Peace of Mind Organizing

Punishment versus rewards

26 May 2010

Back in the days I was a pet writer and wrote about dog training, I wrote repeatedly on the effectiveness of rewards over punishment.

Why, then, am I a little surprised that my recent experiment in using the threat of punishment to get me to do something wasn’t a resounding success?

I’m talking about my 12-week trial of stickK.com to get me to exercise regularly. As I blogged before, stickK has you make a commitment and give them a credit card number. If you don’t keep your commitment, they send the amount of money you pledged to either a charity or anti-charity (an organization you don’t want to receive your money) of your choice.

I opted for an anti-charity. According to my stickK pledge, an organization I do not support would get five of my hard-earned dollars each week that I didn’t exercise at least four times.

It was effective in that I did exercise four times each week during the 12-week trial and the organization didn’t get a dollar from me. But something surprising happened inside of me. The threat of the punishment meant that I achieved the goal, but I never exceeded it (except one week, when I exercised five times). I’d find myself deciding whether or not to exercise on a given day based on whether I needed to in order to meet my goal. Furthermore, the quality of the exercise declined. I’d do just enough to be able to say I’d met the goal. I didn’t think about doing the most beneficial exercise. Before this experiment, I was exercising an average of five times a week, I’d say. And I was mixing hard with easy.

What does it mean? I think it means that I respond much better to a carrot than a stick. After the 12 weeks were over, I took a bit of a hiatus from exercising. I think I’ve done it just once in the past week.

But this morning it hit me: My 30th high school reunion is coming up in July. I want to look my best. Now that’s incentive for exercising. With the specter of punishment gone and the prospect of reward dangling in front of me, I think I’ll be hopping on the Wii Fit tonight.

Next time you’re faced with doing something that you’re not crazy about, think about how you might reward yourself for doing it. Avoid punishments or penalties (including beating yourself up) for not doing it. Make it a meaningful reward. And don’t forget to actually follow through with it!

Tagged with: exercise, goals, punishment, rewards, stickk.com

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