Here, we discuss the nature of habit and behaviour change as well as The Hook Model...Check out what Juliette has to say about The Hook Model here: https://youtu.be/Hm8jTDP5uW0

1. FORMING A HABIT
WITH THE HOOK MODEL
@juliettedenny

2. HABIT &
BEHAVIOUR CHANGE
Driving behavior change across your organization is no easy
task. Providing your learners with the right level of motivation
will get you started, but habit will keep them going. Ultimately, if
you embed a behavior as a habit, then you’ve created the
change you want to see.
If only there were a model for forming habits!
This brings us to the ‘Hook Model’ a theory created by
entrepreneur, investor and author Nir Eyal in his 2004 book,
‘Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products’.

3. THE NATURE
OF HABIT
A habit is a pattern of behaviour that is replicated frequently. Habits
often have an ‘automatic’ or subconscious character about them –
whereby the performer replicates the behaviour without realising they
are doing it (for instance, biting your fingernails or cracking your
knuckles).
Moreover, habits are, by their very nature, hard to give up. If it’s easy for
you to stop doing something (for instance to quit smoking), then there’s
a good chance that it was never a habit in the first place.
It is also important to realise that there are good and bad ‘habits’ just as
there are good and bad behaviours. Organisational success often comes
down to forming new ‘good habits’ and removing old ‘bad habits’.

4. WHY DO WE
FORM HABITS?
The brain is constantly looking for ways to save effort and
habits are formed for to help us do exactly that. Once
we’ve formed a habit, your brain can enter auto-pilot
mode, which means it doesn’t have to work so hard. This
frees up energy for it to complete other more intensive
tasks.
It’s for this reason that Barack Obama only has two
different colours of suit and eats the same breakfast every
day. It frees up more capacity for him to deal with life’s
tougher decisions.

5. THE IMPORTANCE
OF HABIT
Every new year, we’re both motivated by a host of remarkable resolutions. Be it
healthy eating, hitting the gym, or finally learning to play the drums like Dave Grohl.
More often than not, however, we fail to achieve our goals. In fact, research
suggests that 80% of new year resolutions have failed by February.
Why do they fail? Because we haven’t made the new behavior habitual. At this
stage, deciding to go to the gym is a manual process. But once we’ve formed a
habit, the impetus becomes stronger and stronger – to the extent that it can even
become automatic.
According to research from University College London, it takes individuals 66 days
(on average) to form a new habit. In other words, if you can prompt your learners
to behave a certain way 66 days in a row, you’ve officially changed their behavior.

6. The Hook Model is a four-phase process that can
be baked into activities and technology to help
form habits. The model utilises consecutive hook
cycles to drive user engagement without the need
for any costly advertising or aggressive messaging.
Let’s break down the four different stages, starting
with:
The ‘Trigger’ that prompts the action. This can be
external (for instance, a download link in an email)
or internal (for instance, a subconscious urge).
THE HOOK MODEL:
TRIGGER

7. Next up, is step two:
The ‘Action’ itself, or the behavior exhibited by the
user (for instance, watching a video or completing
an eLearning unit). The action was prompted by
the external or internal trigger with some kind of
reward in mind.
THE HOOK MODEL:
ACTION

8. This leads us to step three:
The ‘Variable Reward’. Here, the user is rewarded for
their activity. But why does it need to be ‘variable’? By
following no fixed pattern of rewards, we’re appealing
to a powerful cognitive quirk – our natural desire for
predictability.
As Nir Eyal himself notes, variability is our ‘cognitive
nemesis’. It causes our brains to seek out patterns,
which can override functions like self-control and
moderation. This is what happens when you gamble.
Luckily, in this case, you’re using variability to form
good habits, not bad habits.
THE HOOK MODEL:
VARIABLE REWARD

9. THE HOOK MODEL:
INVESTMENT
This brings us to the fourth and final step.
By this stage, the user has made an ‘Investment’ of
some kind into the hook cycle. This investment can
take numerous forms. It could be a monetary
investment, it may be effort-based or it could be
time-based. This investment makes it easier to begin
the hook cycle anew, whenever they are prompted by
and internal or external trigger.
Think of it this way – you’re more likely to invest into
ventures that have sunk costs, just as you’re more
likely to partake in social communities where you
already have a stake.

10. The Hook Model can be used to create habits amongst your learners on an LMS or a
mobile learning app. For instance, ‘Streaks’, on the Knowledge Arcade reward learners for
consistently completing an action over a specific period of time. If your learners login once
a day for five days in a row, their streak would increase each day until they earn their five
day streak badge on day five. Here’s how this example fits with the model:
• Trigger: User is sent a Push Notification suggesting they login to check out new content.
• Action: User logs in.
• Variable Reward: User receives an XP boost for logging in. This boost should vary each
time they login (e.g. day one: 10xp and day five: 50xp).
• Investment: The learner has invested their time and effort into the learning community
and are considerably more likely to do so ongoing.
APPLYING THE MODEL:
STREAKS

11. FINAL
WORD
Even with the right level of motivation, changing behavior can
be tough. After all, changing behavior means creating new
habits.
Luckily, there is a model for forming habits. If you provide
your learners with a Trigger and their Action results in a
Variable Reward, their Investment levels will increase. This
helps encourage them to repeat the cycle one more time.
Learning technology solutions can use game mechanics like
‘Streaks’ to help embed the Hook Model within their system.
Once that’s in place, you’ve created the ultimate habit-
forming machine.