Should Goal-Strivers Think About ''Why'' or ''How'' to Strive? It Depends on Their Skill Level

Introduction

  • The study investigates how individuals can internalize difficult or unpleasant goals using low-level or high-level writing interventions.
  • It is based on the action identification theory, which suggests an optimal match between skill level and goal cognition enhances motivation.
  • People with lower skills benefit more from writing about the "how" of goals, while those with higher skills benefit from writing about the "why."
  • The research addresses overcoming ambivalence towards necessary but aversive tasks.

Internalizing Personal Goals

  • Self-determination theory (SDT) emphasizes the importance of the type of motivation for behavioral performance.
  • Autonomous motivation involves choice and personal endorsement, while controlled motivation involves internal or external pressure.
  • Autonomous Motivation: Characterized by intrinsic desire and personal endorsement.
  • Controlled Motivation: Characterized by internal or external pressure.
  • Autonomous motivation leads to persistence and success in areas like academic engagement, health practices, and job satisfaction.
  • The Perceived Locus of Causality (PLOC) framework identifies types of motivation on a continuum from external to introjected to identified motivation.
    • External Motivation: Behavior driven by external pressure.
    • Introjected Motivation: Behavior driven by self-pressure and ego-involvement.
    • Identified Motivation: Behavior driven by personal value and importance.
  • Internalization is fostered when authority figures support autonomy by providing choice and meaningful rationales.
  • The study explores whether individuals can facilitate their own internalization without external intervention through cognitive activity.

Optimality of the Match Between Task Difficulty and Task Representation

  • Action identification theory posits that effective behaviors result from matching task difficulty with cognitive representation.
  • Individuals represent behaviors along a continuum of meaningfulness, from concrete steps ("how") to personal significance ("why").
  • Lower-level identification is better for difficult tasks, while higher-level identification is better for easy tasks.
  • Mismatch between identification and task difficulty disrupts engagement, causing identity inflation (high identification for difficult tasks) or fragmentation (low identification for easy tasks).
  • Control theory and Csikzentmihalyi’s model of flow also emphasize the importance of matching task difficulty and perception or skill level.
  • Breaking down difficult tasks into smaller components increases the likelihood of success for less skilled individuals, fostering internalization.

Internalization as an Outcome of the Optimal Match

  • The research examines whether the quality of motivation is an outcome of matching task difficulty and level of identification, focusing on personal goals requiring sustained engagement.
  • Autonomous motivation towards difficult goals is enhanced when the ability or skills match the level of goal identification.
  • Individuals already skilled benefit from high-level identification, focusing on the goal’s ultimate importance to reduce inner conflict.
  • Individuals lacking skills benefit from concrete planning, focusing on the low-level identity of the goal.
  • Lack of clear strategies leads to experiencing goals as pressing obligations, resulting in controlled motivation, which impacts autonomous motivation negatively.
  • Concrete plans increase persistence and goal attainment, leading to increased self-efficacy which helps internalize goals.
  • The study tests the interaction hypothesis that high skill individuals increase internalization with self-reflection on meaning, while low skill individuals increase internalization with detailed planning.

Study 1

  • It is an experimental study focused on health goals, pursued out of self-pressure and guilt, where participants think of a health goal.
  • Participants self-reflect about the value/importance (high level) or create a step-by-step guideline (low level).
  • Internalization is assessed before and after writing.
  • Prediction: High-level writers increase internalization if they perceive high skills, while low-level writers increase internalization if they perceive low skills.
  • Method:
    • 90 students from the University of Missouri-Columbia were involved.
    • Participants completed demographic measures and listed their own health goal.
    • Skill level was assessed on a 5-point scale.
    • Internalization was assessed using a perceived locus of causality (PLOC) measure.
      • It listed four statements representing external, introjected, identified, and intrinsic regulation.
      • The internalization score was calculated using the formula: 2 * intrinsic + identified - introjected - 2 * external.
    • Participants completed a writing exercise based on their assigned condition.
    • Internalization was assessed again after the writing exercise.

Inducing Low Versus High Level Thinking via a Writing Exercise

  • Writing interventions were used to elicit cognitive activity regarding goals.
  • Participants were randomly assigned to high level or low level writing exercises.
  • High-level condition:
    • Participants reflected on the importance and meaning of pursuing their health goal, linking it to broader life goals and personal values.
  • Low-level condition:
    • Participants wrote about specifically pursuing their health goal the following day, describing all associated behaviors.

Results and Discussion

  • Participants' skill levels did not significantly differ between the two conditions (t(88) = .00, p = 1.00), nor did their level of internalization before (t(88) = .59, p = .56) or after (t(88) = .11, p = .91) the writing exercise.
  • Internalization increased marginally significantly among participants overall (M = 5.02, SD = 4.21 before, M = 5.47, SD = 4.33 after, t(89) = -1.93, p = .06).
  • Interaction of Level of Writing by Skill Level:
    • Hierarchical linear regression analysis was performed.
    • The interaction term was significant (F(1, 82) = 8.66, b = -.15, p < .01).
    • In the high-level writing condition, participants increased in internalization to the extent that their level of skill was high (b = .23, p < .001).

