Impact of habit forming

application on society

Michal Muller
University College of Northern Denmark
INDUCTION VS DEDUCTION
● Induction moves from specific facts to a general conclusion.
● Deduction begin with general premises and move to a specific conclusion.

DON’T FORGET FOR THE PAPER TO BE:

● Relevant (always remember if the topic or section you are talking about is
still relevant to the overall research article).
● Support (when you claim something, don’t forget to support your
arguments by evidence).
● Logical order (have a logical order for the overall paper, don’t jump from
one topic to another, have a flow and connection between them).

Thesis (Title)
● Between 8-12 words
● Consider thesis as a conclusion in title-like format.
● What are the key elements for creation of habit-forming application and
how can it be utilized in day-to-day human-computer interaction
● express your opinion, be clear and direct.
Abstract
State that it is review article not research article and what it means.
Focus what is the papers objective. Be specific in setting in measures, results…
and give the conclusion at the end.

Here is going to be brief summary of the paper. Around 300 words is fine
● Abstract will be written after the article as a whole in one paragraph
● Overall purpose of the research
● Mention few sentences to provide a general picture of the methodological
approach
● summary results, observations, trends must be included to make the
abstract useful
● Write objectives in PRESENT TENSE, materials, methods and outcomes in
PAST TENSE and conclusion in PRESENT TENSE

Nir Eyal (2014) is his book “Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products”
describes the principles behind the products which “hook” people and make
them come back. These principles are very core fundamentals of many social
networking sites. Line between regular, and “addictive” use of social networking
sites is very thin. And studies has shown that obsessive use of social networking
sites has adverse effect on life. Analyzing the hook model allow individuals the see
the “hook pattern” in particular sites. Further understanding of people’s own
behaviour might reveal whether or not their use of such sites might be labelled as
“addictive”. However, it is only up to each individual to decide.
Introduction
State how I plan to approach your topic.
● By following research and analysis made on this topics.
● By showing data and analyzing data on internet and social media usage.
● By showing current trends and timeline where it was few years ago and
where are we heading with the current pace.
MANY CITATIONS
Write in present tense only the description and results of my methods in the past
tense

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Introduction
As the World Wide Web (hereafter WWW) was introduced to the public in early
Nineties, so begun the information revolution. Main function of WWW at its early
stage was information transfer. People could access available information via the
internet. According to Can and Kaya (2016) WWW “was used mostly to send
information to relatively passive readers, in a similar manner in with which
newspapers and books were made popular” (Can and Kaya, 2016).

As technology evolved, WWW started to implement interactive features within

the websites. It enabled anybody to participate on the content creation. This
emerge is commonly called as Web 2.0 (O’Reilly, 2006).

Web 2.0 introduced a new form of communication referred to as social

networking (Raymer, 2015). Social networking sites (hereafter SNS) grew on
popularity and became an integral part of people’s lives (Gerhart, 2017). SNS has
been associated with positives attributes such as entertainment, cognitive skill
development, business facilitation and social interaction (Andreassen et al., 2016).
However, the excessive and compulsive usage has raised a speculation about
“addictive use” of such technologies. As Gerhart (2017) depicts: “Like most
technology, SNSs were developed to help solve a problem, such as
communicating with others,which has turned into a negative for some IS clients”

