IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/joecth/v74y2022i2d10.1007_s00199-022-01445-1.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Habit formation, self-deception, and self-control

Author

Listed:
  • Takashi Hayashi

    (University of Glasgow)

  • Norio Takeoka

    (Hitotsubashi University)

Abstract

Recent research in psychology suggests that successful self-control is attributed to developing adaptive habits rather than resisting temptation. However, developing good habits itself is a self-regulating process, and people often fail to accumulate good habits. This study axiomatically characterizes a dynamic decision model where an agent may form a deceptive belief about his future preference: the agent correctly anticipates his future preference by considering the effect of habits; however, he is also tempted to ignore the habit formation. Self-control must be exerted for resisting such a self-deceptive belief. Our model is flexible enough to accommodate a variety of habit formation and explains behavioral puzzles related to gym attendance, self-control fatigue, and demand for commitment.

Suggested Citation

  • Takashi Hayashi & Norio Takeoka, 2022. "Habit formation, self-deception, and self-control," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 74(2), pages 547-592, September.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:joecth:v:74:y:2022:i:2:d:10.1007_s00199-022-01445-1
    DOI: 10.1007/s00199-022-01445-1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s00199-022-01445-1
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s00199-022-01445-1?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Markus K. Brunnermeier & Jonathan A. Parker, 2005. "Optimal Expectations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(4), pages 1092-1118, September.
    2. George Loewenstein & Ted O'Donoghue & Matthew Rabin, 2003. "Projection Bias in Predicting Future Utility," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(4), pages 1209-1248.
    3. Shinsuke Ikeda & Takeshi Ojima, 2021. "Tempting goods, self-control fatigue, and time preference in consumer dynamics," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 72(4), pages 1171-1216, November.
    4. Gary S. Becker & Casey B. Mulligan, 1997. "The Endogenous Determination of Time Preference," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(3), pages 729-758.
    5. Faruk Gul & Wolfgang Pesendorfer, 2001. "Temptation and Self-Control," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(6), pages 1403-1435, November.
    6. Ahn, David S. & Iijima, Ryota & Sarver, Todd, 2020. "Naivete about temptation and self-control: Foundations for recursive naive quasi-hyperbolic discounting," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    7. Jawwad Noor, 2011. "Temptation and Revealed Preference," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(2), pages 601-644, March.
    8. Read, Daniel & van Leeuwen, Barbara, 1998. "Predicting Hunger: The Effects of Appetite and Delay on Choice, , , ," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 76(2), pages 189-205, November.
    9. Larry G. Epstein & Stanley E. Zin, 2013. "Substitution, risk aversion and the temporal behavior of consumption and asset returns: A theoretical framework," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 12, pages 207-239, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    10. Kareen Rozen, 2010. "Foundations of Intrinsic Habit Formation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 78(4), pages 1341-1373, July.
    11. Noor, Jawwad, 2007. "Commitment and self-control," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 135(1), pages 1-34, July.
    12. Tomomi Tanaka & Colin F. Camerer & Quang Nguyen, 2010. "Risk and Time Preferences: Linking Experimental and Household Survey Data from Vietnam," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 557-571, March.
    13. Igor Kopylov & Jawwad Noor, 2018. "Commitments and weak resolve," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 66(1), pages 1-19, July.
    14. Faruk Gul & Wolfgang Pesendorfer, 2004. "Self-Control and the Theory of Consumption," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 72(1), pages 119-158, January.
    15. Harl E. Ryder & Geoffrey M. Heal, 1973. "Optimal Growth with Intertemporally Dependent Preferences," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 40(1), pages 1-31.
    16. Robert B. Barsky & F. Thomas Juster & Miles S. Kimball & Matthew D. Shapiro, 1997. "Preference Parameters and Behavioral Heterogeneity: An Experimental Approach in the Health and Retirement Study," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(2), pages 537-579.
    17. Shiv, Baba & Fedorikhin, Alexander, 1999. "Heart and Mind in Conflict: The Interplay of Affect and Cognition in Consumer Decision Making," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 26(3), pages 278-292, December.
    18. Lawrance, Emily C, 1991. "Poverty and the Rate of Time Preference: Evidence from Panel Data," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(1), pages 54-77, February.
    19. Michael Stern, 2006. "Endogenous time preference and optimal growth," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 29(1), pages 49-70, September.
