If-then plans help people follow through

In one line: a plan that names the moment and the action (“when this happens, I’ll do that”) helps people act on intentions they already have, more often than the intention on its own.

What Gollwitzer did

This isn’t a new experiment. It’s an overview, written by a psychologist for a widely read journal, that pulled together several years of studies on one simple idea.

Gollwitzer had first described the idea in 1993. By 1999 there were enough studies, his own and other people’s, to make the case. In a typical study, one group of people was given a goal and simply said they intended to do it. A second group also decided exactly when and where they would do it. Then the researchers checked who actually did it. In one well-known study, students were asked to write a short report about how they spent Christmas Eve, and to send it within two days. Those who had decided when and where they would write it were much more likely to send it in.

What he argued

• Wanting isn’t enough. People often fail to act on what they intend. Usually that’s not because they don’t care. It’s because the intention says what they want, but not when, where or how. So they have to decide all over again each time, and on a busy day that decision often doesn’t get made.
• A plan links a moment to an action. He called these plans implementation intentions: “when situation X comes up, I will do Y”. The moment becomes the reminder.
• It hands the decision to the moment. Once the plan is made, the right moment tends to catch your eye, and the action is easier to start, often with little conscious effort. You’ve already decided.
• It helps at different stages. The studies he reviewed suggested plans help people get started, and help them keep going when distractions or old habits get in the way.

How much should you trust it?

Well supported in research since; the effect is real but usually moderate, and less tested at work.

• The paper is a review, not a test in itself. The studies it gathered were mostly small, and many used university students and fairly simple tasks.
• The idea has held up well. A 2006 review by Gollwitzer and Sheeran pooled 94 studies and found a clear effect. See the Gollwitzer & Sheeran (2006) summary.
• How it works is still debated. Some later research suggests plans work partly by making people more alert to the moment, rather than by making the action fully automatic.
• Few studies have looked at staff changing their practice after training, in healthcare or elsewhere. Wards and clinics are busier and less predictable than a lab.

If you need to convince someone

In our words (a paraphrase, not a quotation): a wish says what you want; a plan says when and where you’ll do it. People act on plans more often than on wishes.

What it means for you

1. Ask for a plan, not a promise. At the end of your teaching, ask people to finish this sentence: “When [a moment I’ll definitely meet], I will [one specific thing].”
2. Make the moment concrete. “When I’m teaching” is too vague to notice. “When the student nurse arrives for the Tuesday late shift” is a moment someone will recognise.
3. Pick moments that already happen. Handover, the first drug round, booking in a new patient, the start of a home visit. The moment should come round whether or not the person remembers the plan.
4. Start with what people need to do differently. If you can’t name the action, people can’t plan it. Writing the plan is a quick test of whether your teaching had a clear point.

How it appears in Teaching That Lands

This paper is the reason for the ask at the end of Sessions 1 and 2: a specific intention, written on a card in the room, with when or where added, photographed, and read back at the start of the next session. In Session 3 there is no card. The completed design canvas takes its place, plus one named person who will hold each participant to it, and the support they have agreed they need from that person.

The small print

• Terms. A goal intention is “I intend to reach X”. An implementation intention adds “and I will do Y in situation Z”. Gollwitzer called the effect strategic automaticity: choosing, on purpose, to let a situation trigger an action.
• Where the idea started. Gollwitzer, P. M. (1993). Goal achievement: The role of intentions. European Review of Social Psychology, 4, 141–185. The 1999 paper is the best-known overview, not the first description.
• The Christmas Eve study is Gollwitzer and Brandstätter (1997), in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. It was done in real life, not in a lab, which is why it is often quoted.
• Later work. The 2006 review found a medium-to-large average effect. Newer and larger reviews by the same group find a smaller one, and find that plans work best when people really want the goal.