Goal Gradient Effect: How rewards can improve your customer experience
Keep motivation high with this psychological tool
“If you want to reach a goal, you must ‘see the reaching’ in your own mind before you actually arrive at your goal.”
- Zig Ziglar
What is the Goal Gradient Effect?
Coined by behaviorist Clark Hull in 1932, the Goal Gradient Effect states that as people get closer to a reward, they speed up their behavior to get to their goal faster. In other words, people are motivated by how much is left to reach their target, not how far they’ve come.
People are motivated by how much is left to reach their target, not how far they’ve gone.
As Hull put it in his original research:
“Rats in a maze run faster as they near the food box than at the beginning of the path.”
Examples of the Goal Gradient Effect in Action
The closer customers get to their goal, the more encouraged they become to finish. But they can’t get motivated if they don’t know where the finish is.