Addictive use is characterized as: “being overly concerned about online activities,
driven by an uncontrollable motivation to perform the behavior, and devoting so
much time and effort to it that it impairs other important life areas” (Andreassen
& Pallesen, 2014, p. 4054). Using Information Systems (hereafter IS) such as
facebook, instagram, youtube, may seem harmless at first, but its obsessive use
can have rather adverse effect on individual lives as well as on society. Chamath
Palihapitiya (2017), former VP of Facebook stated: ”I think we have created tools
that are ripping apart the social fabric of how society works. The short-term,
dopamine-driven feedback loops we’ve created are destroying how society
works.” Sean Parker (2017), who played major role in creation of Facebook said
”Facebook literally changes your relationship with society, with each other. The
thought process that went into building these applications, Facebook being the
first of them, … was all about: ‘How do we consume as much of your time and
conscious attention as possible?’ And that means that we need to sort of give
you a little dopamine hit every once in a while, because someone liked or
commented on a photo or a post or whatever. And that’s going to get you to
contribute more content, and that’s going to get you … more likes and
comments.” “It’s a social-validation feedback loop … exactly the kind of thing that
a hacker like myself would come up with, because you’re exploiting a
vulnerability in human psychology.”
Many studies has shown that addictive use of SNS is strongly associated with
feeling of loneliness, low self-esteem, episodes of jealousy, depression & social
anxiety (McAndrew & Jeong, 2012; Chen & Lee, 2013; Raymer, 2015; Andreassen et
al., 2016; Donnelly, 2017; van Rooij et al., 2017). Hence the importance of this topic
cannot be stressed enough and needs to be addressed.

Nir Eyal, author of “Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products” proposed

pattern which describes the design behind the most successful SNS. The author
calls it the “HOOK MODEL”.

(Hook, 2012)

Aim of this paper is to analyze the hook, and model raise awareness about
obsessive or “addictive” SNS use. By understanding the principles of
habit-forming products which are highly and effectively utilized by Social
networking sites. Thus Individuals might be able to reveal the pattern why a
particular SNS compel them and observe their own behaviors when it comes to
use of a particular SNS.
Research Methodology
It is necessary to acknowledge that this paper is established on literature review
and no form of data research and analysis has been done within. Paper is
anchored in the work of Nir Eyal and backed by data results from appropriate
studies relevant to topics on habit-formation and social networking sites
addiction.

Reasons and criteria for the sources were: focus on peer-reviewed articles, focus
on research articles which has been published within five years. Comparing
results from various studies before making any conclusion. Not being biased.
RESEARCH
Habits
Before talking about the architecture behind habit-forming product, essential
term to understand is the word “habit”. Cognitive psychologists define habits as
“automatic behaviors triggered by situational cues”. Nir Eyal defines it as:
“things we do with little or no conscious thought” (Eyal and Hoover, 2014 pp. 1).

Creating habitual use of specific product or a service influences user behavior.

Eyal (2014) says: “The Aim is to influence customers to use your product on their
own, again and again, without relying on overt calls to action such as ads or
promotions.

Hook model proposed by Eyal (2014) is constructed out of 4 steps- trigger, action,
variable reward, and investment. World’s most popular sites like Facebook,
Youtube, Twitter, Instagram (Alexa.com, 2018) are all successfully utilizing the
principles from the hook model to their benefit.

HOOK MODEL
Trigger
“Habits are learned behavioral responses to situational cues that have become
established, in the behaviorist tradition” (N. and Hull, 1943).These contextual or
situational cues, called triggers, precedes the habitual action. Hence, Triggers are
the starting point in the hook model.

Wood and Rünger (2016) interpret relation between cue and habit as following: “A
variety of cues might trigger habit performance, including aspects of physical
environments, other people, and preceding actions in a sequence. Once habits
form, perception of the relevant context cues automatically activates the mental
representation of the habitual response”.Triggers comes in two types- external
and internal.

External Trigger
“External triggers tell the users what to do next by placing information within the
user’s environment”(Eyal and Hoover, 2014, pp. 57).External triggers directly tells
user what to do. It could done through an advertisement, notification icon, call to
action button, or simply by word of mouth.

As Eyal (2014) outlines: “ultimate goal of all external triggers is to propel users into
and through the hook model”. He further states, that successive cycles of the
hook model leads to creation of internal triggers, with external triggers
subsequently becoming obsolete. Objective here is to move from external triggers
to internal ones

Internal Trigger
Internal trigger is leveraged when: “product becomes tightly coupled with a
thought, an emotion, or preexisting routine”(Eyal and Hoover, 2014, pp. 47).
Internal trigger guides user to a specific action through associations in his/her
memory. These triggers are not formed overnight, but takes weeks or months to
form. Nonetheless, products bound with user’s mental state …….

