Naturally disengaging control to reveal habits

Naturally disengaging control to reveal habits | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Article Naturally disengaging control to reveal habits Sarah Oh, Anne Collins This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-5773028/v2 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 2 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Show more versions Abstract Habits are an essential part of everyday decision-making, yet the mechanisms underlying human habit formation and expression are difficult to study in laboratory settings, where participants typically engage strong goal-directed (GD) control that can mask habitual tendencies. Recent approaches have successfully elicited habits in long experiments by limiting the amount of GD control participants can exert (e.g., through forced response times). We extend this approach by designing a short behavioral paradigm that aims to induce and reveal habits without extrinsically limiting GD control, instead incorporating task features that we hypothesized would encourage participants to spontaneously relax GD control: a hierarchical multi-step trial structure, opportunities for self-correction, and frequent switches between extensively and minimally practiced behaviors. Across seven experiments, we demonstrate that this approach induces habitual control in a relatively brief paradigm. Specifically, overtraining increases slips of action toward the extensively-practiced context and reduces slips toward the minimally-practiced one, indicating behavioral inflexibility at early response times, while slower responses remain dominated by GD control. The reliability of this overtraining effect depended on the inclusion of task features that we hypothesize encourage relaxed GD control. Beyond providing a practical, robust, and flexible tool for studying the cognitive processes underlying habit formation and expression, our paradigm expands the traditional stimulus-response conception of habits to include more complex, hierarchical behaviors that may better reflect naturalistic human habits. Social science/Psychology/Human behaviour Biological sciences/Neuroscience/Cognitive neuroscience/Decision habits goal-directed control experimental design human behavior Full Text Additional Declarations The authors declare no competing interests. Supplementary Files bootstrapcombinedexclStrict.csv Supplementary Table S1 bootstrapcombinedexclLenient.csv Supplementary Table S2 habitmanuscriptsupp.pdf Supplementary Information for Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 2 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Show more versions Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-5773028","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":404264968,"identity":"e34b3597-fc32-47a0-8c9e-3540c3dd2217","order_by":0,"name":"Sarah Oh","email":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAZAAAAAyAQMAAABI0h/eAAAABlBMVEX///8AAABVwtN+AAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAAA5klEQVRIiWNgGAWjYJACZgaGA3IGYLoALGBAlBZjiBYDErQkbiBai3z72YefCyrupG9n731s8MHAJrGBvXmbBD4tBmfSjaVnnHmWu7PnuHHiDIO0xAaeY2X4tTCkMUjzth3O3XAjjfkwj8HhxAaJHDO8WuT7nzH/BmpJN7j/jPnwH4P/iQ3yb/BrYbiRxgayJcHgBhtzMoPBAaAtPPi1GNx4xmbNc+aw4c6eNGbDHoNk4zaetGIL/A5LY77NU3FY3pz9GLPEjwo72X72wxtv4HUYOnBsI0k5CNiTrGMUjIJRMAqGPQAAJ4dIX7ca/usAAAAASUVORK5CYII=","orcid":"","institution":"University of California Berkeley","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Sarah","middleName":"","lastName":"Oh","suffix":""},{"id":404264969,"identity":"0e183c35-a519-420f-9491-73da9c32454b","order_by":1,"name":"Anne Collins","email":"","orcid":"https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3751-3662","institution":"University of California, Berkeley","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Anne","middleName":"","lastName":"Collins","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2025-01-06 10:41:08","currentVersionCode":2,"declarations":{"humanSubjects":false,"vertebrateSubjects":false,"conflictsOfInterestStatement":false,"humanSubjectEthicalGuidelines":false,"humanSubjectConsent":false,"humanSubjectClinicalTrial":false,"humanSubjectCaseReport":false,"vertebrateSubjectEthicalGuidelines":false},"doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-5773028/v2","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-5773028/v2","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":101205458,"identity":"b9c4010e-210b-453f-adf9-f01b171211ec","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-01-27 09:49:26","extension":"pdf","order_by":0,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":14436736,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"habitmanuscriptmain.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5773028/v2/ea9678143f6fd0bb271e56d2.pdf"},{"id":101206339,"identity":"75451588-fa30-411e-a757-298477b842c4","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-01-27 09:56:00","extension":"json","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":4357,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"NATHUMBEHAV25010062.json","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5773028/v2/09b06179fec7d5994cd04fcd.json"},{"id":101146425,"identity":"43c619ba-f8c0-4887-9578-6ec038c739c6","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-01-26 15:01:45","extension":"pdf","order_by":2,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"acdc-reference","size":10761727,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"habitmanuscriptsupp.