Breaking the rules: Why do people behave in the way they do?

In the following summary I will try to briefly explain some of the main themes that
answer this question and how we can try to convince people to keep to the rules to
ensure their own safety and that of those around them.

Rules
Human behaviour is largely constrained by the rules that govern particular situations
and environments. We are constantly obliged to behave in a particular way, or to avoid
certain behaviours. These rules may be formal regulations such as laws, or they may
be informal rules of 'social etiquette', which are not written down but are implicit
within the situation itself.
'Moral' rules exist to safeguard our own welfare, and the welfare and the rights of
other people around us, whereas others, 'social-conventional' rules, merely exist in
order that our system can continue to operate with as little conflict as possible. This
fundamental distinction concerns the perceived consequences of rule violations for
other people; why does a particular rule exist? We must differentiate here between
moral rules and social-conventional rules (eg: Smetana, 1981). Transgressions of
moral rules result in direct infringements of people's rights and welfare. For example,
we have formal laws forbidding assault and theft, and informal rules about not
cheating on one's partner or shouting unwarranted verbal insults. Social-conventional
transgressions are considered to be less serious. They violate the arbitrary and agreedupon conventions that co-ordinate the behaviour of individuals within social systems;
for example, failing to make a tax return, TV licence evasion or talking to yourself in
public places. There is strong evidence (eg: Smetana, 1985) that children are able to
distinguish between these types of transgression from an early age and throughout
early adulthood, and that moral transgressions are considered far more serious than
infringements of social-conventional rules.
In general, moral transgressions trigger one of the 'moral emotions'; guilt, shame,
remorse or empathy (eg: Blair, 1995). These emotions act as internal 'cues' to prevent
future transgressions. Social-conventional transgressions do not directly initiate these
internal emotional cues, but depend on the threat of legal punishment or social
disapproval to maintain appropriate behaviour.
In general, if people adhere to the rules, then any system will work smoothly, every
individual will co-operate with one another, and everyone's welfare will be ensured.
After all, this is why the rules exist. However, people don't always keep to the rules.
'Accidents' happen, generally because a rule has been broken somewhere along the
line. Breaking a rule reduces the safety margins that rules inherently provide, and
increases the likelihood of an 'accident'. Frequently this rule-breaking behaviour is not
the result of a deliberate act, but is committed without conscious intent. What causes
this behaviour, and how can it be prevented?

Attitudes vs behaviour
Attitudes have generally been considered as 'steering' behaviour in some fairly
concrete way. Traditionally, it is thought that if you change someone's attitudes, then
their behaviour will also change to fall in line with those changes. However, although
there is evidence showing that this approach can work (eg: Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975), it
has been suggested that it is not often the case, and even when it is, those changes in
behaviour are not as great as one would expect (Howarth, 1988). In addition, there is a
problem in measuring attitudes - the attitudes that an individual claims to support are
only true at the moment that they are requested. A large number of factors will affect
those stated attitudes. Consider a Fire Officer asking a youth about their attitude
towards smoking in bed, after they have just attended a talk on the dangers of
domestic fires. Can we assume that this measure is accurate and likely to predict
behaviour? It is unlikely, and although this is an extreme example, the same effects
can be seen whenever a measure of attitude is taken.

Habits
An attitude is essentially a 'behavioural intention'; how we would like to behave at the
time that we are asked. The trouble is that there are a huge variety of things that stop
us from behaving in the way we say we would like to behave. One of the strongest
influences is habit (Ronis, Yates & Kirscht, 1989; Ouellette & Woods, 1998); how we
have always behaved in the past when a particular set of circumstances has arisen. We
may think that smoking in bed after a few beers is potentially dangerous, but if that is
what we have always done when we get home from a night out, then we will continue
to do so regardless. Throughout our lives, habits form the strongest basis for
predicting behaviour (see Verplanken & Aarts, in press).

Why do habits form?