Negative emotions can play a huge role as an internal triggers. When

experiencing feeling of loneliness, one tends to associate these feeling with
opening facebook. Similarly feeling of boredom goes alongside with opening sites
such as pinterest, youtube or instagram. And even the use of google can be linked
to the feelings of ignorance or uncertainty. As an example, identifying the last
time we could not remembered of something and turned to google for an answer
will reveal how internal triggers are connected to our own behaviour. Therefore,
internal triggers are fundamental for habit creation and could be think of as call
to action. ”There is consensus that habits are acquired through incremental
strengthening of the association between a situation cue and an action”(Lally et al.,
2009).
Action
Eyal (2014) states: “Action is paramount to to habit formation”.
Dr. B. J. Fogg proposed a formula for any and all behavior to occur: “The user must
have sufficient motivation; the user must have the ability to complete the desired
action; and a trigger must be present to activate the behavior.”

Motivation
Motivation could be understood as “reasons or goals that give rise to an action”
(Ryan and Deci, 2000).Motivation is the drive behind particular action. Fogg argues
there are three core factors connected to motivation. “Humans are motivated to
seek pleasure and avoid pain; to seek hope and avoid fear; and finally, to seek
social acceptance and avoid rejection” (Eyal and Hoover, 2014, pp. 63).

Ability
Ability is one’s capacity to perform a particular action. The end goal for the
products is to be as easy to use as possible. Aim is focused on simplicity - involving
little time, little of mental and physical effort the greater chance to complete an
action. It is implied that complex behaviours resolve into lower chance of
automaticity than a simple behaviours (Verplanken, 2006).According to Can and
Kaya (2016) “perceived ease of use have a significant effect on habits”. Actions
simple as clicking or scrolling could be considered as very powerful habit-forming
components for a product to utilize.
Variable Reward
Variable reward is the third step in the hook model and comes right after the
actions. When we talk about reward, it could be referred to the part of our brain
called nucleus accumbens. Research suggests that this part of our brain is
becoming most active in anticipation and calms when the reward is
obtained(Knutson et al., 2001). This anticipation creates a desire, as Eyal (2014)
defines it: “It is the itch, we seek to scratch”.

Variability
Humans have incredible ability for pattern recognition and its translation into
concrete ideas. Kurzweil (2013) suggests that the human brain is “recursive
probabilistic fractal” and further argues that intelligence is closely tight to the
pattern recognition abilities and its storage in a memory.
That is why Eyal (2014) argues that variability is an significant factor in a
connection to the rewards, he states: “Once we figure out what will happen next,
we become less excited by the experience. To hold our attention, product must
have an ongoing degree of novelty ”(Eyal and Hoover, 2014, pp. 98). Intention is to
create an infinite variability, for “finite variability becomes predictable and lose
their interest over time” (Eyal and Hoover, 2014, pp. 132).

Eyal (2014) proposes that variable rewards come in three types: the tribe, the hunt,
the self.

Reward of the tribe

Reward of the tribe are social rewards, “fueled by connectedness with other
people” (Eyal and Hoover, 2014,pp. 131). These rewards are built on gratification
from others, they make people feel recognized and accepted.

Reward of the hunt

“Search for material resources, goods, money and information” defines the
rewards of the hunt(Eyal and Hoover, 2014, pp. 132) . Good example for it would be
sites like pinterest and instagram, or the “feed” in twitter and facebook. User
keeps on scrolling until finding the relevant or desired content. This content is
both mundane and exciting, it is the variability that appeals to the user and
creates unpredictable user experience. As Eyal (2014) said: “the unknown is
fascinating”.

Reward of the self

Human seek these rewards for “personal form of gratification (Eyal and Hoover,
2014, pp. 111). Reward of self relates to the master, completion, competency, or
consistency (Eyal and Hoover, 2014,). Rewards of self are defining component in
video games. A business should strive for the right utilization of gamification
elements that is suitable within an application.
Investment
Investment is the last phase through the hook model. “The investment occurs
when the user puts something into the product of service such as time, data,
effort, social capital, or money”(Nir Eyal, 2014, pp. 10).

