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Habit and plasticity

James defined plasticity as a structure weak enough to yield but strong enough not to yield all at once5. Darwin asked whether habit or structure changes first1. Later authors applied the terms to learning, neural connections and cell states789.

Earliest held
1859, Darwin
Most discussed in
The Principles of Psychology, Vols. 1-2, 1890
In the library
1,016 passages in 137 works
Rewritten
2026-10-12
18501875190019251950197520002025Darwin, 18591Darwin, 18592Binet, A., 18883James, W., 18904James, W., 18905Washburn, M. F., 19086Child, C. M., 19247Friston K, 20088Li C, Levin M, Kaplan DL, 20169
01

Habit before structure

Darwin (1859) treated habit as something selection could work on. He gave instances of diversified and changed habits within one species. He wrote that it is hard to tell, and immaterial for his argument, whether habits change first and structure afterwards, or the reverse. He thought both probably change almost together1. On instincts he concluded that compulsory habit alone sufficed for some inherited mental changes, that in other cases it did nothing and selection did all, and that in most cases the two acted together2. Binet (1888) gave a small-scale case. Vorticel infusoria that were placed in a medium poor in food became migratory and raced about in search of nutriment3.

02

James on plasticity

James (1890) began habit with matter itself. He wrote that the laws of Nature are nothing but the immutable habits of the elementary sorts of matter4. In his account organic habits vary because a compound body has a structure that outward forces or inward tensions can alter. The change may be invisible and molecular, as when iron becomes magnetic. He defined plasticity as a structure weak enough to yield to an influence, but strong enough not to yield all at once. Each relatively stable phase of such a structure shows what he called a new set of habits5.

03

Habit in animal learning

Washburn (1908) collected maze and puzzle-box studies that disagreed on whether one habit helps the next. Yerkes and Richardson reported that earlier training helped dancing mice and rats. Hunter and Yoakum found that older habits delayed learning in pigeons and squirrels. Hunter and Yarbrough concluded for white rats that a formed habit interferes with a new one, while the new one does not react unfavorably upon the old6. Washburn suggested that an apparent gain may only reflect the animal becoming used to the experimental situation. Child (1924) tied learning to gradients. In forms where outside factors can obliterate old gradients, the ability to acquire habits goes little beyond the axial gradient and its differentiation7.

04

Plasticity in modern models

Friston (2008) modelled plasticity in the brain with two coupled differential equations. His model predicts that connection strengths change more slowly than the neuronal activity they mediate8. Li, Levin and Kaplan (2016) used the word for cell identity. M1 and M2 macrophages kept the ability to switch toward the other phenotype in the presence of glibenclamide and pinacidil. They took this to mean that plasticity was preserved during membrane voltage modulation, which could then serve to fine-tune it9. The two uses differ from James's. Neither is stated as a change in a material's habits.