Supplementary Analysis

  • A supplementary analysis employed a measure of autonomous motivation, comprising the mean of intrinsic and identified motivation
  • The reliability of the two-item measure of autonomous motivation (a = .62 at T1, a = .77 at T2) was better.
  • Consistent with the results of the original internalization measure, a significant effect of the interaction of level of writing by skill level on participants’ autonomous motivation towards their health goal (F(1, 82) = 4.47, b = -.12, p < .04) was found.

Study 2

  • All participants pursued the academic goal of "keeping up with schoolwork."
  • It was a longitudinal experimental study investigating internalization of the goal over several weeks.
  • Participants completed three writing exercises over the first 3 weeks of the study.
  • Internalization was reassessed to determine any change.
  • It was hypothesized that an interaction of skill level and writing level would predict participants’ expectancies about their semester grades.
  • Participants with lower skill were more likely to report higher expected GPA after low-level writing, while participants with higher skill were reported greater expected GPA when matched with the high-level writing condition.
  • Method:
    • 66 students from the University of Missouri-Columbia participated in the study.
    • The study was longitudinal, with four time points (T1 - T4) of data collection, over a period of seven to 8 weeks.
    • At T1, participants were introduced to their goal for the semester ("keeping up with schoolwork"), which was followed by the PLOC measure to assess goal internalization.
    • Participants completed their first writing exercise, followed by manipulation check items.
    • For two consecutive weeks after this initial survey (T2 and T3), participants repeated the 15-min writing exercise on the same topic.
    • Four or 5 weeks later (T4), participants’ level of internalization of the goal "keeping up with schoolwork" was measured again to examine changes since T1.

Measures in Study 2

  • Skill level was assessed by asking participants to report their ACT score to assess their academic aptitude.
  • Internalization was measured using the same PLOC procedure, subtracting ratings for external (double-weighted) and introjected motivation from ratings for identified and intrinsic (double-weighted) motivation.
    • Autonomous motivation change between T1 and T4 was examined, similar to Study 1.
  • Goal expectancy was measured at T4 by asking participants to list all of their current courses and report the expected letter grade.

Results and Discussion of study 2

  • ACT score (i.e., academic skill) did not differ significantly between the two conditions (t(64) = .03, p = .98), nor did grade expectancies (t(60) = .67, p = .51).
  • The mean level of internalization towards the academic goal was significantly different between the two groups at T1 (t(63) = -2.28, p = .03).
  • Interaction of level of writing by skill level:
    • Our hypothesis was again supported; the main effect variables at the first step were not significant at p < .05, but there was a significant interaction effect of skill level and condition (level of writing) on change in internalization (F(1, 62) = 5.20, b = -.23, p = .03).

Supplementary analysis of study 2

  • A supplementary analysis is again presented using autonomous motivation [i.e. (intrinsic + identified)/2], which demonstrated greater reliability (T1 a = .61, T4 a = .72) compared to the initial measure of internalization.
  • . Consistent with previous results, the interaction term of level of writing by skill level on participants’ significantly predicted participants’ autonomous motivation towards their academic goal (F(1, 62) = 7.10, b = -.28, p = .01) while the main effects were not significant (p < .41).
  • In the high-level writing condition, participants’ level of skill positively, although not significantly, predicted an increased in autonomous motivation (b = .28, p = .18), while skill level among participants in the low-level writing condition negatively predicted autonomous motivation across time (b = -.33, p = .03).
  • Our results suggest that individuals who are more academically competent may not internalize their academic goal if they are instructed to think about their goal at a lower level.

General Discussion

  • Increasing internalization of difficult goals depends on the level at which individuals think about their goals and their skill proficiency level and aptitude.
  • When individuals have the adequate skills to carry out a goal and are encouraged to focus on their goal at a more abstract, meaningful level, rather than at a concrete, detailed level, their motivation receives a boost.
  • When individuals are not sufficiently prepared to carry out the tasks associated with the goal, they benefit when they focus on the technical aspects of accomplishing the associated tasks.
  • There is no "one-size-fits-all" intervention that all individuals can apply to their goals to reap motivational benefits.
  • Individuals have the capacity to self-catalyze the internalization of their own motivations through an internal cognitive process.

Applying Action Identification Theory to Autonomous Motivation

  • According to action identification theory how individuals cognitively represent their behavior influences how they engage in that behavior.
  • Individuals’ level of skill in performing the given behavior plays a moderating role in the relationship between the cognitive representation and the subsequent behavior engagement and performance.
  • When the level of identification is high for difficult tasks, individuals are distracted from attending to the concrete steps that enable them to complete the task.
  • When the task at hand is familiar and easy, a low level identification engenders unnecessary focus on the technical and concrete details and ultimately disrupts a smooth flow of action.

Limitations and Future Directions

  • Demand characteristics may be present in the studies, particularly in Study 1, in which participants made ratings immediately prior and after their writing exercise.
  • The fact that skill in each study was assessed using previously untested single-item measures should be noted.
  • The PLOC yielded unusually low alphas due to the positive correlations between identified and introjected motivation.
  • Future research on this topic should consider using more reliable scales of motivation.
  • Future studies could broaden the range of dependent measures examined within our writing intervention paradigm to test the model.