford, Josh. 2002. Pragmatism and the untenable dualism of means and ends: Why rational choice theory does not deserve paradigmatic privilege. Theory and Society 31:325–363.
DOI: 10.1023/A:1016232404279Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This lucid article argues that while sociologists are traditionally critical of rational choice theory, this theory has nevertheless retained its paradigmatic privilege. The criticism presented by sociologists is unsuccessful because it implicitly endorses a so-called portfolio model of the actor. This model assumes that people have a stable and pre-existing set of beliefs and desires that they carry with them from different context to another.
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Practice Theory
An alternative way to enquire into the social features of routine-like action is to conceptualize it as practice. Practice theory takes into account other aspects besides bodily action and is thus more encompassing than most theories of habits. In this lies its strength and weakness, as one often gets the impression that practice theorists discuss very different kinds of phenomena at the same time with one single concept (practice). Below are also works related to Pierre Bourdieu, the famous French sociologist. Bourdieu 1977 operates on a more general level than most representatives of practice theory. Nevertheless, practice was a major concern of his thought throughout his productive career. Bourdieu is discussed in Swartz 1997. However, not all practice theory comes down to Bourdieusian thinking, as Reckwitz 2002 and Shove, et al. 2012 show.
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1977. Outline of a theory of practice. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.
DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511812507Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Pierre Bourdieu made famous the notion of habitus, which refers to dispositions as the subjective side of social positions. These dispositions are unconscious ways of acting and evaluating and thus the notion of habitus comes close to the idea of habits. However, “habit” refers to a general action-theoretical conception, whereas “habitus” is meant to capture one’s status position within socioeconomic structures. In this (relatively difficult) book, Bourdieu set the agenda for social practice theory.
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Reckwitz, Andrew. 2002. Toward a theory of social practices. A development in culturalist theorizing. European Journal of Social Theory 5:243–263.
DOI: 10.1177/13684310222225432Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This article is often referred to in discussions about practice theory. It positions the contours of practice theory within cultural theory. Reckwitz contrasts practice theory with views that locate culture either in people’s minds (mentalism), symbols (textualism), or interaction (intersubjectivism). Reckwitz sees bodily routines as one of the bases of practices.
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Shove, Elizabeth, Mika Pantzar, and Matt Watson. 2012. The dynamics of social practice. Everyday life and how it changes. Los Angeles: SAGE.
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This relatively slim but engaging volume argues that practices consist of interdependencies between three kinds of elements: materials, competences, and meanings. A material object gives rise to a practice insofar as someone has the skill to use it and to infuse it with symbolic meanings. If the links between these elements break down, the practice in question will not be the same either.
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Swartz, David. 1997. Culture and power. The sociology of Pierre Bourdieu. Chicago and London: Univ. of Chicago Press.
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There are many introductions into the thinking of Pierre Bourdieu whose own writings are sometimes a bit difficult to decipher. Swartz presents a general overview, which includes a chapter on the concept of habitus. Swartz shows how Bourdieu starts with a view heavily influenced by structuralism but eventually moves on to a notion of habitus, which underscores strategies, practices and dispositions.
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Sweetman, Paul. 2003. Twenty-first century dis-ease? Habitual reflexivity or the reflexive habitus. Sociological Review 51.4: 528–549.
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-954X.2003.00434.xSave Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This article mainly engages with Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of habitus. It argues that it is possible to develop a reflexive habitus in which a reflective stance toward one’s identity becomes habitual. This may seem paradoxical, as reflection and habits are often thought of as antithetical to each other. It is no wonder then that Margaret Archer, for example, has been critical of this thesis.
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Turner, Stephen. 1994. The social theory of practices. Tradition, tacit knowledge, and presuppositions. Cambridge, UK: Univ. of Chicago Press.
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This book is one the most well-known discussions of practice theory. Turner claims that a common problem with practice theories is that they do not explain how practices are shared. This same critique could be made in relation to theories of habits if habits are a property of individual psychology. However, this becomes a problem only if practices are seen as possessions of individuals.
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Empirically Oriented Social Science
A striking feature of literature on habits in social science is that for the most part empirical research is lacking. Indeed, all of the texts referred to below are theoretical in nature. However, this literature applies the concept of habit into specific subject matters and is for this reason called empirically oriented. Habit-related work in social science tends to see man as fundamentally social in nature, although habits are traditionally taken to refer to individual psychology. While no one would probably dispute the psychological basis of habits, the fact that habits are a way of incorporating features of the environment into the dispositions of individuals indicates that action is social at its very core. The bodily and corporeal aspects of sociality are accordingly manifested in habits. Margolis 1993 shows that habits of mind are building blocks of scientific paradigms, whereas Hodgson 1997 and Hodgson 2004 argue for the relevance of the idea of habits for (institutional) economics. Many organizational researches have also taken into the idea, as Feldman and Pentland 2003 and Scott 2008 witness.
Bentley, Arthur F. 1995. The process of government. A study of social pressures. New Brunswick, NJ, and London: Transaction.
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Originally published in 1908, Bentley’s book is a semi-classic in political science and the concept of habit figures in his understanding of action as processual. This view, which draws on pragmatism, argues that rather than seeking explanantia for action, political and social science in general should analyze action in its own right. Social structures are not the separate and independent outcomes of action because both are merely two sides of the same coin.
