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The Situated Assessment Method (SAM²): Establishing Individual Differences in Habitual Behavior
Abstract
From the perspectives of grounded, situated, and embodied cognition, we have developed a new approach for assessing individual differences. Because this approach is grounded in two dimensions of situatedness—situational experience and the Situated Action Cycle—we refer to it as the Situated Assessment Method (SAM2). Rather than abstracting over situations during assessment of a construct (as in traditional assessment instruments), SAM2 assesses a construct in situations where it occurs, simultaneously measuring factors from the Situated Action Cycle known to influence it. To demonstrate this framework, we developed the SAM2 Habitual Behavior Instrument (SAM2 HBI). Across three studies with a total of 442 participants, the SAM2 HBI produced a robust and replicable pattern of results at both the group and individual levels. Three trait-level measures of behavior regularity across 80 behaviors, 40 positive behaviors, and 40 negative behaviors exhibited large reliable individual differences. Several sources of evidence demonstrated the construct validity of these measures. At both the group and individual levels, the SAM2 measure of behavior regularity was associated with factors from the Situated Action Cycle known to influence habitual behavior in the literature (consistency, automaticity, immediate reward, long-term reward). Regressions explained approximately 65% of the variance at the group level and a median of approximately 75% at the individual level. The SAM2 measure of behavior regularity also exhibited well-established interactions with personality measures for self-control and neuroticism. Cognitive-affective processes from the Situated Action Cycle explained nearly all the variance in these interactions. Finally, a composite measure of habitualness established habitual behaviors at both the group and individual levels. Additionally, a composite measure of reward was strongly related to the composite measure of habitualness, increasing with self-control and decreasing with neuroticism.
... Thus, to further our understanding of consumption motives, it is important to find ways to capture individual differences in consumption motives, assess their stability across consumption situations, and assess how much insight people have into them. A novel approach to investigate complex behaviours such as eating and drinking is the use of the Situated Assessment Method (SAM 2 ; for an in-depth description, see Dutriaux et al., 2021). ...
... Building on the theory of situated cognition (Barsalou, 2008) SAM 2 proposes that to fully understand and capture a complex behaviour such as eating and its individual differences, it is crucial to measure it in the situation where it occurs, as well as to assess all potential factors that might influence the behaviour in these situations (Dutriaux et al., 2021). In practice, this means that instead of using very general questions, e.g., "how much do you think price influences your eating behaviour" SAM 2 would situate the question, e.g., "how affordable do you find eating a sandwich for lunch". ...
... In a second step, all relevant situational motives are identified that could potentially explain consumption of foods in these situations. In SAM 2 , the Situated Action Cycle is used to help identify possible motives, including factors related to the environment, self-relevance, affect, action and outcomes (for detailed information on the Situated Action Cycle see Dutriaux et al., 2021). ...
This article examines individual consumption motives and explores their stability across eating situations. Study 1 established an extensive sample of foods consumed in the UK in different eating situations and informed which foods to include in Study 2 and 3. Study 2 evaluated potentially relevant eating motives for food consumption. Using a between participant design, each of 885 participants rated a subset of 341 situated foods from Study 1 on consumption frequency or desire, or on one of 30 possible consumption motives (e.g., food availability, automaticity, food sweetness etc.). An exploratory factor analysis reduced redundancies and established underlying eating motives, with six factors emerging (habitualness, unhealthiness/healthiness, fullfillingness, saviourness/sweetness, bitterness/sourness, affordability). Using a within-participant design (n=204), Study 3 then established individual differences in eating motives, their stability across eating situations, and participants’ insights into these motives. Each participant evaluated a subset of foods from Study 1 in a specific eating situation (e.g., “usual breakfast”) on consumption frequency and desire, and on 10 central eating motives: healthiness, fillingness, sweetness, bitterness, affordability, automaticity, self-identity, social connectedness, emotional satisfaction, situational transport (e.g., “How affordable do you find cheese for usual dinner?”). We found that the ten predictors explained a large amount of variance in both consumption frequency (median = .59, IQR = .19) and desire (median = .66, IQR = .17). Between participants, large individual differences emerged in predictive profiles, although within participants these profiles remained remarkably stable across eating situations. Lastly, participants showed little insight into the motives predicting their consumption frequency and desire. These results have implications for measuring eating behaviour and the development of interventions.
