Articles About motivation
Implementation Intentions: The If-Then Sentence That Beats Willpower
implementation intentionsif-then plansgoal settingself-regulationbehavioral sciencestudy habitsprocrastinationmotivation
A 2006 meta-analysis said if-then plans double your chances. In 2025 the same researchers pooled 642 tests and found the headline number inflated.
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36
23 Aug
Competition and Social Comparison: What Grading on a Curve Does to Learning
Festinger said people prefer an objective standard and compare themselves to others only when none exists. A curve removes it. That is the problem.
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34
23 Aug
Variable Reward Schedules: Unpredictable Payoffs Are the Hardest Habit to Break
Every explainer tells you unpredictable rewards are stickier. None says why, because psychology has argued about that since 1939 and has not stopped.
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36
23 Aug
Perfectionism: The Difference Between High Standards and Self-Punishment
Psychology measures perfectionism as two separate factors. The split explains why some people thrive on demanding standards and others are broken by them.
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45
22 Aug
Procrastination: The Mood Repair Strategy That Costs You Tomorrow
Putting something off is not a failure of discipline. It is a fast way to stop feeling bad, and the bill goes to a version of you that does not exist yet.
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53
21 Aug
Mastery Goals vs Performance Goals: What You Are Really Studying For
For thirty years the advice was to study to learn and not to compete. Then somebody pooled 243 studies and found the opposite pattern in the grades.
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49
21 Aug
Self-Determination Theory: Why Rewarding a Child for Reading Makes Them Read Less
The famous meta-analysis narrows the damage to one shape of reward. What decides the outcome is not the size of the prize but its distance from reading.
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54
21 Aug