Humans have only a limited cognitive capacity (Miller, 1956); we can only think
about a certain number of things at a time. The less thought that goes into our day-today lives, the better. As a result of this, we have adapted the way in which we use this
finite capacity. Habits enable us to deal with situations that we have encountered
before (and possibly had to think about quite carefully), without expending too much
of that precious cognitive capacity. We don't have to think particularly hard about
what we are doing; we don't have to pay too much attention to our environment or to

our actions. We can think about other, more important things, while still being able to
live our day-to-day lives.

How do habits form?

Over a period of time, we learn to behave in a particular way when we encounter a set
of circumstances that we recognise. There is evidence that suggests that habits start
off as 'implementation intentions' (Gollwitzer, 1993), or decisions that state, "when X
happens, I will do Y". For example, "When I have got home from a night out, got
undressed and into bed, and before I turn the light out, I will smoke a cigarette",
or "When I get home from work, I will slump in front of the TV all evening or go to the
gym or take my wife and kids to the cinema". These implementation intentions are
likely to be strongly influenced by our personality, as it is our personality traits that
dictate how we perceive the world around us and how we react to the things that we
experience. This is particularly true of habits that involve rule-breaking behaviour.

The effects of personality

To the majority of the population, the transgression of a rule generally has an implicit
aversiveness that prohibits acts of rule violation (Lykken, 1995). We don't break rules
because it 'doesn't feel right' to do so. Some elements of personality can determine
whether we will break rules or not, particularly when the moral/social-conventional
distinction is taken into consideration (Burgess, 1996).
We all have urges to do certain things, to behave in a particular way that might
involve breaking rules. The personality characteristics that determine these urges
would predict behaviour very well if no rules existed to constrain our behaviour - the
situation involves no rules, there is nobody to get hurt and no price to pay for rule
transgressions. If we are certain that there will be none of these negative
consequences, we might engage in the kind of behaviour modern society considers to
be antisocial and illegal.
Assuming that an individual has the urge to behave in such a way, this is where a
second set of personality characteristics becomes important. These traits will
determine how likely an individual is to consider themselves bound by the rules.
Some people will follow the rules to the letter, some will follow only those rules that
they consider legitimate and justified, and a very small proportion will not abide by
any rule that prevents them from achieving their goals. Using pen-and-paper

personality scales it is possible to predict, with a fair degree of accuracy, how an

individual will perceive the rules and how likely they will be to abide by them.
However, all this assumes that we are conscious of the rule-breaking behaviours that
we are engaging in, and are able to think logically and rationally about it. The trouble
is that the existence of a habit will prevent this logical, rational process from taking
place. Simply recognising certain elements of our environment will trigger our
habitual response and we won't think about our subsequent behaviour any further.
Habits can become established quite early in life and, as described earlier, personality
characteristics may have a large part to play in determining the nature of these habits.
However, certain elements of personality change as we get older, especially those
elements that determine our drives and urges. Once a habit is established it will
determine our behaviour, even though the initial motivations for that behaviour may
no longer exist. The fact that the behaviour is 'automatic' means that even if we are
breaking rules, we can largely ignore those transgressions because we are no longer 'in
control' of those behaviours.

What effects do habits have?

One of the fundamental reasons that we develop these habits is to reduce the amount
of information in our environment that we need to attend to in order to decide how to
behave. As a result, we are able to do more things, or more complex things, and most
of the time we can do them successfully. However, we tend to generalise the
circumstances in which we engage in these habitual behaviours. In other words, we
miss things in the environment, 'external cues', that might tell us that the habitual
behaviour is not appropriate in that specific set of circumstances. In addition, the
behaviours we engage in become less complex and varied, as we ignore the 'fine
detail' of situations and as a result end up with a limited number of rigid patterns of
behaviour that are resistant to change. This increases the likelihood that the behaviour
we choose will be inappropriate, simply because we are not taking all of the
environmental and situational information into account before we act.

