MIT Explains Why Bad Habits Are Hard to Break (via LifeHacker)

But not just bad habits. Any habit. Activities and perceptions that are embedded in people’s daily lives are very difficult to overturn. In a way the scientists at MIT have found a biological basis for why culture is such a powerful phenomenon. Nearly every anthropologist would tell you that, and surprisingly few designers listen. So much design is driven by the idea that if we come up with a tech. that does something new and cool, people will happily change in order to incorporate it into their lives. If you look at what happens with most of these technologies, it’s not that they always fail, it’s that they don’t end up in the expected markets. They are adopted by niche groups who can enhance their existing cultural practices.

But there are some times when it’s just a bad idea. Case in point: the video iPod. I’m with Steve Jobs (circa 2002-2004) on this one: no one wants to watch video on a 2 inch screen. At least not in the long run. Video and audio are completely different in this respect. Portable audio is so powerful because you can stick a set of headphones in your ears, and pretty much music is music, wherever you go. (Calm down all you audiophiles…) Video, however, is embedded in our lives as big. It’s just more powerful that way, and it’s what we’re used to. The video iPod is a novelty. People will buy it at first, but then realize 2 inches isn’t fun or engaging (even on the subway or the bus, or wherever everyone says they’ll use it), and that $1.99 for a music video or a TV episode just isn’t that great in a world of DVRs/VCRs/DVDs. I predict iPod video will retreat to niche uses rather quickly - for example film-makers may use them in much the same way Peter Jackson did during filming of the LoTR trilogy.

The moral of this story: If you work hard enough at it, you can overturn existing practices to advance a new idea. But mostly, why would you want to? You’re fighting neurobiology. Certainly there are cases where the potential benefits are worth the effort to promote the transition. We might classify some of the industrial age’s profound technologies this way: electricity, railroad, telephone, PC. But 9 times out of 10 it seems to me the best idea is to design things that incorporate the way people already behave, rather than telling them they’re doing it wrong and they should come around to your way.