Make Commitments

[14] When you make a commitment to another person, you establish what psychologists call a contingency of reinforcement; you've automatically arranged for a reward if you comply and a punishment if you don't. It puts some pressure on you, and that's often just what you need.

[15] For instance, if you want to exercise more, arrange to do it with a friend. If you don't show up, your friend will get angry, and that may be just the ticket to keeping you punctual. Decades of research have demonstrated the power of this strategy. For example, in 1994 Dana Putnam and other researchers at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University showed that patients who made written commitments were far more likely to take prescribed medicine than patients who hadn't. Mary Lou Kau and Joel Fischer of the University of Hawaii reported a case of a woman who got herself to jog regularly by setting up a simple arrangement with her husband: he paid her quarters and took her out on weekends whenever she met her jogging goals.

[16] There's good news here for all of us. We can meet many of the demands and overcome many of the challenges of life with simple skills--straightforward practices that anyone can master and that don't require willpower--in other words, with skill, not will.

许下诺言

[14]当你向别人许诺时，你就形成了心理学家所说的“后效强化”这么一种情况。一旦实现承诺，你自然早已准备好得到嘉奖；如果食言，面临的就是惩罚。这将给你带来压力，而通常这也正是你所需要的。

[15]比方说，如果你想加强锻炼，那么就安排和朋友一起锻炼吧。假如你到时没露面，你的朋友就会生气，这或许正是督促你守时的一种手段。几十年的研究已证实了这一措施的效力。例如在1994年，弗吉尼亚理工学院和州立大学的达纳·帕特南等研究人员证明，作出书面承诺的病人远比未作书面保证的病人更能按医嘱服药。夏威夷大学玛莉·卢·考和乔尔·费希尔报告过一位妇女的案例，这位女士使自己坚持慢跑锻炼的方法就是和丈夫达成了一项简短的协议----无论何时，只要她实现了慢跑目标，丈夫都给她一些零钱，并在周末陪她出去玩。

[16]对我们大家来说这都是好消息。要满足生命中这诸多要求并克服众多挑战，我们只需运用简单技巧——而这些技巧是任何人都能掌握并且无需意志力的实践操作——换句话说，只用技巧，而非意志。