Acerca do estabelecimento de objectivos

Um interessante e útil artigo "You’re More Likely to Pursue Your Goals After a Birthday or the First of the Month", onde se refere "The Fresh Start Effect: Temporal Landmarks Motivate Aspirational Behavior", onde se pode ler:

"Understanding when people are most motivated to pursue their aspirations is important for a number of reasons. Aspirational behaviors are activities that help people achieve their wishes and personal goals.
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Temporal landmarks, or distinct events that “stand in marked contrast to the seemingly unending stream of trivial and ordinary occurrences that happen to us every day”, have been shown to structure our memories and experiences. One type of temporal landmarkincludes reference points on socially constructed and shared timetables. Examples include the beginning of an academic semester, secular and religious holidays, and time dividers on the yearly calendar. Another type of temporal landmark includes personally relevant life events that demarcate our personal histories, such as developmental milestones, life transitions, first experiences, and occasions of recurrent significance. These temporal landmarks not only influence the manner in which people recall memories, experiences, and time durations retrospectively but are also used to organize current activities and future plans and to designate the boundaries of temporal periods.
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temporal landmarks open new mental accounts. We propose that when temporal landmarks open new mental accounts, the beginning of a new period stands in contrast to more typical days in our lives.
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We argue that by relegating previous imperfections to a past self and generating a sense that the current self is superior, temporal landmarks can alter people’s decisions.
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In addition to psychologically separating people from their past imperfections, temporal landmarks may motivate people to pursue their aspirations by altering the manner in which they process information and form preferences. Specifically, by creating discontinuities in our perceptions of time, experiences, and activities, temporal landmarks may promote taking a broader view of decisions. ... interruptions to decision making (e.g., switching to a new background task while pondering a focal decision) change information processing. Specifically, interruptions move people from a bottom-up, contextually rich mode of thinking focused on concrete data to a higher level, top-down mode guided by preexisting goal and knowledge structures. Temporal landmarks may serve as one type of disruption to decision making and thus direct attention to high-level, goal-relevant information."