Behavioral self-monitoring technique requires the keeping of useful data on the frequency and consequences of the behavior to be changed. To quit smoking, therefore, I would first have to identify the reinforcers that support my smoking habit. To identify these reinforcers would require me to be conscious of my smoking habit and consequently maintain a precise and realistic record of my smoking habit. This record would show when I smoke, for what reasons I smoke at those identified moments, how much I smoke, with whom and the effects experienced after smoking.
After identifying the intricacies of my smoking behavior including the reinforcers that have been maintaining it, I would then craft a self-treatment program to help me quit smoking. The self-treatment endeavor would involve a continued monitoring of my smoking behavior by making records in my diary detailing my progress, limitations, motivations and experiences pertaining to my responses to the adjustments I would have to make in the treatment process. Rather than set abstract and vague goals for myself, I would instead design small achievable goals that allow me to build on the next goal basing it on the accomplishment of the previous goal. Most imperative to my self-treatment would be the consciously changing the reinforcers maintaining my smoking habit.
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Having resolved to quit smoking and acquiring a diary, I was ready to begin the behavioral self-monitoring technique and self-treatment to change my undesirable habit. To better understand my problem, I had to first identify the reinforcers of my behavior through keeping a record of my smoking habits. Doing so revealed that passing time and relief from tension and anxiety feature prominently as the chief reinforcers that support my smoking addiction. To change these reinforcers, I will have to find more constructive ways to pass time. Being particularly intrigued by new knowledge, rather than stay idle and smoke to pass time, I will read books and watch informative documentaries.
To get relief from the tension and anxiety that I experience in the face of important events such as sitting an examination, meeting new people and attempting new tasks, I will make efforts to talk to people close to me and who understand my anxiety and tension in such moments rather than rely on the temporary relief that smoking offers. Additionally, realizing that I smoke the most when with my friends who also smoke, I would minimize my interactions with them to avoid the negative peer pressure that ensues. Realizing that escaping from the trap of smoke addiction is mostly a gradual and deliberate process, I will set achievable weekly targets to reduce the number of cigarettes I smoke to ensure that I smoke in a week than in the previous week to the point I can eventually manage without any instance of smoking.