In a 2011 study, Dan ariely, Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Economics,

proved how irrationally people value they own labor. Ariely names the IKEA effect,
a cognitive bias in which people place higher value on products they partially
made (Ariely, 2014). “The more users invest time and effort into a product or a
service, the more they value it“(Eyal and Hoover, 2014, pp. 136). Eyal (2014) further
proposes, that the products people invested their time in, are hard to leave
behind or dispose.

Stored Value
Unlike physical goods, which depreciates and loses their value over time,
habit-forming products should do the opposite, because of the principle of stored
value.(Eyal and Hoover, 2014). The more content and data user put into a given
service, the better the product becomes. UK mathematician, Clive Humby (2006)
coined the term “data is the new oil”. Humby elaborates: It’s valuable, but if
unrefined it cannot really be used. It has to be changed into gas, plastic, chemicals,
etc to create a valuable entity that drives profitable activity; so must data be broken
down, analyzed for it to have value.”

Automaticity through Repetition

Going only once through the hook model, will not make people to create a
successful habits. The key is repetition of a particular behavior until it becomes a
second nature. Wendy Wood (2017) in her latest publication describes habits as:
“implicit associations between contexts and responses that develop through
repeated reward learning”.

Studies indicates that habit formation takes anywhere from 15 days to 254 days
(Lally et al., 2009). “With each repetition, small changes occur in the cognitive and
neural mechanisms associated with procedural memory”(Wood and Rünger, 2016).

“Repetition of a behaviour in a consistent context progressively increases the

automaticity with which the behaviour is performed when the situation is
encountered” (Lally et al., 2010). “Once habits form, perception of the relevant
context cues automatically activates the mental representation of the habitual
response”(Wood and Rünger, 2016).
Digital age
We live in a digital age. Already more than half of the population is connected via
the internet. Global Digital Reports 2018(We Are Social UK, 2018) portrays the data in
understandable infographics.

(We Are Social UK, 2018)

Technology is often assumed to improve the quality of life since it became

ubiquitous (Gerhart, 2017). And research indicates that life satisfaction increased,
since people first adopt the internet(Lissitsa & Chachashvili-Bolotin, 2016).
Nonetheless, as Jerome K. Jerome wrote, “everything has its drawbacks”.

Internet Addiction
As early as 1990, mainstream media coined the term “online addicts”, which has
later turn into the phenomenon known as internet addiction. There is no widely
accepted definition of Internet addiction(Starcevic and Aboujaoude, 2016). Therefore
various term have been proposed such as “pathological Internet use, problematic
internet use, and compulsive internet use” (Starcevic and Aboujaoude, 2016).
Data indicates that “the internet is capturing more and more of our time each day
– with total hours spent online via PCs, laptops, mobiles and tablets growing from
5 ½ hours in 2012 to 6 ½ in 2016” (Mander, 2018).
Problematic, pathological or addictive use of internet might seem somewhat
ambiguous and unclear. Internet serves only as a medium, question then arises as
what it is that individuals become addicted to. “There have long been indications
that those with problems controlling their Internet use manifest those problems
in relation to specific applications”(van Rooij et al., 2017). Such as Social Networking
applications.
Addictive Use of Social Networking Sites
As the term SNS addiction has not been clearly defined and researched enough
across disciplines and has no established classification criteria (Vaghefi &
Lapointe, 2014; Kuss and Griffiths, 2017), it will be referred to as an “addictive use”.

Study evidence suggests that “addictive use” of SNS may have a potential mental
health problem for some users (Kuss and Griffiths, 2011) and is strongly associated
with feeling of loneliness, low self-esteem, episodes of jealousy, depression &
social anxiety (McAndrew & Jeong, 2012; Chen & Lee, 2013; Raymer, 2015;
Andreassen et al., 2016; Donnelly, 2017; van Rooij et al., 2017).

Millennials
Specific demographic factor that tend to increase the risk of SNS “addictive use” is
young age(e.g., Andreassen, 2015; Kuss et al., 2014; van Deursen et al., 2015). Survey
among 231 emerging adults (age 18–25) showed that Facebook use was related to
a greater degree of negative social comparison, which was in turn related
negatively to self-perceived social competence and physical attractiveness(de Vries
and Kühne, 2015). From the statistics is visible that Millennials, in the age of 18-32,
doubled the time spent on their mobile device in five years.

