#behavior-change

#behavior-change

Our mental system constantly generates expectations about what will happen next, including what we ourselves are likely to do, think, or feel. These expectations are often outside of awareness, but they quietly shape our behavior: We tend to act, think, and feel in ways that fit our expectations. As a result, the system becomes self-reinforcing: When our expectations are confirmed, they grow stronger, making the predicted behavior feel even more natural next time.

"You're not a team player" is an example of feedback that makes an assertion about a person's character. The receiver of this feedback is likely to experience a "fight, flight, or freeze" response because the feedback conversation has just become deeply personal. As a result, the feedback will not be heard by the receiver and therefore misses the opportunity to promote learning, growth, or improvement.

In the 1960s and 70s, researchers showed that while people's actions are heavily influenced by the context around them, we tend to explain behavior by focusing on internal traits. This tendency, for example, to say someone was rude because they are a rude person, rather than because they were in a stressful situation, is called the Fundamental Attribution Error. We pay less attention to the context and attribute behavior to the content of a person's character.

To address hoarding, begin with the main principle: Your emotions and behaviors come from your thinking about situations, not from the situations themselves.This is good news! When your emotions or behaviors are undesirable, you're not defeated. You can identify the beliefs causing these emotions and behaviors and then change your thinking. So the first step in diagnosing a hoarding problem involves identifying the irrational thinking that's behind it.

In the cybersecurity world, fear is easy to sell. Headlines announce devastating breaches. Alerts warn us that phishing emails are on the rise. Yet for all the anxiety that cybersecurity messaging generates, it rarely leads to meaningful behavior change. In fact, scare tactics often backfire. People tune out. They freeze up. Or they file the message away under "someone else's problem."

You may not rise to the level of your goals, but rather fall to the level of your systems, indicating that success is deeply rooted in effective systems.

"Threshold transitions are not about minor adjustments but a profound transformation of our way of being in the world."