'Mind-sets'
It is likely that we will establish a collection of habitual responses to a variety
elements in the environment. We can describe this set of habits as a 'mindset' (Gollwitzer, 1993, 1996). This mind-set will direct our conscious attention only

towards particular types of relevant information in the environment. For example,

when someone is considering a choice of goals, a 'deliberative'mind-set may be
activated that comprises an open mind for new information and promotes relatively
objective information processing - in other words, we are thinking; "How do I sort
this one out then?". However, an 'implemental' mind-set will focus attention on
particular information regarding where, when and how to act, and is characterised by
closed-mindedness, or; "I know what to do - let's get on with it". Once a behavioural
act is initiated, an 'actional' mind-set will focus the individual's attention exclusively
on aspects of the self and environment that sustain that behaviour; in other words,
they will be thinking something like, "This bit goes there, and then I do that". Recent
research (Verplanken, Aarts, van Knippenberg, & Moonen, A.; 1998) has suggested
that a habitual mind-set may enhance the perceptual readiness for habit-related cues,
and prevent the individual from being distracted and adopting other, less efficient
courses of action. This mind-set acts as a kind of enduring 'default' cognitive
orientation that is inherently associated with the habitual behaviour, although it may
be present all the time, and not only during the time that a habitual action is actually
executed.
The upshot of all this is that when we find ourselves in a familiar environment, it is
very likely that we will think and behave in a habitual, preordained way, without
looking around us for unexpected elements of the environment. This will obviously
leave us open to making errors of judgement in our behaviour, which may have
serious consequences for our safety, and that of those around us.

How do we stop inappropriate habits from forming?

There is very little that can be done to persuade the small percentage of the population
that will not abide by the rules regardless of the consequences. However, some rules
are broken by a large proportion of the population, due to the way in which those rules
are commonly perceived. The rules' legitimacy and the justification for abiding by
those rules should be emphasised in the strongest possible way. Highlighting the
negative consequences for other people ('moral' basis for the rules) will reinforce this
justification, and make compliance more likely. It is important to emphasise other
people's rights and welfare, because otherwise it is only the individual's personal
safety that is at risk. Personal safety is inherently nobody else's business but our own,
and therefore if someone imposes rules on us 'for our own safety', we are likely to feel
patronised and ignore them. If someone wants to risk their own safety, then why
shouldn't they? However, in threatening the welfare of other people, the rule
transgression emerges from the 'personal' sphere into the 'public' sphere, thus
becoming subject to the legitimate concerns of others (seeVerkuyten, 1992;

Verkuyten, Roodpijpers, Elffers & Hessing, 1994). Emphasising the effects of

particular rule transgressions on others makes those transgressions more aversive, and
therefore less likely.
Because habits are formed fairly quickly as a result of experience of a particular
environment or set of circumstances, it is important to introduce the moral
justification for the relevant rules from the moment the individual enters the new
environment or experiences the new set of circumstances for the first time. In the
majority of cases, this means as early as possible in the life of the individual.

How can we change existing habits?

Again, by emphasising the moral justification of particular rules we can make
compliance more likely. Furthermore, we can counteract the effects of the mind-set by
deliberately drawing attention towards elements of the environment that might
otherwise have been considered irrelevant and ignored. Drawing attention to specific
safety-related elements can counteract the deficiencies in our cognitive capacity by
providing the basis for new, safer habits. After a time, these habits will require no
more conscious attention than the inappropriate ones, but will reduce the likelihood
that rules will be broken and consequently reduce the risk to the individual.
Obviously the specifics of each rule and situation will dictate exactly how this is
achieved, but the theme is consistent. People ignore vital information in the
environment which, if taken into consideration, could cause them to question their
habitual responses. Given a strong enough argument in favour of change, reminders in
the environment and perhaps some form of additional incentive, people's
inappropriate habits can be changed, and more appropriate behaviours take their
place.