Evaluating the impact of individuals’ morningness-eveningness on the effectiveness of a habit-formation intervention for a simple and a complex behavior

Planning-based interventions are often used to help individuals form habits. Existing literature suggests a one-size-fits all approach to habit formation, but planning interventions may be optimized if tailored to individual differences and/or behavioral complexity. We test the hypothesis that planning to do a relatively complex behaviour (exercise) at a time that matches an individuals’ diurnal preference will facilitate behavioral engagement; whereas for a simpler behaviour (calcium supplementation), the optimal time-of-day for a new behavior will occur in the morning. Young, women volunteers (N=317) were randomly assigned to take calcium supplements or to exercise for 4 weeks and to control (no planning) or to one of three planning interventions (morning plan; evening plan; unassigned-time plan). Participants reported diurnal preference at baseline and habit strength and behavioral frequency weekly. Fitbit Zips and Medication Event Monitoring System Caps (MEMS) were used to objectively assess behavioral engagement. Multilevel modelling found that calcium supplementation was greatest for morning-types in the morning-cue condition, whereas exercise was greatest for morning types with morning cues and evening-types with evening cues. Habit-formation strategies may depend on diurnal preference and behavioral complexity. Future research can evaluate the role of other individual differences.