ITHACA, N.Y. — Why is it so hard to stick to New Year's resolutions all year long? A new study from Cornell University has found an answer: The key to achieving goals is less about the outcome and more about enjoying the journey.
The findings , published July 15 in Psychological Science, challenge the assumption that if a goal is important or valuable, we'll naturally be more likely to stick with it. Instead, they show people are more likely to stay committed to resolutions that are fun, engaging, and personally rewarding.
"Across several studies, including one that spanned a full year and others conducted across different cultures and behaviors like step tracking, we consistently found that intrinsic motivation — doing something because you like it — leads to immediate benefits and predicts long-term success much better than extrinsic motivation — doing something because you seek the reward," said co-author Kaitlin Woolley , professor of marketing and management at the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management.
In one study, the team tracked 2,000 U.S. adults for a full year after setting New Year's resolutions. Every few months, the researchers asked the study participants how motivated they felt, both in terms of enjoyment and importance of their goals, and how well they were adhering to their objectives.
"People who found their goals intrinsically enjoyable and motivating were much more likely to stick with them throughout the year," said Woolley.
The researchers then repeated the study in China to see if the results would hold in a different culture. Despite cultural differences in goal-setting values, the pattern was the same: Intrinsic motivation mattered more and prompted the participants to stick with their objectives.
In another study designed to promote goal pursuit, the team asked participants to use a health app that scans the barcode of everyday products (e.g., food, cosmetics) to learn about their health impacts. Participants told to focus on how fun and interesting the app was to use scanned 25% more items in 24 hours than those told to focus on its usefulness.
"We learned that people often predict that extrinsic motivation would be more useful in goal setting," said Woolley. "That belief could be holding them back though, because if a goal feels like a chore, they're less likely to keep doing it, no matter how much they want the outcome."
