Motivation & Goals
In this category, you will find all our science-based articles on motivation, self-determination theory, goal-setting and modalities like motivational interviewing.
Download 3 Free Goals Exercises (PDF)
These detailed, science-based exercises will help you or your clients create actionable goals and master techniques for lasting behavior change.
Victor Vroom’s Expectancy Theory of Motivation
Motivation is vital to beginning and maintaining healthy behavior in the workplace, education, and beyond, and it drives us toward our desired outcomes (Zajda, 2023). [...]
SMART Goals, HARD Goals, PACT, or OKRs: What Works?
Goal setting is vital in business, education, and performance environments such as sports, yet it is also a key component of many coaching and counseling [...]
How to Assess and Improve Readiness for Change
Clients seeking professional help from a counselor or therapist are often aware they need to change yet may not be ready to begin their journey. [...]
What Is Motivational Enhancement Therapy (MET)?
Motivation is a powerful predictor of change in recovery. In recent years, addiction treatments have shifted away from punitive methods and abstinence protocols toward a [...]
Motivational Interviewing Training: Top 14 Courses
Even if we know changing our behavior is good for us, change involves chartering unknown territories, putting forth effort, and letting go of familiar habits. [...]
What Is Behavior Change in Psychology? 5 Models and Theories
Why do we behave the way we do? Can the answer to this question help us change our less desirable behaviors? Changing less desirable behaviors [...]
Is Motivational Interviewing Effective? A Look at 5 Benefits
Have you ever had a conversation with a friend and been persuaded to make a positive change? Think back now. What was it they said [...]
Intrinsic Motivation Explained: 10 Examples & Key Factors
Intrinsic motivation is a much sought-after quality. “Perhaps no single phenomenon reflects the positive potential of human nature as much as intrinsic motivation, the inherent [...]
18 Best Motivational Interviewing Worksheets & Activities
Helping people change unhealthy or damaging behavior is one of the most significant challenges therapists face (Hall, Gibbie, & Lubman, 2012). When encouragement to stop [...]
15 Motivational Interviewing Books to Help Clients Change
In the absence of motivation, health-related advice is often ignored and behavior change is blocked by ambivalence (Miller & Rollnick, 2013). Motivational interviewing (MI) is [...]