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Feldman, Martha S., and Brian T. Pentland. 2003. Reconceptualizing organizational routines as a source of flexibility and change. Administrative Science Quarterly 48:94–118.
DOI: 10.2307/3556620Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
An examination of the way in which routines have been identified at the level of organizations. Organizational routines are often treated akin to individual habits. In the authors’ view, such treatment omits considerations of agency and the flexibility of action. The authors feel that more attention should be paid to the performative and improvisational aspects of organizational routines.
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Franks, David D. 2010. Neurosociology. The nexus between neuroscience and social psychology. New York: Springer.
DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4419-5531-9Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
The book presents a perhaps surprising attempt to build sociology on the foundations of neuroscience. Franks argues that current neuroscience vindicates classical pragmatist views on the primacy of action and its habitual character. In addition, neuroscience—the role of mirror neurons—highlights the social nature of selfhood.
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Hodgson, Geoffry M. 1997. The ubiquity of habits and rules. Cambridge Journal of Economics 21:663–684.
DOI: 10.1093/oxfordjournals.cje.a013692Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
Hodgson is known as a spokesperson for institutional economics. This article shows that even though economics is a science of decision-making, economists have ignored the actual processes that make decision-making possible. According to Hodgson, habits and rules are advantageous because they help agents to decide, learn, and act.
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Hodgson, Geoffry M. 2004. Reclaiming habit for institutional economics. Journal of Economic Psychology 25:651–660.
DOI: 10.1016/j.joep.2003.03.001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
This article by the institutional economist Geoffrey Hodgson presents a discussion of the nature of institutions and their relationship with habits. Institutions are established and prevalent social rules that structure social interactions. They are, however, based on habits. Hodgson finds that early pragmatist thought can be used as a guide in thinking of habits.
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Hodgson, Geoffrey M., and Thorbjorn Knudsen. 2006. Why we need a generalized Darwinism, and why generalized Darwinism is not enough. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 61.1: 1–19.
DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2005.01.004Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
According to the authors, biological and social evolution share the same general principles of variation, selection, and heredity. Institutions are “inherited” by learning the habits that sustain the institutions in question. However, critics might point out that biological evolution entails descent from a common ancestor, which is not always the case with the “inheriting” of habits.
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Margolis, Howard. 1993. Paradigms and barriers. How habits of mind govern scientific beliefs. Chicago and London: Univ. Of Chicago Press.
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This book presents a case that habits of mind are the essential constituents of scientific paradigms. The argument is that habits of mind tie people together into communities, which follow certain paradigms. Changes in the latter are also changes in habits of mind.
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Scott, W. Richard. 2008. Institutions and organizations. Ideas, interests and identities. 4th ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
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Scott is the grey eminence of organization theory in social sciences and this book presents his main ideas concerning organizations and also institutions. Scott argues that institutions are often embodied in habitualized routines. Habits are related to the cultural-cognitive aspects or pillars of institutions but institutions also have to do with regulations (e.g., laws, rules) and norms (propriety).
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Popular Science
The concept of habit is relatively common in popular discussions. It is also likely to encounter similar kinds of ideas to habituation without explicit references to the concept itself. For example, Malcolm Gladwell’s journalistic books have recently been in vogue and he argues, for example, that industrious practice is a, if not the, major reason for success in any walk of life. It should come as no surprise that popular science has paid attention to bodily practice and unconscious thought since both are important themes in current psychology and modern cognitive science. Claxton 2005 shows that the history of thought on unconsciousness can be written in an entertaining manner. Wansink 2006 is an example of science-based literature, which focuses on a particular mundane practice—eating—while presenting a case that we are hardly aware of the environmental cues guiding our behavior. Duhigg 2012 is probably the most popular of science books explicitly focusing on the effects of habits but Dean 2013 is just as interesting and readable.
Claxton, Guy. 2005. The wayward mind. An intimate history of the unconscious. London: Abacus.
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This is an illuminating book on the history of thought on the unconscious. The book also discusses findings of recent brain sciences, which reveal the essential role of sensomotoric proclivities in cognition. The concept of habit rarely features in this book but the author nevertheless underscores the surprisingly relevant nature of the ideas of Willian James concerning the habituality of cognition.
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Dean, Jeremy. 2013. Making habits, breaking habits. Why we do things, why we don’t, and how to make any change stick. Boston: Da Capo.
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Another entertaining popular discussion, which challenges the notion that habits flow from our intentions. It often happens that people infer their intentions from their habits. Intentions are poor predictors of action especially in the case of strong habits. Paradoxically people are most confident that a strong relationship between their intentions and behavior outcomes exists in these cases.
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Duhigg, Charles. 2012. The power of habit. Why we do what we do in life and business. New York: Random House.
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This book is an international bestseller and it explains the formation of habits through a habit loop: a cue in the environment of action eventually elicits a routine, which anticipates the reward associated with the cue. The book contains entertaining stories about people—marketers, CEOs etc.—who have been able to transform their habits which has led to productive results.
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Wansink, Brian. 2006. Mindless eating. Why we eat more than we think. London: Hay House.
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Although this book is not a popular thesis on the power of habits, it shows how much eating is guided by context-dependent cues. The lesson to be learned from this book is that eating is rarely based on conscious thinking and thus changing one’s eating patterns is more about changing the context rather than ones’ thinking.
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