Implementation Intentions and Goal Achievement: A Meta-analysis of Effects and Processes
This is the meta-analysis of implementation intentions, the technique of specifying in advance the situation in which you will act and exactly what you will do, in the form of an if-then plan. The distinction it rests on is between a goal intention, which states what you want to achieve, and an implementation intention, which states when, where and how. The claim tested across the studies is that most people have no difficulty forming goals and considerable difficulty noticing the moment to act on them, and that naming the moment in advance closes that gap by making the situation itself trigger the behaviour, in the way a habit does, except deliberately. The review reports that the technique substantially improves the rate at which goals are attained, across a wide range of behaviours, and examines the processes by which it works. This page describes the technique from public material, because no abstract of the chapter is publicly available.
This is the meta-analysis of implementation intentions, the technique of specifying in advance the situation in which you will act and exactly what you will do, in the form of an if-then plan. The distinction it rests on is between a goal intention, which states what you want to achieve, and an implementation intention, which states when, where and how. The claim tested across the studies is that most people have no difficulty forming goals and considerable difficulty noticing the moment to act on them, and that naming the moment in advance closes that gap by making the situation itself trigger the behaviour, in the way a habit does, except deliberately. The review reports that the technique substantially improves the rate at which goals are attained, across a wide range of behaviours, and examines the processes by which it works. This page describes the technique from public material, because no abstract of the chapter is publicly available.
Written from the public account of the technique this paper reviews.
What our sources record
Reproduced as it was written when this source was checked, figures and all.
Gollwitzer, P. M. & Sheeran, P. (2006). "Implementation intentions and goal achievement: a meta-analysis of effects and processes." Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 38, 69-119.
Where we use it
- Nobody Is Born Consistent, Why We Move
Reliability of this reference
The link below was matched against the publisher's record on title, first author and year, and all three agree.
The source
https://doi.org/10.1016/s0065-2601(06)38002-138002-1)
DOI: 10.1016/s0065-2601(06)38002-1