Latest data result from Global Web Index shows that “ the average internet user is
now on social media and messaging services for over 2 hours per day.” (Mander,
2018). Research further indicates that the reason for it is the emergence of
multi-networking. Average number of social media accounts per internet user has
doubled in 4 years, making it average of 7.6 social media accounts (Statista, 2018).
SNS users are not only spending more time but research suggests that “use of
multiple SM platforms is associated with symptoms of depression and anxiety”
(Primack et al., 2017).
Facebook, since its launch as an online community for Harvard students, has
established its supremacy as the world’s most popular SNS.

(Statista, 2018)
There are over 2.13 billion monthly active Facebook users for Q4 2017.
“Membership has been steadily increasing by 17%- 20% annually”(Kuss and
Griffiths, 2017).

(Statista, 2018)

Statistics below demonstrates a rise of Instagram through its active users.

(Statista, 2018)
The SNS growth is detectable in every aspect. Whether it is the number of active
users, or the daily time spent online. There is no doubt that SNS has exploited the
core essence of the hook model. However the behaviour that some of the sns
users resemble cannot be longer understood as a habitual, but rather addictive.
People were granted constant access to SNS through their smartphones.

Year-long study, in which users who did not own smartphone were given
instrumented iPhone, has disclosed and addictive use of a the device for more
than half of the participants(Tossel et al., 2018).Tossel (2018) states: Mail, Messaging,
Facebook and the Web drove this use”.Many studies suggest addictive use of
smartphone has direct correlation of pathological symptoms such as anxiety,
depression and stress (Kuss et al., 2018; Chen et al., 2017; Samaha and Hawi, 2016)

People are so dependent on their mobile devices, that gave birth to the
phenomenon called Nomophobia which is defined as “fear of being without one’s
mobile phone“(Kuss and Griffiths, 2017). Another phenomenon known as FOMO,
an abbreviation for fear of missing out, is related to excessive checking and
obsessive use of a device which could lead to SNS addiction in some individuals.
(Andreassen et al., 2016; (Lee, Cheng et al., 2014).

Instant Gratification
The uses and gratifications theory (U&G) targets people's aspiration for use of
mass communication and media.Modern technology is heavily build on Uses and
gratification theory. Results from 2013 study exhibits ten uses and gratifications:
“social interaction, information seeking, pass time, entertainment, relaxation,
communicatory utility, convenience utility, expression of opinion, information sharing,
and surveillance/knowledge about others”(Whiting and Williams, 2013). Of course,
different gratifications can be sought and obtained from different platform.
Today, we live in a time of instant gratification, experience of satisfaction or
pleasure without a delay.

Instant gratification is greatly interconnected with social media & online

shopping((Chung and Austria, 2012)). Many studies has shown, that instant
gratification activates part of human brain responsible for emotional decisions
that whereas delay of gratification is influenced by rational decision-making
processes (Kidd, Palmeri and Aslin, 2013; Halfmann and Barry, 2016, Cheng, Shein and Chiou,
2011). Millennials, as heavy user of sns and technology in general, are especially in
danger, they are growing up with a sense of impatience, getting dopamine hits in
a form of an instant gratification ((Sinek, 2016)). This could lead to desensitization of
dopamine receptors in central nervous system and make activities which aren’t
instantly gratified very hard to do.
Discussion
Vulnerability in human psychology
“Beliefs come first; explanations for beliefs follow” (Shermer, 2011). Shermer(2011)
further states: “Once we form beliefs and make commitments to them, we
maintain and reinforce them through a number of powerful cognitive biases that
distort our percepts to fit belief concepts.” (Shermer, 2011). All people are
biased(Pronin, 2007),. Pronin (2007) says: “Accumulating research shows that people
recognize the existence, and the impact, of many of the biases that affect human
judgment and inference. However, they seem to lack recognition of the role that
these same biases have in shaping their own judgments and inferences.”

