Description

Personal Motivational Action Plan:
We will be learning about theories of motivation, including how self-regulation and self-control are instrumental to the process of achieving one’s personal goals. To make your learning personally-meaningful, this assignment will provide you with the opportunity to apply evidence-based theory to make positive changes in your life. For example, health goals (e.g., eating a healthy diet, reducing snacks/soft drinks, regular physical exercise, adequate sleep amounts, reducing alcohol consumption or smoking, downregulating anxiety), financial goals (reducing spending, borrowing, poor investments), technology management goals (reducing TV/social media/internet/messaging/video game frequency), academic goals (meeting deadlines, attending/participating in class, increase daily/weekly study time, earning a particular grade), or learning/mastering a particular skill to perform an activity. Choose a behaviour that you can “reasonably” expect to change. Your objective for this assignment is to create and implement a personal motivational action plan (for yourself) to reach the desired goal, monitor/track and evaluate behavioural change and tie that change to behavioural principles that we discuss in the course.
A plan is the preparatory sequence of action steps to achieve a goal. Planning is an anticipatory decision-making process; it’s deciding – in advance – what to do, how to do it, and when to do it. Planning is part of a goal-setting, the latter which calls for the following steps:
a. Goals should always be SMART: (i) specific (detailed), (ii) measurable (quantifiable), (iii) achievable (attainable/action-oriented), (iv) relevant (reasonable), and (v) time-bound (identified timelines)
b. The result you’d like to achieve is called an outcome goal and the actionable steps you’ll need to repeatedly follow in order to achieve that result are called process goals.
c. The process of developing an action plan is to detail the actionable steps you would take in order to achieve a particular goal. Incorporate all your actions into your daily schedule. The critical actionable steps are “controllable by “you.” They’re called process-goals and they detail the daily actions of “what” and “how” you’re going to reach your ultimate outcome-goal. HINT: If you focus on process-goals, the outcome-goals are more likely to be realized.
d. Plans should identify any anticipated obstacles/temptations that need to be overcome in reaching each specified-goal. Plan out in advance how you will manage those critical situations by adding “implementation intentions” to your goal intentions. These “if-then” plans function as an automatic pre-decisional commitment wherein when “X” happens (i.e., situational cue such as being tired, stressed-out, tempted, distracted, etc), you will engage in “Y” behaviour. Having a predetermined automatic “planned” response to a cue eliminates your habitual response to the challenge or temptation because you’ve pre-chosen a goal-oriented response.
e. Plans should detail the resources/supports needed for overcoming the obstacles and sustaining motivation. Consider sharing your goals with 1-2 people who can provide you with encouragement, advice, healthy feedback or a willing ear. Remember to reward yourself as you reach certain milestones/sub-goals.
f. The operational plans for achievement would include the careful monitoring and documenting of your behaviours for a specified period, as well as a final assessment of the degree to which your behaviour has changed. It’s important that one detail explanations for limited progress or absence of behaviour-change.
Your task is to draw on self-determination and goal-setting theories to describe, clarify and explain your challenge, plan and goal. This assignment is intended to provide you with a practical opportunity to apply the theory/models discussed in this course to your “motivational” challenge and to change your behaviour in a way that will improve your life.