Why Goal-Setting Apps Can Motivate You or Quietly Kill Your Motivation
As the new year approaches, millions of people download goal-setting apps with the hope of improving their lives. Whether the aim is to get fitter, save more money, or learn a new skill, these digital tools promise structure, tracking, and motivation. But there’s a growing realization among researchers that these same apps can sometimes do the opposite of what they promise. Instead of motivating users, they can undermine confidence, distract attention, and even reduce long-term commitment.
This tension between motivation and demotivation is the focus of a recent academic study that takes a deep look at how modern technologies influence human motivation. The research doesn’t argue that goal-setting apps are bad. Rather, it explains why they work in some cases and backfire in others, depending on how they are designed and used.
The Double-Edged Nature of Goal-Setting Technology
Goal-setting apps rely on features like data tracking, gamification, social comparison, and increasingly, AI-driven feedback. These tools can be incredibly powerful. Seeing progress visualized on a screen can make long-term goals feel closer. Personalized feedback can make users feel understood and supported.
At the same time, these features can easily tip into negative territory. A fitness app that constantly compares a beginner’s performance to advanced users may cause discouragement rather than inspiration. Excessive reminders and metrics can overwhelm users instead of guiding them. The technology itself isn’t neutral; it actively shapes how people think about their goals.
Bridging Motivation Science and Technology Design
One of the core issues highlighted by the researchers is that motivation research and technology research have often developed in isolation. Psychologists have spent decades studying how goals, rewards, and intrinsic enjoyment affect behavior. Meanwhile, technologists and marketers have focused on engagement metrics, feature adoption, and user retention.
The new study attempts to bring these two worlds together. It argues that understanding motivation is essential for designing technologies that actually help people sustain effort over time, rather than just keeping them clicking and tapping.
The GAINS and DRAINs Framework Explained
To organize the benefits and risks of goal-related technologies, the researchers introduced the GAINS and DRAINs framework. This model categorizes how digital features influence motivation across multiple dimensions.
GAINS: How Technology Can Boost Motivation
The GAINS framework highlights five ways technology can support motivation:
- Goal clarity and attainability: Apps can make goals more concrete and realistic by breaking them into manageable steps.
- Action–intention connection: Clear links between actions and outcomes help users understand how daily behaviors contribute to long-term goals.
- Intrinsic enjoyment: When apps make the process enjoyable, users are more likely to stay engaged.
- New information: Data insights can reveal patterns, progress, and opportunities for improvement.
- Support: Social features and personalized feedback can create a sense of encouragement and accountability.
When these elements are well designed, users feel capable, informed, and motivated to continue.
DRAINs: How the Same Technology Can Demotivate
The DRAINs framework captures the darker side of motivational technology:
- Distraction: Gamified elements can pull attention away from the actual goal.
- Reward misalignment: Points, badges, or streaks may reward behavior that doesn’t truly reflect meaningful progress.
- Action avoidance: Overly complex systems can make users avoid engagement altogether.
- Information overload: Too much data without clear guidance can overwhelm users.
- Negative self-efficacy: Constant comparison or poor feedback can make users feel incapable of success.
The key insight here is that the same feature can appear in both GAINS and DRAINs. For example, gamification can be motivating when it reinforces progress, but harmful when it becomes the main focus.
Why Gamification Often Causes Problems
Gamification is one of the most common features in goal-setting apps, and also one of the most controversial. Badges, streaks, leaderboards, and points are designed to keep users engaged. In the short term, they often work.
The problem arises when users start chasing rewards instead of meaningful improvement. Language-learning apps are a common example. Users may focus on maintaining streaks or earning points rather than actually mastering the language. Over time, learning becomes secondary to winning the game, which can undermine real skill development.
The Role of Social Comparison
Social features are another area where motivation can easily flip into demotivation. Seeing others succeed can be inspiring, but it can also trigger feelings of inadequacy, especially for beginners. If an app constantly highlights top performers, users who are struggling may feel like they don’t belong or aren’t capable of success.
The research suggests that personal progress comparisons are often more effective than public leaderboards. Measuring improvement against one’s own past performance supports confidence and persistence.
How AI Changes the Motivation Equation
Artificial intelligence adds a new layer to goal-setting apps. AI-powered feedback can adapt messages based on user behavior, proficiency, and progress stage. When used carefully, this can make motivation feel more personal and less judgmental.
For example, instead of showing raw step counts or savings totals, AI can emphasize trends, effort, and improvement. This helps users stay motivated even when progress is slow.
However, AI can also contribute to information overload if it delivers too much feedback too frequently. The researchers argue that less frequent but more actionable feedback is often more effective.
Designing Better Motivational Technologies
One of the practical contributions of the research is the idea of a motivational design audit. Designers and marketers are encouraged to evaluate their products through the lens of DRAINs to identify features that distract, misreward, or discourage users.
The goal is not to remove technology features, but to realign them with intrinsic motivation. Instead of rewarding surface-level metrics, apps should highlight mastery, learning, and meaningful progress toward long-term goals.
Personalization is also critical. Feedback that works for a beginner may not work for an experienced user. Tailoring information based on skill level and engagement history can help maintain motivation over time.
Broader Implications and Future Research
The researchers also point to broader questions that deserve attention. Access to motivational technology is not equal, and differences in age, experience, and resources can shape how people respond to these tools. There is also growing interest in understanding how long-term exposure to digital motivation systems may fundamentally change how people set and pursue goals.
As goal-setting apps become more sophisticated, the challenge will be ensuring they support sustained motivation, not just short-term engagement.
What This Means for Users
For users, the takeaway is simple but important. Goal-setting apps are tools, not guarantees. Paying attention to how an app makes you feel is just as important as tracking numbers. If a tool causes stress, distraction, or self-doubt, it may be working against your goals rather than supporting them.
Choosing apps that emphasize personal progress, clarity, and meaningful feedback can make a real difference in long-term success.
Research paper reference:
https://doi.org/10.1002/arcp.70004