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5773028/v2/b4bb13d919405d33cd5504a2.pdf"},{"id":101880961,"identity":"9614fe1b-dce1-4290-a64b-f207627d3986","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-02-04 15:08:24","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":9604741,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"habitmanuscriptrevised.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5773028/v2_covered_e6392f26-b01c-47d8-a132-6e9412086330.pdf"},{"id":101146420,"identity":"a918f48d-8114-410a-89ed-f20ed81dd794","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-01-26 15:01:44","extension":"csv","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":16349,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"Supplementary Table S1","description":"","filename":"bootstrapcombinedexclStrict.csv","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5773028/v2/84eb812a978e2d883ee9ddc5.csv"},{"id":101146422,"identity":"1780594b-f26d-4a1e-8e0d-4c2ffef74d55","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-01-26 15:01:44","extension":"csv","order_by":2,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":15536,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"\u003cp\u003eSupplementary Table S2\u003c/p\u003e","description":"","filename":"bootstrapcombinedexclLenient.csv","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5773028/v2/ead09efc985dea2cbd15a7da.csv"},{"id":101146423,"identity":"70b19e86-0372-4c66-a051-2e2cbd8765a2","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-01-26 15:01:44","extension":"pdf","order_by":3,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":10761727,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"\u003cp\u003eSupplementary Information for\u003c/p\u003e","description":"","filename":"habitmanuscriptsupp.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-5773028/v2/ba2b2ced83cc9bec4313365e.pdf"}],"financialInterests":"The authors declare no competing interests.","formattedTitle":"Naturally disengaging control to reveal habits","fulltext":[],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":false,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":true,"hideJournal":true,"highlight":"","institution":"","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"habits, goal-directed control, experimental design, human behavior","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-5773028/v2","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-5773028/v2","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"\u003cp\u003eHabits are an essential part of everyday decision-making, yet the mechanisms underlying human habit formation and expression are difficult to study in laboratory settings, where participants typically engage strong goal-directed (GD) control that can mask habitual tendencies. Recent approaches have successfully elicited habits in long experiments by limiting the amount of GD control participants can exert (e.g., through forced response times). We extend this approach by designing a short behavioral paradigm that aims to induce and reveal habits without extrinsically limiting GD control, instead incorporating task features that we hypothesized would encourage participants to spontaneously relax GD control: a hierarchical multi-step trial structure, opportunities for self-correction, and frequent switches between extensively and minimally practiced behaviors. Across seven experiments, we demonstrate that this approach induces habitual control in a relatively brief paradigm. Specifically, overtraining increases slips of action toward the extensively-practiced context and reduces slips toward the minimally-practiced one, indicating behavioral inflexibility at early response times, while slower responses remain dominated by GD control. The reliability of this overtraining effect depended on the inclusion of task features that we hypothesize encourage relaxed GD control. Beyond providing a practical, robust, and flexible tool for studying the cognitive processes underlying habit formation and expression, our paradigm expands the traditional stimulus-response conception of habits to include more complex, hierarchical behaviors that may better reflect naturalistic human habits.\u003c/p\u003e","manuscriptTitle":"Naturally disengaging control to reveal habits","msid":"","msnumber":"","nonDraftVersions":[{"code":2,"date":"2026-01-26 15:01:39","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-5773028/v2","editorialEvents":[{"type":"communityComments","content":0}],"status":"published","journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true}},{"code":1,"date":"2025-01-20 03:14:46","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-5773028/v1","editorialEvents":[{"type":"communityComments","content":0}],"status":"published","journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true}}],"origin":"","ownerIdentity":"f7409736-7888-445a-b870-71b04b67ff42","owner":[],"postedDate":"January 26th, 2026","published":true,"recentEditorialEvents":[],"rejectedJournal":[],"revision":"","amendment":"","status":"posted","subjectAreas":[{"id":43094911,"name":"Social science/Psychology/Human behaviour"},{"id":43094912,"name":"Biological sciences/Neuroscience/Cognitive neuroscience/Decision"}],"tags":[],"updatedAt":"2025-04-11T09:22:24+00:00","versionOfRecord":[],"versionCreatedAt":"2026-01-26 15:01:39","video":"","vorDoi":"","vorDoiUrl":"","workflowStages":[]},"version":"v2","identity":"rs-5773028","journalConfig":"researchsquare"},"__N_SSP":true},"page":"/article/[identity]/[[...version]]","query":{"redirect":"/article/rs-5773028","identity":"rs-5773028","version":["v2"]},"buildId":"XKTyCvWXoU3ODBz1xrDgd","isFallback":false,"isExperimentalCompile":false,"dynamicIds":[84888],"gssp":true,"scriptLoader":[]}