Gabriele Oettingen
Positive thinking without an implementation strategy is ineffective wishful thinking, found NYU’s Gabriele Oettingen.
She advocates using “Mental Contrast” by considering obstacles and potential ways to manage them, using a mnemonic WOOP:
- Wish,
- Outcome,
- Obstacle,
- Plan.
Andreas Kappes
Oettingen and University of London colleague Andreas Kappas reported two less effective approaches to goal engagement:
– Indulging – Thinking about the desired future state without considering ways to overcome obstacles,
– Dwelling – Thinking about the present reality without future goals and ways to achieve them.
People who used these approaches were less committed to their goals than those who used Mental Contrast.
This trend was true even when success probabilities were high in interpersonal relations, academic achievement, professional achievement, health, life management experiences.
Mental Contrast helped people self-regulate and improve performance technique when used with Implementation Intentions (MCII).
However, Mental Contrast alone was less effective when perceived chances of success were low.
This approach led to disengagement from goals.
More effective approaches in this condition were Indulging in the future goal fantasy or Dwelling only in the present reality.
Volunteers who spent more time imagining working in a “dream job,” but had lower expectations of success, received fewer job offers and lower starting salaries, found Oettingen and Doris Mayer of University of Hamburg.
The research team differentiated the motivational impact of:
- Positive expectations for future success->high effort+successful performance,
- Positive fantasies when the probability of success is low->no increased effort.
Mental Contrast helped people disengage from unfeasible goals like reviving an ended relationship or achieving an unattainable professional identity.
When chances of success are low, people can use Mental Contrast to move on to more feasible goals.
When facing controllable and escapable tasks, people benefitted from Mental Contrast of fantasy vs reality.
However, when facing tasks that cannot be mastered such as terminal illness, Indulging in positive fantasies enabled people to maintain a positive outlook.
Volunteers increased performance when they linked a negative personal attribute (“impulsivity”) with its positive element (“creativity”).
Timur Sevincer
Participants showed greater effort-based creativity than those who were given no information or told that there’s no association between impulsivity and creativity.
This “silver lining theory” increased performance and enabled people to manage perceived negative attributes.
Mental Contrast between a desired future with a present reality also increased physiological activation measured by systolic blood pressure and grip strength.
This energy activation from mental processes can increase performance effort, concluded University of Hamburg’s A. Timur Sevincer and P. Daniel Busatta collaborating with Oettingen.
Philip Daniel Busatta
Coupling Mental Contrast with Implementation Intentions (MCII) helped economically-disadvantaged children convert positive thoughts about future outcomes into effective action, found University of Pennsylvania’s Angela Lee Duckworth, Teri A. Kirby of University of Washington with NYU’s Peter Gollwitzer and Oettingen.
Teri Kirby
Volunteers compared a desired future with potential obstacles, and developed if–then implementation intentions to mitigate obstacles.
More than 75 U.S. urban middle school 10 year olds were randomly assigned to learn either MCII or a Positive Thinking strategy as a comparison.
Student volunteers who applied MCII tools to their academic goals significantly improved their report card grades, attendance, and conduct, suggesting the value of Mental Contrast to enhance goal commitment and realization.
Mental Contrast can increase motivation when used with Implementation Intentions.
An exception occurs when there is low probability of achieving goals.
In those cases, Indulging or Dwelling strategies are more effective in maintaining goal motivation.
- How have you seen Mental Contrast affect your motivation and performance?
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- Still Fulfilling Your New Year’s Resolutions?
- Working toward Goals with “Implementation Intentions”
©Kathryn Welds
Kathryn Welds, PhD | Curated Research + Commentary 
Gary W. Kelly wrote:
IMO, this is difficult to translate into anything useful for an average employee. It may be that people already having a positive and success oriented psychology can benefit–but, they are doing well anyway . . . For those who are struggling, this is not going to make any useful difference.
What matters in creating a positive image of any future is the beliefs and self image one has. To advise a person with a poor self image to imagine being in a situation where appreciation, compensation, and advancement are realities is fruitless. It will never happen until the self image changes first. Prolonged sessions trying to do this will be depressing, and confirm the poor self image.
