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The Habit Change Workbook: How to Break Bad Habits and Form Good Ones
This step-by-step, cognitive-behavioral program helps you break unwanted habits and replace them with healthy new ones. Together with extensive self-assessment and monitoring tools, it includes detailed guidance for overcoming a variety of specific habits. This book has been awarded The Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies Self-Help Seal of Merit — an award bestowed on outstanding self-help books that are consistent with cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) principles and that incorporate scientifically tested strategies for overcoming mental health difficulties. Used alone or in conjunction with therapy, our books offer powerful tools readers can use to jump-start changes in their lives.
- GenresSelf HelpNonfiction
242 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2001
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 13, 2021
This manual invites us to examine the facts regarding our habits, so, I guess, it would be fair to examine this manual, its strengths and weaknesses.
Strengths:
Things are laid out in a clear, concise and down to earth manner.
It is a workbook, it requires you to experiment with the techniques proposed which are: Record keeping; Review of Benefits/Costs of habit; Relaxation exercises (three briefly described); Competing response (that is a new habit interfering with the problematic one); Trigger management (or Stimulus Control); Diary of Thoughts & Feelings; Social support; Reward (to be reduced if too much, to increase if too little).
It offers a wide and diverge range of problematic habits to break: hair pulling, skin picking and nail biting; sleeping habits; health and fitness habits; relationship habits; excessive spending & leisure activities; problem gambling with a final section on family and group habit change.
It gives a good theoretical framework through which to view habitual behaviour: that is behaviour science: to understand the function of a behaviour through its reinforcements, and the stages of change model.
Weaknesses:
Being a workbook and having to work through the proposed exercises can be daunting so this may be a slow read.
Techniques appear to be described in a very essential way, for instance relaxation, and it possibly refers to other books on the subject. Some important techniques - such as the token economy - appears only once and it is not repeated for other problem areas.
Some problematic behaviours are very well described, such as the nervous habits and sleeping habits, making this a good non-specialized introductory manual even for clinicians, while other problematic areas I found less well explored, possibly revealing the clinical expertise, or personal interest, of the authors. Some areas need more work, such as the family and group habits, and the gambling chapters. The feeling here is that the manual was ambitious but couldn't dwell deeply enough on very specialized interventions such as problem gambling, while not writing anything incorrectly here, I wonder why someone with gambling issues would want to purchase this workbook, instead of acquiring a more specific publication.
Some areas of the manual are repetitive, using the same exact examples over and over. While this can be maybe justified by the fact that who reads one section - for instance sleeping habits - will probably won't read the chapter on skin picking, I really didn't sit well with me.
End of the line:
I did enjoy this no-nonsense workbook that contains all the essentials of habit breaking and I will be referring back to it for problem areas I don't see too often in my professional practice.
Strengths:
Things are laid out in a clear, concise and down to earth manner.
It is a workbook, it requires you to experiment with the techniques proposed which are: Record keeping; Review of Benefits/Costs of habit; Relaxation exercises (three briefly described); Competing response (that is a new habit interfering with the problematic one); Trigger management (or Stimulus Control); Diary of Thoughts & Feelings; Social support; Reward (to be reduced if too much, to increase if too little).
It offers a wide and diverge range of problematic habits to break: hair pulling, skin picking and nail biting; sleeping habits; health and fitness habits; relationship habits; excessive spending & leisure activities; problem gambling with a final section on family and group habit change.
It gives a good theoretical framework through which to view habitual behaviour: that is behaviour science: to understand the function of a behaviour through its reinforcements, and the stages of change model.
Weaknesses:
Being a workbook and having to work through the proposed exercises can be daunting so this may be a slow read.
Techniques appear to be described in a very essential way, for instance relaxation, and it possibly refers to other books on the subject. Some important techniques - such as the token economy - appears only once and it is not repeated for other problem areas.
Some problematic behaviours are very well described, such as the nervous habits and sleeping habits, making this a good non-specialized introductory manual even for clinicians, while other problematic areas I found less well explored, possibly revealing the clinical expertise, or personal interest, of the authors. Some areas need more work, such as the family and group habits, and the gambling chapters. The feeling here is that the manual was ambitious but couldn't dwell deeply enough on very specialized interventions such as problem gambling, while not writing anything incorrectly here, I wonder why someone with gambling issues would want to purchase this workbook, instead of acquiring a more specific publication.
Some areas of the manual are repetitive, using the same exact examples over and over. While this can be maybe justified by the fact that who reads one section - for instance sleeping habits - will probably won't read the chapter on skin picking, I really didn't sit well with me.
End of the line:
I did enjoy this no-nonsense workbook that contains all the essentials of habit breaking and I will be referring back to it for problem areas I don't see too often in my professional practice.
August 18, 2013
First, I have to say that I didn't read this book in its entirety, because I didn't read the habit-specific sections that didn't pertain to me (e.g., gambling). If I hadn't already been exposed to many of the ideas presented in this book, in addition to having completed a cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) workbook for adult ADHD/ADD, I undoubtedly would have found this book more fresh and original. As it stands, for me this book was a retread, although I did pick up some new ideas and strategies for dealing with my bad habit(s). I think this book would be most helpful for someone who has never gone through the process of even beginning to address a bad habit, whether that process included professional help (i.e., counseling and/or psychiatric care), reading similar books, going through some sort of self-paced CBT, etc. A person well-versed in the language of CBT might not find this book quite as useful.
(On a side note, I also found the worksheets overwhelming at times. Not a criticism of the book; it's a workbook after all, so such should be expected. Nevertheless, I'm not good at record-keeping, and most of the time when I indulge in my habit, I'm not in a place where I can whip out a piece of paper and begin writing down my automatic thoughts. I suspect that's true for many others.)
(On a side note, I also found the worksheets overwhelming at times. Not a criticism of the book; it's a workbook after all, so such should be expected. Nevertheless, I'm not good at record-keeping, and most of the time when I indulge in my habit, I'm not in a place where I can whip out a piece of paper and begin writing down my automatic thoughts. I suspect that's true for many others.)
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