Can’t keep your New Year’s resolutions? Science has a simple fix

The world is ready to welcome the New Year 2026 in a matter of hours. As the countdown begins, many are setting their New Year’s resolutions. Though many start with enthusiasm, it slowly dies down. Most people end up breaking their resolutions. Your new year resolution may be hard to keep, but science offers one simple fix to succeed.

According to a study by researchers at Stockholm University and Linköping University, there is a simple way to succeed in keeping your New Year’s resolution. The findings of the study are published in the journal PLOS ONE.

Rephrase your resolution

The research says that one possible solution to keep your New Year's resolution isto rephrase it. Yes, you read that right. Rephrase your resolution. How you formulate your resolution really affects its outcome. How do you rephrase your resolution?

Instead of “I will quit or avoid,” rephrase it as “I will start to.” This way, you will have a greater chance of reaching your goals. This is the world's largest study about New Year's resolutions.

Why does this simple trick work?

To understand how to successfully keep New Year's resolutions, the researchers looked at the resolutions that 1066 people made at the end of 2017. The participants of the study formulated their own resolutions. They were divided into three different groups, based on the amounts of support they got throughout the year: no support at all, some support, and extended support. The participants were followed each month throughout the year.

"It was found that the support given to the participants did not make much of a difference when it came down to how well participants kept their resolutions throughout the year. What surprised us were the results on how to phrase your resolution," Professor Per Carlbring at the Department of Psychology, Stockholm University, said.

The researchers found that the participants who formulated an ‘approach goal’ had the highest success. What is an approach goal? It is a resolution where you try to adopt a new habit or introduce something new in your life. On the other hand, resolutions regarding avoiding or quitting something, known as the ‘avoidance goals’ turned out to be less successful.

"In many cases, rephrasing your resolution could definitely work. For example, if your goal is to stop eating sweets in order to lose weight, you will most likely be more successful if you say 'I will eat fruit several times a day' instead. You then replace sweets with something healthier, which probably means you will lose weight and also keep your resolution. You cannot erase a behaviour, but you can replace it with something else. Although, this might be harder to apply to the resolution 'I will quit smoking', which is something you might do 20 times a day," Per Carlbring, added.

So, whatever your resolution is for 2026, try to formulate an approach goal to make it successful.