The psychology of New Year Resolution

The second Friday of January is known as “Quitters Day”. Because statistics reveal that most people quit on this day. 23% quit in the first week, 64% after a month and so on. Only 9% of people?stay committed to their new year resolution.

The longest research on new year resolution was for a?period of forty-two years; precisely between 1978 and 2020. Famous psychologist John C Norcross studies people and their behavior related to new year resolutions. In the four-decade long study Norcross found some interesting facts.

Five most interesting facts:

1.??????75% succeed till the end of first week

2.?????Towards the second weekend number drops to 71%

3.?????After one month the number drops to 64%

4.?????46% stay committed to their resolution after six months

5.?????Only 8% who didn’t make any resolution succeed with similar goals

It was also observed that around the world there is a pattern to new year resolutions. People across countries and cultures are mostly similar when it comes to resolutions.

Top five new year resolutions:

1.??????33% taking care of health

2.?????20% losing weight

3.?????13% changing food habits

4.?????9% personal growth

5.?????5% mental health and sleep

Why does new?year resolution fail?

1.??????Weak Reason: 80% of any change is ‘Why’ & 20% is ‘How’. When purpose or reason is not strong enough, we tend to lose our motivation. Purpose propels us towards the goal and makes us persistent. When ‘Why’ is strong and clear, we find ‘How’ easily. To strengthen the reason, we need to ask ourselves two questions; one is “What is the worst thing that can happen if I do not achieve my goal?” The second question is “What is the best thing that can happen if I achieve my goals.”

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2.?????Weak support system: Often we create resolutions, we make strategies to achieve them, but we fail to continue. We struggle with consistency when we fail to create a system around our goals. Apple trees do not grow in Delhi, but blossoms in Himachal. The seed is the same, but the environment is different. To achieve consistency, we must create a conducive environment for our goal. The environment and its elements will act as a support system.

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3.?????Weak monitoring: If you can measure it, you can improve it. So, goals need continual monitoring. Some goals need daily monitoring like walking and running. Some goals need weekly like keeping up with friends and socializing. Understand your goal and set up the frequency of monitoring accordingly. You can also change the monitoring parameters and frequency as and when required. Monitoring goals also helps in course correction and making things better.

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4.?????Weak estimation: New year resolution fails because we overestimate our will power and underestimate the time required. We expect it too soon and do not give it the time it deserves. Eventually we fail and become disappointed. The way out is setting up a realistic expectation, not by the social media standard but by our own individual standard. For that we need to look at our resolutions and then look within to understand our strength and limitations. We need to examine our past goals and their journey. It will let us know how we succeeded and why we failed. It will help us set up a realistic expectation which will enable us to stick to our new year resolutions.

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5.?????Accepting failures: In a study on new year resolution, it was found that people who succeed slip and taste failure 14 times on an average during two years’ time. Staying on track all the time is like expecting too much. Because when we obsess about staying on track no matter what happens and suddenly, we fail; we find it extremely hard to accept failure. Learning how to deal with distractions and failures is an integral part of the journey and we need to be prepared for these speed breakers on our way to success.

Published earlier in the newspaper tabloid "The Desert Trail"