Habits
The one-sentence plan behind a 38% vs. 91% exercise gap
A one-sentence if-then plan beat motivation alone in a small exercise study. What the wider research shows, why it works, and where it falls short.
Discipline
Habits
The Habit Chain Seinfeld Disowns, and What Happens When It Breaks
Seinfeld says the X-on-a-calendar method wasn't his idea. Research on broken streaks suggests why one missed day can stall a habit, and how to plan for it.
Habits
54 gym habit tricks, tested at once on 61,293 members. Few lasted.
In a Nature megastudy, 54 four-week programs tried to get gym members to show up. About 45% raised visits; only 8% still showed an effect after they ended.
Success
The 10,000-Hour Rule Was Never a Rule. Here's What the Data Says
Ericsson's violin study never set a 10,000-hour threshold. Here's what practice research measured, how much it seems to explain, and what counts as practice.
Habits
Forget 21 days: what the habit study actually measured
The 21-day habit rule began as a surgeon's rough floor. The study that measured habits found a median of 66 days, with a range of 18 to 254.
Habits
What the marshmallow test really found about willpower
A larger study shrank the famous marshmallow result. The more useful lesson was in the original work all along: change the room, not yourself.