A Behavioral Change Essay

A Behavioral Change: My Shopping Habits

There are many behaviors that people see in themselves and wish they could change or sometimes try changing but it turns out either positive or negative.   The behaviors in people may be the smallest problem such as hitting the snooze button too much and not waking up or a person’s behavior might be a big problem such as cigarette smoking and trying to quit.   For me, I noticed a huge problem with myself that I consider kind of a big problem in my behavior.   I noticed that when I would get bored or just get out of class, I would automatically feel a need to go spend money even when I did not need to get anything.   The behavior or habit that I would like to change in myself is to start saving money by not shopping for clothes, shoes, purses, ect…when I obviously need to sit and really think if the something I want to go buy is a “need” or a “want.”  
It’s a beautiful day and I get out of class.   What is the first thing that pops in my head?   To go straight home and maybe get a head start on some homework or go home and just relax? No.   Not in my case.   I will find anyway to either go by myself or with my friends to go shopping at the mall or right in Danada square with some of my favorite stores like Express and Victoria’s Secret.   My closet is bulging with clothes and my mom notices everyday that I have something new on.   I started noticing that I had a bad habit of not controlling my money and that I took the money that I earned at work to a bad advantage for myself.   For this behavior modification project in Psychology it was a very easy task to come up with a behavioral change.
When the behavior project did not start I monitored and kept track of every time I would spend money on unnecessary things.   I took a deep look at the one week chart and the total amount of money that I spent in that week alone was over five hundred dollars.   To me and probably to anyone else, that seems a little overboard.   I set up a reward...