By Padraig.
Business reporter with technology.
The image is from Carlotta Belton.
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Is Padraig more productive because of apps?
Run. Work on a doctorate. Progress is elusive so begin all my to-do lists. With New Year's resolution season here, maybe technology can make me into a more productive machine.
Brendan Kelly is a professor of Psychiatry at Trinity College Dublin.
Prof Kelly thinks that between 45% and 85% of what we do is habit.
"We act according to our habits from the time we rise and go through our morning routines until we fall asleep after evening routines," says Ann Graybiel, a neuroscientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Her research shows that we develop those habits by putting them in a part of our brain called the striatum, which deals with reward and dopamine.
Habitica, SnapHabit, and Strides are some of the new apps that claim to reprogram our habits to improve our lives and be happier.
ruth medjber is the image source.
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Brendan Kelly says that an 'extraordinary' amount of what we do comes down to habit.
To take a daily walk and ring a friend are two of the default habits that snapHabit arrives with.
You can choose to exercise in the habit app gym orguided journeys. One is becoming a more committed opponent of racism and the other is doing 100 press-ups a day.
You can choose your own. "Run for an hour" and "colour two boxes" were added to the days I selected. It is very satisfying.
Prof Kelly says short-term rewards are important for changing our habits. He warns that doing physical exercise just to be healthier isn't enough to sustain a daily habit.
To get a new habit or change an old one, the change needs to be small, should ideally be tied to an existing habit, and must be rewarding in the short term.
Jake Bernstein is the image source.
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Jake Bernstein says changing habits is the hardest thing to do.
App developers can help with short-term rewards. Tie our new habits to our old ones. Sharing things we've done with our friends, like checking our mobiles.
It can make us work harder if we tell people about our attempts to change a habit.
We did a correlation analysis. Jake Bernstein, co-founder of the app, says that how many friends you had on the app was related to how successful you were in changing your habits.
Habitica, another app, has a quest function that incorporates social accountability, as stated by the company's chief executive, who was an early user of the app.
"If you don't do any of the things that you've committed to for the day, then the app takes away points from you and everyone else who's opted in to participating in the quest with you," explains Ms.
She says that collecting random pets helped her stay on top of meditating, exercising, and going to bed on time.
"I found the visual representation of the work I was doing to be very helpful, especially since I do a lot of intangible work that doesn't feel productive," says Ms Hsu, who also practises as a lawyer.
The largest group of users is trying to exercise more. In second place, 15.9% are trying to build habits.
Mr Bernstein was surprised by some of the habits people set up.
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Getting an exercise habit is the most popular function.
If an app helps us change our habits, it's likely because it shows how we can best train the striatum in our brain.
The mental effort involved in completing a task or learning new information is called cognitive load.
When this is low, we're more likely to learn a new habit, and by marking tasks we've completed, an app can help us form it.
An app can help remind us of our progress by showing progress bars or percentages.
Mr Bernstein says that he originally built the app to solve his own problem.
I know the things that I enjoy doing and that give me fulfilment, so how can I plan my time to those things?
When Covid started he wanted to make it more social, make us more connected, and help us meet our goals together.
The image is from Tessy Ehiguese.
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Dr Shubhangi Karmakar says to be careful when developing new habits.
Kyle Richey's is the founder of the Strides habit app. He used to use to-do list and calendar apps to manage his day.
These were awesome replacements for their analogue counterparts, but I felt like something was missing.
I wanted to do more than just do a task. I needed a way to stay focused and motivated.
Mr Bernstein says that apps that show the number of days you follow a new habit are a powerful tactic but can be frustrating if you drop them.
He says it's important to be compassionate to yourself when you fail. Insight about what motivates you can be taken away.
An app won't tell you to take a break and look after yourself, says Shubhangi Karmakar, a junior doctor in Dublin and an editor of the British Journal of Psychiatry. She says the important thing is to form a healthy habit.
Mr Bernstein says changing our behavior is the hardest thing to do. These can only go so far on their own.
For me, the number of days spent working on my doctorate is still stuck at zero.
