Jena Gao
Dr. Nordstrom
EDPE 340
May 3, 2018
Goal Setting Paper
Goal setting has been considered one of the most effective psychological strategies for improving performance as we’ve talked about in class. It is important for us to understand the different types of goals and how they best be utilized. A successful goal getting plan includes outcome goals, performance goals, and process goals. Goals keep us focused on a purpose. They provide a course of action and give direction. In terms of setting physical activity goals, the benefits are plentiful and significant. Physical activity can improve health cognitive and psychosocial function (McKinney & Morrison 2016). There is a positive relationship between physical exercise and job performance and that relationship is mediated by good mood and subjective health (Drannan, J, 2016). Although my goal setting plan for this semester has changed, the main purpose was to keep myself more active and improve work efficiency. During the time, I found it difficult to follow my plan but it helped me grow both physically and mentally.
An outcome goal focuses a competitive result of an event. My original outcome goal was to achieve an average score of 77 by the end of this semester. A performance goal is one that measures an end product that can be achieved comparatively, independently from others. My performance goals were related to golf techniques and drills –hit average 10 fairway, average 8 green, and average putting stroke lower than 32. A process goal differs from both outcome and performance goal because it doesn’t focus on an end product but rather on the behavior needed for successful performance. My process goals were focusing on techniques like swing smoothly at the top and keep the club face square at impact. In the first two months, I practiced four times a week and worked on different drills at each session. I was close to reach my performance goals and they have encouraged me a lot when I was performing on the course. Things worked fine physically but not mentally. Reality always changes before plans do. I felt more stressful as I played more tournaments and thought I was not able to compete at college level so I decided to take a long break in golf for now. Then, I adjusted my goals to physical activity related ones. I planned to exercise at least five days a week and 30 minutes each time. The reason I set up this goal is because I was really negative after I made the decision of quitting the team in March and I wanted to get out of my room without thinking about golf related issues. It was the toughest time I have went through but I learnt a lot from doing it. By doing some physical exercises on a daily basis, even just walk around campus for 30 minutes helped me forget some negative thoughts. According to the study, there is a positive relationship between physical exercise and good mood (Drannan, 2016). The researchers identified that respondents had stronger feelings towards positive mo...
