Essay, Research Paper: Behavior Change

The primary goal of my behavior change project is not to quit smoking, but to cut back on the amount of cigarettes that I smoke per day. Since I enjoy smoking after I eat, I plan to allow myself a cigarette after each meal, after that I am allowing myself three other cigarettes per day. This will total six cigarettes per day, which may seem like a lot to some people, but this is a dramatic cutback. This is a six week project, in which each week I will subtract one cigarette from the total, until I reach zero cigarettes per day.
I feel that this goal was definitely attainable and realistic. If I would have followed the planned routine then this plan would have been effective. The goal was a definite challenge seeing that I would usually smoke at the least, half a pack of cigarettes per day. Though the plan was a good plan I wasn t able to stick to it. If I was to change anything about the plan it would be that I would give my cigarettes to a friend and they would give one at that time.
The biggest barrier to the plan is being around other friends who smoke. When they lite up it automatically makes me want a cigarette. Another barrier is partying with my friends, everyone knows that when you consume alcohol it enhances your desire to smoke. Alcohol makes you smoke like a chimney! A helpful measure to overcome this barrier would be to chew more gum or to have a toothpick or a straw in my mouth. I
don t believe that I am addicted to nicotine I just think I have an oral fixation, I ve got to have something in my mouth, this probably stems from a thumb sucking problem I had when I was little.
Sure enough I encountered both of these barriers which were often at the same time. These barriers were the number one contributors which kept me from achieving my primary goal. One barrier which I never mentioned in the plan was simply wasting time, maybe between classes or just when I m bored. This barrier was unanticipated.
My evaluation plan will include a chart in which I will pin up a used cigarette butt for each day that I achieve my goal. An X would indicate that I didn t achieve my goal for the day.
This plan never really worked, after the second week I found that I had way more X s than butts.
The rewards for accomplishing my goal would be that I would feel so much healthier and would know that if there was a goal which was important to accomplish that I could do it.
This project wasn t to rewarding, seeing that I didn t come remotely close to accomplishing my goal. Maybe if I had a bigger and better incentive to quit smoking and a figure to look over me while trying to change this behavior.
Conclusion
Although this behavior change project was not effective in helping me to quit smoking, it did help me realize that I do have a smoking problem and need to try and come up with a more effective plan to help me to quit smoking.