For some it could be far-fetched, however addictive use of SNS could compromise
our own free will. Free will is a describe as “an ability to choose between
alternative courses of action” (Racine, Sattler and Escande, 2017). Nonetheless In the
context of addiction this definition will not longer apply. Levy (2013) implies: “free
will has been an object of debate and scrutiny, since addiction could compromise
an individual’s ability to choose freely.”

As the psychology and strategies behind social media advance and keep making
it more and more seductive, we can expect addictive use of SNS only to
aggravate. “It has been claimed that social networking taps into very fundamental
human needs by offering the possibilities of social support and self-expression“
(Kuss and Griffiths, 2017).

Dependence on technology and its constant use could prompt to the decay of
social skills.“Individuals have come to be described as “alone together”: always
connected via technology, but in fact isolated” (Kuss and Griffiths, 2017).
Conclusion
Studies has shown that use of SNS can become addictive and have negative
effect on live. Vital remark is that most of the studies considering addictive use of
SNS calculates the average from the data. Thus the use of SNS and its impact on
one’s life is highly individual and might vary.

As the research suggests, there is a “fine line between frequent non-problematic

habitual use and problematic and possibly addictive use of SNSs” (Kuss and
Griffiths, 2017). Observing and deconstructing our own behavior while using social
networking sites will reveal whether or not addictive use of SNS is something to
consider.Hereby, determining there is a problem is the first step of dealing with
any addiction (Aa.org, 2018). Eyal (2014) claims that people themselves needs to
figure out which of the habit-forming products “serve us and which hurt us”.

There is no doubt that creation of habit-forming products can be done with both,
favorable, and malicious intentions. However understanding of the underlying
principles behind the hook model allows people to build product from which can
society benefit, and stay away from the ones which has destructive effect.
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RANDOM SECTIONS
“perceptions about reality are dependent on the beliefs that we hold about it”
(Shermer, 2011).

Biases and heuristics

Biases (Shermer, 2011)
anchoring bias. Relying too heavily on one reference anchor or piece of
information when making decisions.
authority bias. Valuing the opinions of an authority, especially in the evaluation of
something we know little about.
belief bias. Evaluating the strength of an argument based on the believability of
its conclusion.
confirmation bias. Seeking and finding confirming evidence in support of already
existing

Addiction on SNS.
One way of gauging the impact is by assessing quality of life

Flossing experiment
An exploratory study of the psychological determinants of habit formation
illustrates that placing a behaviour within an existing routines might influence the
probability of a new habit formation (Judah, Gardner and Aunger, 2012).
As an instance, opening web browser can trigger an automatic response to check
out facebook. This way a new habit can be formed and triggered every time a web
browser is open.

Addictive use of SNS was positively related with being female and single, lower
age, ADHD, OCD, anxiety and lower levels of depression (Andreassen et al., 2016),

Consumers VS Creators and Influencers

Give an example in social media sites. One person can be only the consumer of
the content whereas on the other side sits the content creator… who is having
greater benefit of using social media platforms.

HABITS - REWRITE
According to Wood, there are three main principles to consider when effectively changing
habitual behavior.

First, you must derail existing habits and create a window of opportunity to act on new intentions.
When the cues for existing habits are removed, it's easier to form a new behavior.

Lastly, there must be stable context cues available in order to trigger a new pattern. "It's easier to
maintain the behavior if it's repeated in a specific context," Wood emphasizes. Having an initial
cue is a crucial component.

HABITS
Study or cigarette smoking showed that attentional bias was positively correlated
with habitual automaticity.(Orbell and Verplanken, 2010)

TRIGGER
A variety of cues might trigger habit performance, including aspects of physical
environments, other people, and preceding actions in a sequence.(Wood and Rünger,
2016).

Dopamine oxytocin serotonin - what it has to do with it

Dopamine - responsible for wanting and therefore liking, study where chemical
compound was used to destroy dopamine neurons in rats brain show it destroyed
Dopamine is not about pleasure it is about anticipation of pleasure (robert
Sapolsky talk on fora.tv )