Goal Setting Experiment

4 conditions
The 5 goal got : It is important that you commit to a specific yet attainable goal. Your goal is to create 5 words during the allotted 1 minute using the 7 letters. This goal is difficult, but realistic. In previous studies many students were able to create 5 or more words per round using the same groups of letters you are about to see. The 9 goal got : It is important that you commit to a specific yet attainable goal. Your goal is to create 9 words during the allotted 1 minute using the 7 letters. This goal is difficult, but realistic. In previous studies many students were able to create 9 or more words per round using the same groups of letters you are about to see. The 16 goal got : It is important that you commit to a specific yet attainable goal. Your goal is to create 16 words during the allotted 1 minute using the 7 letters. This goal is difficult, but realistic. In previous studies many students were able to create 16 or more words per round using the same groups of letters you are about to see. The do your best goal got : Do your best to create as many words as you can during the allotted 1 minute using the 7 letters on each page.

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Goal Setting Experiment Round 1

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Goal Setting Experiment Round 3

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Goal Setting Experiment - Implications

Possible conclusions: 1. 16 was a good motivator. Perhaps not considered impossible (/frustrating). 2. 5 and 9 seems to be less motivating than do your best. Specific LOW goals can reduce motivation. For the next experiment (class): 1. Changing the conditions to : goal 5 (easy), goal 16 (difficult but perceived achievable), goal 50 (impossible), and do your best (control condition). 2. Running more than 3 rounds. We saw that it could take time for people to get used to the the task.
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