... In the domain of soft drinks, for example, this would mean that certain situations (e.g., feeling bored, being at a party) can trigger simulations of drinking soft drinks, along with possible consequences (e.g., enjoying the sweet and fizzy sensation). These simulations can then lead to that behaviour being performed, especially when the behaviour serves a current goal or is otherwise rewarding (see also Dutriaux et al., 2021;Kruglanski & Szumowska, 2020). ...
... In addition, we did not assess habitualness for each situation separately, which prevents us from establishing the observed overall shift in consumption related to increased habitualness in the home situation. More fine-grained, situated assessments could address this issue in future research (Dutriaux et al., 2021). ...
We examined the impact of a COVID-19 lockdown in England on the frequency of consumption occasions and amount of soft drinks consumed. Beverage consumption is strongly associated with specific, often social, consumption situations (e.g., going out). We reasoned that lockdown would affect consumption behaviour because it removed typical soft drink consumption situations. Specifically, we hypothesised that soft drink consumption occasions and amount would be reduced during lockdown compared to before and after lockdown, especially in typical soft drink consumption situations. In two surveys (Dec. 2020 and May 2021) among the same participants (N = 211, N = 160; consuming soft drinks at least once/week), we assessed the frequency of soft drink and water consumption occasions before, during, and after the November/december 2020lockdown, across typical soft drink and water drinking situations. This presents a detailed picture of the situations in which participants drink soft drinks and water, and how this was affected by a lockdown. We also assessed the daily amount of soft drinks and water consumed in each period, and perceived habitualness of drinking soft drinks and water. As predicted, participants reported fewer occasions of drinking soft drinks during lockdown compared to before and after, especially in typical soft drink consumption situations. Unexpectedly, however, the daily amount of soft drinks consumed increased during lockdown, compared to before and after, especially among participants with stronger perceived habitualness of soft drink consumption. Exploratory analyses suggest that during lockdown, participants increased their soft drink consump--tion at home. Water consumption, on the other hand, was not systematically affected by the lockdown. These findings suggest that even if some typical consumption situations disappear, consumption may be hard to disrupt if the behaviour is rewarding.
Background
Despite its numerous health benefits, consumers’ daily water consumption is below recommend levels while soft drink consumption remains high. Previous research has shown that the degree to which drinks are cognitively represented in terms of consumption and enjoyment (i.e., through simulations of consumption and reward) predicts desire and intake. Here, we examined whether simulation-enhancing advertisements that frame water in terms of consumption and reward change cognitive representations and increase motivation for a fictitious bottled water.
Methods
In three pre-registered online experiments (Nexp1 = 984; Nexp2 = 786; Nexp3 = 907), UK participants viewed three advertisements that either highlighted the rewarding consumption experience of water (e.g., “Refresh all your senses with this smooth, cool water”; simulation-enhancing ads), the health consequences of drinking water (e.g., “This water takes care of your health”; health-focused ads), or control ads. We assessed cognitive representations of the bottled water with a semantic feature production task, and we coded the words used as consumption and reward features or positive long-term health consequences features. We assessed motivation through ratings of the attractiveness of the water (Exp. 1 only), desire to drink it, and willingness to pay for it (WTP).
Results
In line with our hypotheses, participants represented the bottled water more in terms of consumption and reward after viewing simulation-enhancing advertisements, and more in terms of positive long-term health consequences after viewing health-focused advertisements. There was no direct effect of advertisement condition on motivation ratings. However, significant indirect effects showed that simulation-enhancing advertisements increased desire and WTP through the proportion of consumption and reward features, whereas health-focused advertisements increased motivation through an increase in the proportion of positive long-term health consequences features. The effects through consumption and reward were stronger.
Conclusions
These findings are consistent with research suggesting that the experience of immediate reward from drinking water underlies intake. Public health interventions should emphasize the enjoyment of drinking water, rather than the long-term health benefits.
