Two Steps Forward, One Step Back: How Progress Steadiness Affects Motivation

Rarely does the path to goal accomplishment look perfect. Making progress on everyday goals is often unsteady, in that each unit of effort or time spent generates unequal results. In this research, we examine how progress steadiness affects motivation. Although unsteady goal progress is common, we suggest that goal pursuers find it discouraging. We hypothesize that even when goal progress is equal in amount and speed, unsteady (vs. steady) progress decreases people’s sense of accomplishment and motivation to continue, and increases quitting. Across a variety of goal domains, findings from vignette experiments (Studies 1a, 1b, and 5), a recall study (Study 2), and real-time experiments (Studies 3 and 4) support these hypotheses. We also explore the mediating role of self-efficacy (Study 3), and identify how manipulations targeting expectations about progress steadiness can reduce the negative effects of unsteady progress (Study 5). These results are the first to consider how progress steadiness can affect motivation.