SourcesEach quotation was checked word for word against the passage it opens.
  1. it is difficult to tell, and immaterial for us, whether habits generally change first and structure afterwards; or whether slight modifications of structure lead to changed habits; both probably often change almost simultaneously.Darwin, 1859 · On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of… · open at passage 329
  2. In some cases com- pulsory habit alone has sufficed to produce such inhe- rited mental changes; in other cases compulsory habit has done nothingDarwin, 1859 · On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of… · open at passage 384
  3. But if they are placed in a medium affording but little nutritive material, they become as migratory as the hunters, and are seen to race about in all directions searching for more abundant nutriment.Binet, A., 1888 · The Psychic Life of Micro-organisms: A Study in Experimental Psychology · open at passage 119
  4. The laws of Nature are nothing but the immutable habits which the different elementary sorts of matter follow in their actions and reactions upon each other.James, W., 1890 · The Principles of Psychology, Vols. 1-2 · open at passage 235
  5. Plasticity, then, in the wide sense of the word, means the possession of a struc ture weak enough to yield to an influence, but strong enough not to yield all at once.James, W., 1890 · The Principles of Psychology, Vols. 1-2 · open at passage 236
  6. Hunter and Yarbrough (355) conclude from experiments on establishing auditory associations in white rats that a formed habit interferes with the formation of a new one, but that the new habit does not react unfavorably upon the old one.Washburn, M. F., 1908 · The Animal Mind: A Textbook of Comparative Psychology · open at passage 520
  7. In such forms the ability to learn, to acquire habits, goes but little beyond the most general habit of all, 7. e., the axial gradient, and more or less differentiation in relation to it.Child, C. M., 1924 · Physiological Foundations of Behavior · open at passage 682
  8. because plasticity is governed by two coupled ordinary differential equations (Equation 55), connection strengths should change more slowly than the neuronal activity they mediate.Friston K, 2008 · Hierarchical models in the brain · open at passage 80
  9. indicating that macrophage plasticity were preserved during Vmem modulation and that Vmem modulation could be a useful tool to fine-tune macrophage plasticity.Li C, Levin M, Kaplan DL, 2016 · Bioelectric modulation of macrophage polarization · open at passage 27
Linked ideas
Trial and errorrelated to
Washburn's maze studies concern how habits form and how earlier habits help or hinder new ones, the learning side of habit.
Child treats the axial gradient as the most general habit of simple organisms, which new external factors can overwrite.
Binet and Jennings describe infusorian food habits that change with the medium, an early case of behavioural plasticity.
Regenerationrelated to
Levin links high plasticity to robust morphogenetic control, including regrowth after loss of limbs and organs.
Alam et al. call cancer metabolism plastic, while Levin says plastic, regenerative animals suppress cancer readily.
James reports Lamarck's view that habits become propensities, perpetuated unchanged while the outward conditions of existence stay the same.
Passages present Xenobots and Anthrobots as examples of massive cellular plasticity: novel behaviours like kinematic self-replication from standard cells. Habit as settled action isn't discussed, so the link is via plasticity only.
Passages liken rewriting planarian target morphology via brief gap-junction blockade to synaptic plasticity: gap junctions freeze transient stimuli into stable network changes. Habit itself is never discussed.
Habit and memory in the objective sense, a modified response to past stimuli, is the question the flatworm work takes up.
The Y-maze result, a left preference after repeated reward, is a simple case of past experience shaping later choice.
Passages tie plasticity, meaning regulative or morphogenetic plasticity, to cell collectives' problem-solving competencies. They never discuss habit, so the link covers only the plasticity half of A.
Basal cognitionrelated to
Passages treat plasticity (experience-dependent change, history-based remodeling of stable states) as a core mechanism of basal cognition in non-neural cells, networks and tissues; habit itself is never discussed.
Habituation and sensitization are listed alongside Pavlovian conditioning as learning types found in simple network models.
Passages map neural plasticity and neuromodulation onto body patterning, where pre-nervous neurotransmitter signaling and bioelectric change shape form. Habit itself is never discussed, so the link runs through plasticity only.
Summation and fatigue show that repeated stimuli leave lasting traces in reflex pathways, a step toward habit.
Darwin (via James) denies instincts arise from inherited habit, favoring selection of chance tendencies; Bateson rejects shaping of plastic organisms by selection alone; Friston treats both as timescales of adaptation.
James's diffusive wave narrows with repetition, linking reflex spread to the formation of habit.
Habituation and sensitization in Aplysia are the simple nonassociative learning forms compared in the sensitization literature.
Both treat the persistence of past experience in the body as a general physiological property, not something confined to a nervous system.
Another modern case of plasticity, here in cell networks, where connection strengths change over time as in Friston's neural model.
Perseveration under depleted dopamine in the simulations resembles fixed response patterns, as a failure of set switching.
Where it is discussedPassages matching habit, plasticity, habits
1890The Principles of Psychology, Vols. 1-2 · James, W.194
1859On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of… · Darwin124
1902Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution · Kropotkin, P.71
1908The Animal Mind: A Textbook of Comparative Psychology · Washburn, M. F.34
1930The History of Biological Theories · Rádl, E.33
1906Behavior of the Lower Organisms · Jennings, H. S.29
1880The Power of Movement in Plants · Darwin, C.25
1925Elements of Physical Biology · Lotka, A. J.21
2022Technological Approach to Mind Everywhere: An Experimentally-Grounded Framework… · Levin M20
1992On Growth and Form · Thompson, D. A. W.16