An implementation intention is a self-regulatory strategy in the form of if-then-plans that can lead to better goal attainment, as well as create useful habits and modify problematic behaviors.
[1] Studies conducted by Gollwitzer in 1997 and earlier show that the use of implementation intentions can result in a higher probability of successful goal attainment, by predetermining a specific and desired goal-directed behavior in response to a particular future event or cue.
The research also suggested that the weak intention-behavior relation is a result of people having good intentions, but failing to act on them.
[4] This inspired a growing body of research to help determine ways in which peoples' good intentions could be made more effective in accomplishing desired goals.
This also has the effect of freeing cognitive resources for other mental processing tasks, and also for avoiding goal-threatening distractions or competing goals.
The strength of commitment related to both the plan set and the goal is very important for the implementation intention to have an effect on people's behavior.
As the intention of the technique is to direct the user to clearly defined and short actions that improve his situation in the long run, and to reduce the burden of decision-making, the then clause should never mention a goal, or the problematic behavior itself.
[15] Todd Rogers, Katherine L. Milkman, Leslie K. John, and Michael I. Norton (2015)[16] suggest the following situations in which the use of planning prompts is most effective: Implementation intentions have been very successful in helping individuals achieve targeted and specific goals over the years, as indicated by a survey of the research.
In a study conducted by Katherine L. Milkman, John Beshears, James J. Choi, David Laibson, and Brigitte C. Madrian (2011),[20] randomly assigned employees at a Midwestern company received a mailing that prompted them to write down the date and time that they would get their flu shot, while the remaining employees received a letter with only the clinic information.
[21] Implementation intentions have been found to be particularly effective in unpleasant goal pursuits such as health-promotion (e.g. balanced and nutritious diet) and disease-prevention (e.g. daily exercise) behaviors, where there may be significant immediate costs and only long-term rewards.
[22] In a 2-month study investigating the effect of implementation intentions on weight loss, obese women between the ages of 18 and 76 were either instructed to create specific implementation intentions regarding their dieting and exercise (e.g. when, where, and what I will eat during the upcoming week; Where, when, how will I exercise during the upcoming week), or simply attend health, diet and stress-related group meetings.
[24] In 2009 Schweiger Gallo, Keil, Gollwitzer, Rockstroh and McCulloch published another study that was conducted to address the effectiveness of implementation intentions in regulating emotional reactivity.
[27] The earlier developments of the concept suggest that implementation intentions cause the mental representation of the anticipated situation to become highly activated and therefore easily accessible.
The research suggests that implementation intentions result not only in an association between cue and behavior, but it's the act of planning into the future that actually serves as the foundation for this phenomenon.
An experiment conducted by Papies et al., investigated the rate of goal completion by means of both implementation intentions and also the learning of cue-behavior association.
Initially, both approaches led to the same rate of goal completion, but a week later, only the effect of implementation intentions was maintained.
This lends evidence to the notion that implementation intentions rely on more complex mechanisms than simple cue-behavior associations, as was believed to be the case in earlier research.
[29] A large amount of research has been conducted on implementation intentions to better understand the questions relating to the initiation of goal striving.
Participants who formed implementation intentions were more successful with long-term dieting, as well as concentration and performance in a tennis match.
The focus on "If-then-plans" is the prevention of distracting thoughts and an efficient accomplishment of cognitive, motivational and emotional barriers of goal striving.
Powers and colleagues, implementation intentions seem to have a negative effect on the performance in people who score high on socially prescribed perfectionism.