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How Focusing on Superordinate Goals Motivates Broad, Long-Term Goal Pursuit: A Theoretical Perspective

Goal-setting theory states that challenging, specific, and concrete goals (i.e., subordinate goals) are powerful motivators and boost performance in goal pursuit more than vague or abstract goals (i.e., superordinate goals). Goal-setting theory predominantly focuses on single, short-term goals and l...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Höchli, Bettina, Brügger, Adrian, Messner, Claude
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6176065/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30333781
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01879
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author Höchli, Bettina
Brügger, Adrian
Messner, Claude
author_facet Höchli, Bettina
Brügger, Adrian
Messner, Claude
author_sort Höchli, Bettina
collection PubMed
description Goal-setting theory states that challenging, specific, and concrete goals (i.e., subordinate goals) are powerful motivators and boost performance in goal pursuit more than vague or abstract goals (i.e., superordinate goals). Goal-setting theory predominantly focuses on single, short-term goals and less on broad, long-term challenges. This review article extends goal-setting theory and argues that superordinate goals also fulfill a crucial role in motivating behavior, particularly when addressing broad, long-term challenges. The purpose of this article is to shed light on the benefits of superordinate goals, which have received less attention in research, and to show theoretically that people pursue long-term goals more successfully when they focus on subordinate as well as superordinate goals than when they focus on either subordinate or superordinate goals alone.
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spelling pubmed-61760652018-10-17 How Focusing on Superordinate Goals Motivates Broad, Long-Term Goal Pursuit: A Theoretical Perspective Höchli, Bettina Brügger, Adrian Messner, Claude Front Psychol Psychology Goal-setting theory states that challenging, specific, and concrete goals (i.e., subordinate goals) are powerful motivators and boost performance in goal pursuit more than vague or abstract goals (i.e., superordinate goals). Goal-setting theory predominantly focuses on single, short-term goals and less on broad, long-term challenges. This review article extends goal-setting theory and argues that superordinate goals also fulfill a crucial role in motivating behavior, particularly when addressing broad, long-term challenges. The purpose of this article is to shed light on the benefits of superordinate goals, which have received less attention in research, and to show theoretically that people pursue long-term goals more successfully when they focus on subordinate as well as superordinate goals than when they focus on either subordinate or superordinate goals alone. Frontiers Media S.A. 2018-10-02 /pmc/articles/PMC6176065/ /pubmed/30333781 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01879 Text en Copyright © 2018 Höchli, Brügger and Messner. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychology
Höchli, Bettina
Brügger, Adrian
Messner, Claude
How Focusing on Superordinate Goals Motivates Broad, Long-Term Goal Pursuit: A Theoretical Perspective
title How Focusing on Superordinate Goals Motivates Broad, Long-Term Goal Pursuit: A Theoretical Perspective
title_full How Focusing on Superordinate Goals Motivates Broad, Long-Term Goal Pursuit: A Theoretical Perspective
title_fullStr How Focusing on Superordinate Goals Motivates Broad, Long-Term Goal Pursuit: A Theoretical Perspective
title_full_unstemmed How Focusing on Superordinate Goals Motivates Broad, Long-Term Goal Pursuit: A Theoretical Perspective
title_short How Focusing on Superordinate Goals Motivates Broad, Long-Term Goal Pursuit: A Theoretical Perspective
title_sort how focusing on superordinate goals motivates broad, long-term goal pursuit: a theoretical perspective
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6176065/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30333781
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01879
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