Cross-linguistic differences in concepts have implications for all theories of concepts, not just for grounded ones. Failure to address these implications does not imply the belief that they do not exist. Instead, it reflects a division of labor between researchers who focus on general principles versus cultural variability. Furthermore, core principles of grounded cognition-empirical learning and situated conceptual processing-predict large cultural differences in conceptual systems. If asked, most grounded cognition researchers would anticipate and endorse these differences, as would most researchers from other perspectives. Finally, by incorporating ethnographic and linguistic analysis, grounded cognition researchers can examine how cultural differences manifest themselves in conceptual systems.
Background
Some individuals are no longer entering romantic relationships, others move through relationships too quickly searching for “the one” and making quick assessments of their romantic partners, while others stay in their relationships but “check out” or do not work on their issues. These are conclusions from two studies: (1) an interview with psychologists who specialise in relationship therapy, and (2) an analysis of individuals’ lived experiences of relationships. The concept of relationship sabotage can explain these phenomena. However, presently, there is no instrument to conceptualise and empirically measure how people continue to employ self-defeating attitudes and behaviors in (and out) of relationships to impede success, or withdraw effort, and justify failure.
Methods and Results
A series of three studies (involving a total of 1365 English speaking individuals of diverse gender orientation, sexual orientation, and cultural background, with relationship sabotage experience) were conceptualized for the current project to fill the need for scale development and to build empirical evidence on the topic of self-sabotage in romantic relationships. The scale was developed over two studies using exploratory factor analysis and one-congeneric model analyses. The third study, using confirmatory factor analysis, confirmed the final structure for the Relationship Sabotage Scale (RSS), which contains 12 items and three factors: defensiveness, trust difficulty, and lack of relationship skills. Constructive validity analyses were also conducted.
Conclusion
The RSS is a brief scale that provides conclusive information about individual patterns in relationships. Findings using this scale can offer explanations regarding the reasons that individuals engage in destructive behaviours from one relationship to the next. Investigations should continue to test a model for sabotage in romantic relationships using the developed scale and other factors such as relationship diferences and insecure attachment. More specifically, this measure can be used to understand mediator constructs of relational outcomes within the attachment framework to explain relationship dissolution and work towards relationship maintenance.
According to the grounded perspective, cognition emerges from the interaction of classic cognitive processes with the modalities, the body, and the environment. Rather than being an autonomous impenetrable module, cognition incorporates these other domains intrinsically into its operation. The Situated Action Cycle offers one way of understanding how the modalities, the body, and the environment become integrated to ground cognition. Seven challenges and opportunities are raised for this perspective: (1) How does cognition emerge from the Situated Action Cycle and in turn support it? (2) How can we move beyond simply equating embodiment with action, additionally establishing how embodiment arises in the autonomic, neuroendocrine, immune, cardiovascular, respiratory, digestive, and integumentary systems? (3) How can we better understand the mechanisms underlying multimodal simulation, its functions across the Situated Action Cycle, and its integration with other representational systems? (4) How can we develop and assess theoretical accounts of symbolic processing from the grounded perspective (perhaps using the construct of simulators)? (5) How can we move beyond the simplistic distinction between concrete and abstract concepts, instead addressing how concepts about the external and internal worlds pattern to support the Situated Action Cycle? (6) How do individual differences emerge from different populations of situational memories as the Situated Action Cycle manifests itself differently across individuals? (7) How can constructs from grounded cognition provide insight into the replication and generalization crises, perhaps from a quantum perspective on mechanisms (as exemplified by simulators).
The core message of this paper is that many of the challenges of habit research can be traced back to the presence of causal elements within the definition of habits. For instance, the idea that habits are stimulus-driven implies that habitual behavior is not causally mediated by goal-representations. The presence of these causal elements in the definition of habits leads to difficulties in establishing empirically whether behavior is habitual. Some of these elements can also impoverish theoretical thinking about the mechanisms underlying habitual behavior. I argue that habit research would benefit from eliminating any reference to specific S-R association formation theories from the definition of habits. Which causal elements are retained in the definition of habits depends on the goals of researchers. However, regardless of the definition that is selected, it is good to be aware of the implications of the definition of habits for empirical and theoretical research on habits.
