Enacting Rituals to Improve Self-Control

Rituals are predefined sequences of actions characterized by rigidity and repetition. We propose that enacting ritualized actions can enhance subjective feelings of self-discipline, such that rituals can be harnessed to improve behavioral self-control. We test this hypothesis in six experiments. A field experiment showed that engaging in a pre-eating ritual over a 5-day period helped participants reduce calorie intake (Experiment 1).
Pairing a ritual with healthy eating behavior increased the likelihood of choosing healthy food in a subsequent decision (Experiment 2), and enacting a ritual prior to a food choice (i.e., without being integrated into the consumption process) promoted the choice of healthy food over unhealthy food (Experiments 3a and 3b). The positive effect of rituals on self-control held even when a set of ritualized gestures were not explicitly labeled as a ritual, and in other domains of behavioral self-control (i.e., prosocial decision-making; Experiments 4 and 5). Furthermore, Experiments 3a, 3b, 4 and 5 provided evidence for the psychological process underlying the effectiveness of rituals: heightened feelings of self-discipline. Finally, Experiment 5 showed that the absence of a self-control conflict eliminated the effect of rituals on behavior, demonstrating that rituals affect behavioral self-control specifically because they alter responses to self-control conflicts. We conclude by briefly describing the results of a number of additional experiments examining rituals in other self-control domains. Our body of evidence suggests that rituals can have beneficial consequences for self-control.







Keywords: rituals, self-regulation, self-control, health, prosociality, decision-making



As “a hallmark virtue of human character” (Prelec & Bodner, 2003, p. 277), self-control refers to the capacity to inhibit prepotent responses that are immediately gratifying but ultimately detrimental, in order to align short-term behavior with longer-term goals (Baumeister, Bratslavsky, Muraven, & Tice, 1998; Baumeister, Vohs, & Tice, 2007; Carver & Scheier, 1998). Individuals must exercise self-control to accomplish tasks ranging from eating healthily and exercising to behaving prosocially and saving money. However, people generally find exerting self-control to be challenging, and often fail despite their good intentions (Baumeister & Heatherton, 1996; Baumeister, Heatherton, & Tice, 1994; Baumeister et al., 2007; Muraven & Baumeister, 2000). Self-control failures have been linked to obesity, smoking, and binge drinking, with economic, health, and social costs for individuals and society (Baumeister, 2002; Baumeister et al., 1994). Interventions that help people to exercise self-control are therefore critical (Patrick & Hagtvedt, 2012).



We propose a simple yet effective tool to help people exercise self-control: engaging in rituals. Anecdotal evidence supports this notion: popular online blogs suggest that rituals can facilitate self-control, offering “A Simple Ritual That Will Make Your Goals ‘Stick’” (Reynolds, 2011) and describing “The Power of Ritual: Conquer Procrastination, Time Wasters, and Laziness” (Young, 2015). However, research has not empirically tested the effects of personal rituals on improving self-control. We investigate whether rituals play a causal role in facilitating self-control by randomly assigning individuals to enact rituals in contexts that require self-control – such as healthy eating and prosocial decision-making. Moreover, we document a psychological mechanism that at least in part underlies the effectiveness of rituals. The performance of rituals – characterized by rigidity and repetition – increases feelings of self-discipline; in turn, this heightened sense of self-discipline drives the effect of rituals on self-control.