    20. Shi, Shouyong & Epstein, Larry G, 1993. "Habits and Time Preference," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 34(1), pages 61-84, February.
    21. Stefano DellaVigna & Ulrike Malmendier, 2006. "Paying Not to Go to the Gym," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(3), pages 694-719, June.
    22. Gerelt Tserenjigmid, 2020. "On the characterization of linear habit formation," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 70(1), pages 49-93, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. T. Hayashi & R. Jain & V. Korpela & M. Lombardi, 2023. "Behavioral strong implementation," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 76(4), pages 1257-1287, November.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Shinsuke Ikeda & Takeshi Ojima, 2021. "Tempting goods, self-control fatigue, and time preference in consumer dynamics," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 72(4), pages 1171-1216, November.
    2. Mira Frick & Ryota Iijima & Tomasz Strzalecki, 2019. "Dynamic Random Utility," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(6), pages 1941-2002, November.
    3. Houser, Daniel & Schunk, Daniel & Winter, Joachim & Xiao, Erte, 2018. "Temptation and commitment in the laboratory," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 329-344.
    4. Sebastian Vollmer & Juditha Wójcik, 2017. "The long-term consequences of the global 1918 influenza pandemic: A systematic analysis of 117 IPUMS international census data sets," Courant Research Centre: Poverty, Equity and Growth - Discussion Papers 242, Courant Research Centre PEG.
    5. Noor, Jawwad & Ren, Linxia, 2023. "Temptation and guilt," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 272-295.
    6. Takashi Hayashi, 2020. "Investment in time preference and long-run distribution," The Japanese Economic Review, Springer, vol. 71(2), pages 171-190, April.
    7. Drew Fudenberg & David K. Levine, 2012. "Timing and Self‐Control," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 80(1), pages 1-42, January.
    8. Houser, Daniel & Liu, Jia & Reiley, David H. & Urbancic, Michael B., 2021. "Checking out temptation: A natural experiment with purchases at the grocery register," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 191(C), pages 39-50.
    9. Higashi, Youichiro & Hyogo, Kazuya & Takeoka, Norio, 2014. "Stochastic endogenous time preference," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 77-92.
    10. David S. Ahn & Ryota Iijima & Yves Le Yaouanq & Todd Sarver, 2017. "Behavioral Characterizations of Naivet� for Time-Inconsistent Preferences," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 2074, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    11. André Lapied & Thomas Rongiconi, 2013. "Ambiguity as a Source of Temptation: Modeling Unstable Beliefs," Working Papers halshs-00797631, HAL.
    12. Jawwad Noor, 2005. "Temptation, Welfare and Revealed Preference," Boston University - Department of Economics - Working Papers Series WP2005-15, Boston University - Department of Economics.
    13. Stefano DellaVigna, 2009. "Psychology and Economics: Evidence from the Field," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(2), pages 315-372, June.
    14. Peysakhovich, Alexander, 2014. "How to commit (if you must): Commitment contracts and the dual-self model," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 100-112.
    15. Huseynov, Samir & Palma, Marco A. & Ahmad, Ghufran, 2021. "Does the magnitude of relative calorie distance affect food consumption?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 188(C), pages 530-551.
    16. Ingmar, SCHUMACHER, 2006. "On optimality, endogeneous discounting and wealth accumulation," Discussion Papers (ECON - Département des Sciences Economiques) 2006058, Université catholique de Louvain, Département des Sciences Economiques.
    17. Griffith, Rachel & O'Connell, Martin & Smith, Kate & Cherchye, Laurens & De Rock, Bram & Vermeulen, Frederic, 2017. "A new year, a new you? Heterogeneity and self-control in food purchases," CEPR Discussion Papers 12499, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. James Andreoni & Charles Sprenger, 2012. "Estimating Time Preferences from Convex Budgets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(7), pages 3333-3356, December.
    19. Eisenbach, Thomas M. & Schmalz, Martin C., 2016. "Anxiety in the face of risk," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(2), pages 414-426.
    20. Takashi Hayashi & Michele Lombardi, 2021. "Social discount rate: spaces for agreement," Economic Theory Bulletin, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 9(2), pages 247-257, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Habit formation; Self-deception; Projection bias; Self-control fatigue; Addiction; Endogenous time preference;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D15 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Intertemporal Household Choice; Life Cycle Models and Saving
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:joecth:v:74:y:2022:i:2:d:10.1007_s00199-022-01445-1. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.