Human habits are considered to be an important root of societal problems. The significance of habits has been demonstrated for a variety of behaviors in different domains, such as work, transportation, health, and ecology, suggesting that habits have a pervasive impact on human life. Studying and changing habits in societal context requires a broad view of behavior, which poses a challenge for applying basic models to complex human habits. We address the conceptualization and operationalization of habits in the current literature and note that claims about the role of habits in societal context rarely agree with the basic definition of habits as goal-independent behavior. We consider future directions that are important for making progress in the study of habit change in societal context.
Lay definitions tend to conceptualize stress as negative, undesirable, and maladaptive. However, contemporary stress models emphasize the differentiation between negative and positive stress responses, known as distress and eustress. Despite prominent theoretical conceptualisations accepting the existence of eustress, the vast majority of stress measures tend to focus exclusively on the distress response. The current study introduces the Adolescent Distress-Eustress Scale (ADES) which holistically captures both aspects of the stress response, bridging the gap between theory and measurement and counteracting the typically negatively focused approach to stress research. The ADES was systematically developed and tested in a socio-educationally diverse sample of 981 adolescents ( M age = 15.19, 50.62% female). The finalized self-report scale consists of two 5-item subscales, individually indexing distress and eustress. Initial psychometric properties of the ADES are promising, and the scale has the potential to meet the needs of researchers, schools, and organizations.
Background
Habits have been proposed to develop as a function of the extent to which a behavior is rewarded, performed frequently, and executed in a stable context. The present study examines how each of these factors are associated with behavioral automaticity across a broad variety of behaviors drawn from previous habits research. This study further assesses how perceived complexity of the behavior influences the associations of rewards, frequency, and contextual stability with automaticity.
Methods
Participants (N = 459) completed an online survey assessing their experiences and engagement with 25 different behaviors, including exercise, handwashing, smoking, and medication adherence, among others. Exploratory factor analysis validated a short, relatively novel scale of perceived behavioral complexity, and multilevel analyses grouped by participant were used to examine the factors that contribute to automaticity.
Results
Across behaviors, frequency, contextual stability, and perceived rewards were positively associated with automaticity. Perceived complexity was negatively associated with automaticity and moderated the influence of contextual stability and rewards, but not frequency, on automaticity. Both contextual stability and rewards were stronger predictors of automaticity when behavioral complexity was high rather than low, as predicted; in addition, when contextual stability was high, more complex behaviors showed greater automaticity than simpler behaviors.
Conclusion
The results of this study confirm that behavioral frequency, rewards, and contextual stability are each independently associated with automaticity across a spectrum of behaviors. This study further demonstrates that perceived complexity of a behavior moderates the extent to which contextual stability and rewards are associated with automaticity. The results affirm a need to further understand the components of habits and how they differ across varying behaviors.
We address the relation between goal-driven and habitual behaviors. Whereas in recent years the two have been juxtaposed, we suggest that habitual behavior is in fact goal-driven. To support this view, we show that habitual behavior is sensitive to changes in goal properties (reward contingencies), namely goal value and its expectancy of attainment. Whereas adjustment to these properties may be slower for habitual (or overlearned) than for nonhabitual behavior, this is likely due to the routinized (or automatic) nature of such behavior, characterized as it is by reduced attention to its consequences. Furthermore, we show that habitual behavior’s prolonged persistence despite its manifest detachment from the original goal likely stems from its attachment to a different goal. Thus, there is no need to postulate purposeless behavior. The view that habitual behavior is goal-driven offers an integrative account of a considerable body of evidence and is consistent with a functional account of psychological processes.
Causal inference and generalizability both matter. Historically, systematic designs emphasize causal inference, while representative designs focus on generalizability. Here, we suggest a transformative synthesis – Systematic Representative Design (SRD) – concurrently enhancing both causal inference and “built-in” generalizability by leveraging today’s intelligent agent, virtual environments, and other technologies. In SRD, a “default control group” (DCG) can be created in a virtual environment by representatively sampling from real-world situations. Experimental groups can be built with systematic manipulations onto the DCG base. Applying systematic design features (e.g., random assignment to DCG versus experimental groups) in SRD affords valid causal inferences. After explicating the proposed SRD synthesis, we delineate how the approach concurrently advances generalizability and robustness, cause-effect inference and precision science, a computationally-enabled cumulative psychological science supporting both “bigger theory” and concrete implementations grappling with tough questions (e.g., what is context?) and affording rapidly-scalable interventions for real-world problems.