Bring in Reinforcements
Around 40% of us will make New Year's resolutions, yet according to a 2023 Forbes survey, most resolutions last 3.7 months…if that! So about now, if you haven't already, you're probably looking at bailing or have started sneaking little 'cheat days' into your routine. Am I right?
The 1950s Health Belief Model reconciles the conflict between people knowing what they 'should' be doing, but not doing it. Anyone who smokes or vapes must be familiar with this. This theory recognises that there is an opportunity cost to taking the action (hello Year 11 Economics!). We are more motivated by things happening in the current moment, like our need for stress release, than something that could happen in the future (lung cancer). What does this mean? The today factor is more powerful than the threat of repercussions down the track.
So, with New Year's resolutions in mind, how can we move beyond March and make our resolutions stick? How do we make them important to stick to today and everyday?
Introducing Reinforcements:
Day to day support systems to reinforce positive behaviours and mitigate negative ones.
Negative reinforcements: trigger action to avoid consequences
These little bad boys are for those that want to get up early to gym or meditate, but can't seem to get themselves out of bed. Negative reinforcements initiate behaviours by driving us to remove negative stimuli. I.e. applying sunscreen to avoid sunburn or having a shower to avoid smelling. We can use these to generate behaviours that we want to to begin. So we ask ourselves: How can I make the outcome of not doing my resolution WORSE than doing it? For example, if your goal is to workout in the morning but you can't force yourself up, you could put your alarm in the room next to you. If you choose not to get up, the alternative is to listen to it while you try to go back to sleep. Not fun. Thus, you've made it harder to avoid your resolution by making the alternative worse.
Positive reinforcements - trigger action through reward
These techniques are all about rewarding you for your efforts. Whether it's praise, gifts or star charts, we use these reinforcements to drive us towards positive action. Most of us don't go to work just because we feel like it. Our main driver is that we get a paycheck at the end of it. So how can we bring positive rewards to resolutions? Sticking with the theme of getting up to exercise...here's some ideas:
make it social by roping in a friend or making it fun with exercise in disguise = walks with friends, zumba, dance class
if retail therapy is your thing, set up a reward chart that lets you buy yourself something every 10 workouts you do
book in for a challenge, race or community group, bringing socialisation and the added incentive of prizes and certificates
Combined reinforcement - do the negative to get the positive
This last one is a goodie, based on the Premack principle - making access to our preferred activity contingent on completing less preferred activity. So, if we want to eat chocolate, we make that contingent on eating our dinner or some fruit first. Or perhaps drinking that morning coffee or watching TV is contingent on you exercising first. The reward comes after the cost. And in the end the cost is good for you, eventually providing physical, mental and social benefits that will trigger you to do it again without the need for contingencies. trigger action through reward
So, after all this, what resonates? Is there an easy reinforcement you can integrate to get you back on the resolution bandwagon? Who knows, you might make it to the end of the year for once...
