A lot of times, I think habits are short cuts. Why would I say that? I wish that I have the habit of getting up early so that I do not need to struggle on my bed every morning. I hope I have the habit of reading so that I can be a more studious person. Unfortunately, I do not have any of those habits, and the problem I am facing now seems to be how to develop these habits. The desire of solving this problem leads to this essay about how to develop a habit.
To find out the answer of the problem, I will start with presenting an experiment. The experiment was conducted by University College London. One hundred and one participants attended the experiment that lasted for 12 weeks. In the experiment, participants were asked to choose one activity among eating, drinking and exercise behaviors. They needed to login online to check if they had done that day’s work or not. The scale is determined by the participants’ report, which include “I do automatically”, “I do without thinking” and “I would find hard not to do.” The answers will be analyzed and put into a scale of seven. Also, fifty dollar was given to each participant just to keep them in the research.
The graph is from the experiment report. Somehow I can not make the picture more clear.
This graphs show that different days were spent for different activities. It takes a lot less time for people to develop a habit of walking for 10 minutes after breakfast. It takes after the whole experiment process for participants to develop the habit of doing 50 sit-ups after my coffee. The graph develops a model of habit developing, and 39 out of the eight two people who reported regularly fit the model.
A few hypothesis can be shown from the experiment. Firstly, because not everyone fits the model, there is clearly a difference between every individual in habit developing. Over half of the people failed or did not develop a habit as fast as the others. Secondly, as there is a different model for every habit, different habits are very possibly require different time to develop. The time difference can be caused by the complexity of the activity. In this experiment, walking for 10 minutes after breakfast seems to be more achievable, easier than doing 50 sit-ups after morning coffee. However, it is hard to make a conclusion just based on one experiment, and I failed to find more similar experiments, so the conclusion I make can be either correct false positive.
The common thing that is shown in all graphs is that repetition from day to day is definitely helpful in habit development. I think the fifty dollar reward somehow played a motivation or a role of monitor in the experiment, which can cause inaccurate result.
It seems that the only answer to the question of how to develop a habit is repetitive practice. The time that it takes to develop a habit varies depending on the habit. There is no “common formula“ for all the habits. The formula for developing different habits is different. I believe the result will be different if the test is not done on students in school, but on mid-aged workers and seniors.
Another research on physical exercise habit shows that the habit wears out after entering adolescence, which proves that the time for developing a habit varies and the situation can be much more complicated than expected. Motivation, time limit and even the growth of a person can play a big role in habit developing. A little bit motivation with persistence in repetition seems to be the best solution in developing a habit.
As the picture says, 
. The only way to develop a habit is through repetition. There is no guarantee about how much time it is going to take to develop a habit. Self-motivation and self-supervision will play an important role in habit development. Also, start with easy habits, then work towards harder ones.
Works Cited
http://her.oxfordjournals.org/content/12/3/363.short
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ejsp.674/pdf
http://getrippedathome.com/motivation/motivation-monday/
As I am sitting here writing comment after comment and blog after blog, I find myself wishing I could get into a good habit of not procrastinating. I think a lot of college students and adolescents in general would benefit from developing a habit of some kind whether it be, getting more sleep or eating healthier. I don’t agree that habits wear out in all adolescents, I believe some children going into their adolescence become more motivated and develops habits quicker. For example, when I became an adolescent I got in the habit of making my bed every morning, the habit kept going and I still make my bed every morning. I also appreciate the quote at the end, represents your topic in an inspiring way.