Why don’t we keep resolutions?

The big question is whether we need to receive the external reward or just anticipate it to produce the internal feeling of reward.

We’ve all made promises to ourselves, but only a few follow these goals? Yet, we’re still happy without completing our goals. We keep coming back to them, and proclaiming for the thousandth time that this will be the last scoop of ice cream. What causes us to fall into this endless cycle of broken promises?

Do we find joy in accomplishing a task or in the idea of accomplishing a task? Ultimately, anticipating the reward might make us happier than receiving it.

To better understand the difference between a rewarding feeling (e.g. happiness or satisfaction) and an external reward (e.g. money), let’s dive into where this internal feeling comes from. One school of thought is that everything we experience in life is the result of various chemicals interacting with specific cells in certain parts of our brains. For example, dopamine is a neurotransmitter (chemical in the brain) associated with the feeling of happiness. This neurotransmitter is involved in our ability to anticipate and appreciate reward.

Depending on where this chemical is in your brain, it can create happy feelings in response to different stimuli. If you do something rewarding like talk to a friend, dopamine might take effect in a brain region called the amygdala. However, if you’re anticipating that rewarding conversation, dopamine might take effect in a different part of the brain called the striatum.

The same chemical can influence our internal response by acting in different parts of the brain. For example, a hug might make dopamine abundant in the amygdala, while a paycheck might make dopamine abundant in another part of the brain called the prefrontal cortex. This internal feeling of happiness can be produced by many different external stimuli, and the part of your brain with increased dopamine will vary accordingly, depending on the particular external stimulus.

The big question is whether we need to receive the external reward or just anticipate it to produce the internal feeling of reward.

Wolfram Schultz’s famous experiments showed that dopamine neurons in a brain region called the ventral tegmental area will respond to the anticipation of a taste reward, regardless of reward receipt. Studies showed activity in both the amygdala and striatum during anticipation of a taste reward, but not during receipt of the reward.

So it seems that whether or not we do the physical thing that should make us happy, just the thought of it will make us happy. We won’t have finished that paper, exercised, eaten healthier, or cleaned the house, but we’ll be happy just by thinking about it.