Meta-analysis / Getting Things Done / teens + adults
If-then plans outperform good intentions
A meta-analysis across hundreds of behaviour-change studies found that specifying when and where you'll act meaningfully improves whether you do.
The short version
Meta-analysis · teens + adults · 2006
Across a large body of studies, people who formed a concrete if-then plan achieved their goals more often than people who simply held the intention.
The benefit came from linking the action to a specific, reliably occurring cue.
Most of this work is in general populations, not ADHD samples.
What they studied
- The authors pooled experimental studies in which participants either formed an implementation intention — a plan in the form 'if situation X occurs, I will perform behaviour Y' — or held a goal intention only.
- Studies spanned health, academic, environmental and interpersonal behaviours.
What they found
- Implementation intentions produced a medium-to-large improvement in goal attainment across the pooled studies.
- Benefits were strongest when the cue was concrete and reliably encountered, and weakest when plans were vague.
Why it matters
- Format beats motivation. 'When the kettle clicks, I open the folder' does work that 'I'll do it later' does not.
- It's a technique you can attach to something already in your day, which is exactly what ADHD-friendly design asks for.
What it doesn't mean
- This is general-population research. The size of the benefit specifically in ADHD is inferred, not directly established.
- It doesn't work when the cue never reliably occurs, or when the barrier is emotional rather than logistical.
- It is not a substitute for treatment or accommodation.
The bigger picture
Well established in the general behaviour-change literature; smaller, less consistent evidence directly within ADHD samples.
Original research
- Authors
- Gollwitzer, P. M., & Sheeran, P.
- Study title
- Implementation intentions and goal achievement: a meta-analysis of effects and processes
- Journal
- Advances in Experimental Social Psychology
- Year
- 2006
- Study design
- Meta-analysis of experimental studies
We only publish a direct DOI link when we hold a verified identifier. Where we don't, we send you to a search for the original publication rather than guess at a URL.
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