Ayelet Fishbach || How to Motivate Yourself
01/20/22 • 63 min
2 Listeners
In this episode, I talk to award-winning psychologist Ayelet Fishbach about the science of motivation. How do we motivate ourselves to do anything? From her extensive research, Ayelet shares with us four crucial strategies for successful behavior change: identify the right goals, avoid the “middle”, resist temptations, and seek social support. And equally important, she gives tips on how to sustain motivation for longer periods of time. We also touch on the topics of reinforcement, flow, deliberate practice, self-control, and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.
Bio
Dr. Ayelet Fishbach is the Jeffrey Breakenridge Keller Professor of Behavioral Science and Marketing at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, and the past president of the Society for the Study of Motivation and the International Social Cognition Network (ISCON). She is an expert on motivation and decision making and the author of Get it Done: Surprising Lessons from the Science of Motivation. Dr. Ayelet’s groundbreaking research on human motivation has won her several international awards, including the Society of Experimental Social Psychology’s Best Dissertation Award and Career Trajectory Award, and the Fulbright Educational Foundation Award.
Website: www.ayeletfishbach.com
Twitter: @ayeletfishbach
Topics
01:28 What is motivation science?
03:15 Maslow’s hierarchy of needs as motivation
07:07 Choosing the right goals
12:42 Goals aren't chores
14:42 Quantify the goal-setting process
17:40 The effect of incentives on motivation
20:41 Ayelet’s view on SMART Goals
22:53 Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation
27:26 Flow, deliberate practice, and discomfort
30:58 Sustain motivation with feedback
34:21 Overcome the “middle problem”
38:00 Learn to balance multiple goals
43:17 Identify and resist temptation
48:39 The glass half-empty mindset
51:50 How to learn from negative feedback
56:54 Do relationships affect our pursuit of goals?
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In this episode, I talk to award-winning psychologist Ayelet Fishbach about the science of motivation. How do we motivate ourselves to do anything? From her extensive research, Ayelet shares with us four crucial strategies for successful behavior change: identify the right goals, avoid the “middle”, resist temptations, and seek social support. And equally important, she gives tips on how to sustain motivation for longer periods of time. We also touch on the topics of reinforcement, flow, deliberate practice, self-control, and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.
Bio
Dr. Ayelet Fishbach is the Jeffrey Breakenridge Keller Professor of Behavioral Science and Marketing at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, and the past president of the Society for the Study of Motivation and the International Social Cognition Network (ISCON). She is an expert on motivation and decision making and the author of Get it Done: Surprising Lessons from the Science of Motivation. Dr. Ayelet’s groundbreaking research on human motivation has won her several international awards, including the Society of Experimental Social Psychology’s Best Dissertation Award and Career Trajectory Award, and the Fulbright Educational Foundation Award.
Website: www.ayeletfishbach.com
Twitter: @ayeletfishbach
Topics
01:28 What is motivation science?
03:15 Maslow’s hierarchy of needs as motivation
07:07 Choosing the right goals
12:42 Goals aren't chores
14:42 Quantify the goal-setting process
17:40 The effect of incentives on motivation
20:41 Ayelet’s view on SMART Goals
22:53 Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation
27:26 Flow, deliberate practice, and discomfort
30:58 Sustain motivation with feedback
34:21 Overcome the “middle problem”
38:00 Learn to balance multiple goals
43:17 Identify and resist temptation
48:39 The glass half-empty mindset
51:50 How to learn from negative feedback
56:54 Do relationships affect our pursuit of goals?
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Previous Episode
Oliver Burkeman || Time Management for Mortals
In this episode, I talk to bestselling author Oliver Burkeman about his latest book Four Thousand Weeks. On the surface, it’s easy to mistake it for another self-help book on time management. But instead of enthusing about productivity hacks, Oliver challenges his readers to confront the finite nature of humanity. By doing so, he argues we can live fuller lives—without having to always carry the fear of missing out. We also touch on the topics of procrastination, positive psychology, flow, realism, deep time, and patience.
Bio
Oliver Burkeman is a journalist for The Guardian. From 2006 to 2020, he wrote the popular weekly column on psychology called “This Column Will Change Your Life”. He is the author of The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking and Help! How to Become Slightly Happier and Get a Bit More Done. In 2015, he won the Foreign Press Association’s Young Journalist of the Year award, and has been short-listed for the Orwell Prize. His most recent book is Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals.
Website: www.oliverburkeman.com
Twitter: @oliverburkeman
Topics
00:02:03 The efficiency trap
00:05:34 Accepting human limitations
00:08:35 Why we handicap ourselves
00:13:07 How to be a better procrastinator
00:18:32 Each activity is paid for with your life
00:20:55 The joy of missing out
00:23:55 Harness more deep time
00:27:57 The common theme of Oliver’s books
00:32:02 Realism and doing the impossible
00:37:29 Productivity and self-worth
00:40:53 Embracing boredom instead of acceleration
00:46:14 Developing a taste for problems
00:50:21 Radical incrementalism
00:57:30 “Originality lies on the far side of unoriginality”
01:01:06 How time management distracts us from wonder
01:03:50 Oliver’s approach to new year resolutions
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Next Episode
Andrew Yang || The Future of American Democracy
In this episode, I talk to Forward Party’s founder Andrew Yang about the future of American democracy. Andrew shares the insights he’s learned from his presidential and mayoral campaigns. His major realization is that America’s two-party system is designed for polarization and dysfunction. With the media and the internet further inciting division, polarization may eventually escalate into violence. In order to shift towards a human-centered economy, Andrew believes we need to change our political dynamics and incentives. We also touch on the topics of tribalism, rationality, automation, education, leadership, and governance.
Bio
Andrew Yang is an entrepreneur, attorney, and political candidate. He was a candidate in the 2020 Democratic Party presidential primaries and the 2021 New York City Democratic mayoral primary. His signature policy was a universal basic income of $1,000 a month as a response to job displacement by automation. After his campaigns ended, he left the Democratic Party and founded Forward Party, a political action committee that seeks to alleviate political polarization and reform the U.S. political and economic systems.
Andrew is also an author and has published several books including Smart People Should Build Things, The War on Normal People, and most recently, Forward: Notes on the Future of Our Democracy.
Website: www.andrewyang.com
Twitter: @AndrewYang
Topics
01:34 Andrew’s childhood and early ventures
09:04 Andrew’s desire to humanize the economy
11:28 The presidential and mayoral candidacy experience
19:51 Society’s current incentive structures
22:57 “The duopoly is designed for polarization”
29:49 How do we reward grace and tolerance in politics?
33:18 Fact-based governance and a shared objective reality
39:59 New measures for well-being
46:26 Politics is tribal
51:44 United by universal human values
55:28 Fulfilling the need to matter
1:00:36 Human-centered education
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
The Psychology Podcast - Ayelet Fishbach || How to Motivate Yourself
Transcript
It's important to understand that there are many ingredients and there are many factors that influence motivation. The idea that we can make a list and only what's on the least counts and everything that's on the least counts is, you know, is a bit naive. Hello, and welcome to the Psychology Podcast. In this episode, I talked to award winning psychologist I yell At Fischbach about the exciting science of motivation. How do we motivate ourselves t
If you like this episode you’ll love
Episode Comments
Generate a badge
Get a badge for your website that links back to this episode
<a href="https://goodpods.com/podcasts/the-psychology-podcast-120652/ayelet-fishbach-how-to-motivate-yourself-19017800"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/goodpods-images-bucket/badges/generic-badge-1.svg" alt="listen to ayelet fishbach || how to motivate yourself on goodpods" style="width: 225px" /> </a>
Copy