Behavioral and Social/Cognitive Approaches to Forming Habits Paper
By: LaTreena Alexander
PSY/250
December 13, 2014
John Muench

The information being presented analyzing a habit, how it was developed, if there were role models for this habit, and which people influence the adoption of this habit. The author explains why the habit has continued, and if there has ever been a time when the habit was attempted to be broken. This paper explains why this habit is here, and why the habit was formed. A plan is developed to change this habit and is clearly explained in detail, and between behavioral and social/cognitive theories the author describes which one explains his or her personality. A habit that was developed deals with smoking, and it has been going on throughout my entire family for several years. The habit was developed because of older siblings smoking and inviting the younger sibling to join in the smoking festivities. The role models for this bad habit that formed over these years were two male teenagers who had the responsibility of babysitting there younger sister while the mom was at work for several hours a day and night. The habit was adopted because the older male siblings use to blow smoke in the younger female sibling’s face starting at the age of 3 years old. They were young teenagers who liked to hang out with their friends, smoke, and blow it in her face in order to get their sister to fall asleep. The two brothers were young teenagers who learned the bad habit of smoking from their father who condoned it, and let their friends come over to his house and they all smoked together. The influence of their father made the two brothers think it was okay to introduce this bad habit to their younger sister. The bad smoking habit was continued throughout the younger sibling’s life because she had gotten use to smoking, and every morning before she went to school her brothers would smoke with her and she grew accustomed to the smoking habit after years of smoking. She knew that smoking was bad and it could affect her health in several different ways, but it was already implemented in her life and in her body that she did not see a reason to stop smoking. She ended up going to high school and it seemed like all her friends and peers were smoking, and if you were not smoking something were wrong with that person. All the popular kids at school were smokers and it was the thing to be doing at that time because it meant you were cool and hip with the crowd who was smoking. It gave the young girl a sense of belonging and fitting in with the other kids that were smoking. There has been four times in her life when the smoking habit was stopped, and she stuck with the broken habit each time. The first time she was a teenager in high school, and she had got put on probation for running away from home. The condition of her probation was mandatory testing, and she did not have any type of choice but to stop the bad habit or pay the consequences. The next three times that her habit was stopped happened when she became an adult, and started to have children. Any new mother wants to make sure her children have the best care while in the womb, and she wants to ensure a healthy child is being born. The first pregnancy happened when she was at the age of twenty, and as soon as she found out she was pregnant the bad smoking habit ended. Once the baby was born she did not have milk formed in her breast, and the doctor told her that he could prescribe pills to help the milk come out but she did not want to take pills because she thought it could affect her baby. The habit was formed again once she found out she did not have breast milk to feed the baby. The second pregnancy happened about two and a half years later, and when she found out she was pregnant with her next child she immediately stopped smoking. Once she had the baby there was not any milk in her breast again so she picked up the bad habit of smoking again and continued it throughout the years until her next pregnancy. This pregnancy happened five years later, and as soon as she found out about the wonderful news regarding the pregnancy she quit smoking again until the baby was born. It seems like every time she ends up pregnant the bad habit of smoking stops immediately, but it gets picked back up once the baby is born and some time has passed by. The bad habit has been an ongoing situation for her to deal with for over the pass thirty years, and she still smokes to this very day, but does want to quit because the damage it can cause to her body. She does realize that this is a major habit that has been formed in her life but it was brought on by her siblings and further lead on by her peers throughout high school. She does know that she is capable of stopping the bad habit, but she feels that there has to be a stipulation or regulation that stops this habit. She feels that her habit cannot be broken on her own accord, but she does know that it is becoming a major problem in her life. The habit is here because she has not done anything to get help, or she has not put her mind over the matter and stopped the bad smoking habit on her own. The habit was formed because of the behavior of her older brothers blowing the smoke in her face as a young child, and continuing to smoke with her throughout her teenage and adult life. Since she has become an adult with three children her responsibilities are with them and not with smoking. She tries to develop a plan to quit smoking through her local hospital that provides classes and materials to help her quit the bad smoking habit. She also has implemented a class for smokers anonymous to help her with this bad habit. Each implementation in her life has focus groups twice a week that meet regularly and discuss the bad habits formed. The personality she has is formed through behavioral and social theories because this habit was learned through the behavioral of her older siblings. The social theory describes her personality because as she went to high school her peers were smoking and this was her social group who she was around daily. In conclusion the information describes how the bad habit of smoking was introduced and formed in her life, and it also explains who the influences were that brought on this habit. The paper describes why this smoking habit was continued throughout her life, and when there was a point in time where the bad habit was broken. The author describes a plan that was developed to change this habit and is clearly explained in detail. This paper describes the behavioral and social cognitive theories that describes her personality.