To advise a person with beliefs that “money is the root of all evil” to imagine a career with rich financial rewards, and to see herself as wealth and in the class she desires will produce conflict. She will be defeated as soon as she starts. No significant change can occur until the beliefs change to be more expansive.
Most people have beliefs that limit them from achieving their desires. These need to be understood and changed before exercises of visualization and goal achievement can be successful. Advising a person to engage in the exercises without first examining and being aware of individual beliefs is like advising a woman who is blind to go forth and navigate her neighborhood–she will likely stumble, and be battered and bruised while making the attempt. She may return home and refuse to listen to such entreaties again.
Help her to see first–see her beliefs, values, and understand her current image of herself. Then help her to create the tools for her to set forth more successfully. People are much the same–they are blind to their own beliefs, their own self image. they need to come to terms with those before seeing themselves at the ball dancing with Prince Charming–or being Prince Charming.
Kathryn Welds re:plied
Thanks, Gary, for reinforcing the importance of considering deeply-held values, evaluating automatic negative thoughts, and assessing the likelihood of success in achieving goals.
An earlier blog post identifies ways to recognize and modify unproductive thought patterns like self-defeating beliefs:
https://kathrynwelds.com/2012/01/22/creating-productive-thought-patterns-challenging-destructive-thinking-through-thought-self-leadership/
Sandra Ondraschek-Norris wrote:
Thanks for this post Kathryn. I was lucky enough to hear Gabriele Oettingen speak on this topic and can wholeheartedly recommend the WOOP approach as well as the book ‘Rethinking Positive Thinking’.
Kathryn Welds replied
Thanks so much for the validation of Oettingen’s WOOP approach, based on your reading of her book, available @http://www.amazon.com/Rethinking-Positive-Thinking-Science-Motivation/dp/1591846870
For a preview, you can see her in action @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mobxikaYgU
Gary W. Kelly wrote:
Yes, the RET work of Albert Ellis is one good element, as are the others. The issue with them is that they are much too cognitive for many people. “Thoughts” for many people are elusive, jumbled, and broken into fragments. They may not have the skills to objectify them through writing, and not yet developed skills for analyzing their thoughts, following a line of thought to a belief, and realizing that it is a belief that can be changed.
For these people, there is an answer. Use emotions to find beliefs. Any emotion arises out of beliefs. At the time one experiences an emotion there is an opportunity to ask “Why am I feeling this?” Doing this successively whenever emotions are experienced–especially strong emotions, leads to beliefs as surely as objectifying them through writing them down.
Recognizing beliefs as beliefs is the first step in altering them. Following one to another is equally important–some beliefs connect to other beliefs–these may be called “bridge” beliefs. Other beliefs link to a core belief–a deeply held belief that is normally never questioned.
Example: I am a responsible parent.
May connect to:
I have to stay on top of the kids all the time!
and lead to:
I never got away with anything when I grew up.
Taken separately, the beliefs may not be questioned, or even seem worth examination. When there is stress over an incident, then there is an opportunity to understand that a belief about childhood may be creating over-critical and micromanagement of your own children now.
Doing this successively can be as effective as writing out thoughts, and analyzing them to understand patterns of beliefs. Yes, for any positive thought process to work, it is essential to do one or the other of these exercises first, in order to be sure that the suggestions/practices one is doing are not in conflict with basic beliefs, concepts, or tied to past experiences in a way that thwarts the achievement of the objective.
It does little good to project for a better position with a higher salary if one believes that money corrupts people, or that those having money are less moral, or a host of other beliefs that tie money, finance, or associate lifestyle with behaviors and circumstances that are unacceptable. The steps towards positive affirmation and the behaviors to achieve a change will produce conflict more than success whenever basic beliefs conflict with the object or methods used to reach goals.
Kathryn Welds responded:
Thanks or mentioning ways to detect underlying beliefs that could interfere with Mental Contrasting possible future states and developing Implementation Intentions (MCII), Gary.
Your detailed summary is a helpful reminder that techniques like MCII can be modified for more widespread adoption.