Getting things done: Self-regulatory processes in goal pursuit

Abstract

Self-regulation is the process by which people direct their thoughts, feelings, and actions in order to achieve their goals. For example, how does a person control their alcohol consumption or remember to feed the cat? A starting point for understanding self-regulation is the concept of intention, which is assumed to capture the motivational factors that influence behaviour. However, recent experimental evidence suggests that a ‘medium-to-large’ change in intention leads only to a ‘small-to-medium’ change in subsequent behaviour. Investigation of the volitional issues that people face when trying to act on their intentions reveals that intentions are more likely to be translated into behaviour if they are supplemented with specific plans about when, where, and how to perform be aviour (known as ‘implementation intentions’, Gollwitzer, 1999). Furthermore, there is evidence that motivation and volition interact such that implementation intentions only benefit self-regulation when respective goal intentions are strong and activated. The final part of this review considers evidence for two mechanisms which may underlie the beneficial effects of implementation intentions; namely, heightened accessibility of specified situational cues and strong cue-response linkages.

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