Regulatory Mode and the Joys of Doing: Effects of ‘Locomotion’ and ‘Assessment’ on Intrinsic and Extrinsic Task-Motivation ANTONIO PIERRO 1 * , ARIE W. KRUGLANSKI 2 and E. TORY HIGGINS 3 1 Universita ` di Roma ‘La Sapienza’, Italy 2 University of Maryland, USA 3 Columbia University, USA Abstract This research investigates the relation between regulatory-mode (Higgins, Kruglanski, & Pierro, 2003; Kruglanski et al., 2000) and task motivation. Four studies conducted in diverse field and laboratory settings support the notions that ‘locomotion’, i.e. a self- regulatory emphasis on movement from state to state, is positively related to intrinsic task motivation, whereas ‘assessment’, i.e. a self-regulatory tendency to emphasize compara- tive appraisal of entities and states (such as goals and means) is positively related to extrinsic motivation. It is further found that ‘locomotion’, but not ‘assessment’, is positively related to effort investment, which, in turn, is positively related to goal attainment. Attainment is, additionally, predicted by an interaction of locomotion and assessment, such that individuals are most likely to reach their goals if they are high on both these dimensions. Taken as a body, these findings highlight the relevance of regulatory-mode concepts to the study of task motivation and activity experience. Copyright # 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Key words: regulatory mode; task motivation; effort investment; goal attainment INTRODUCTION In self-regulating toward their objectives, people generally focus on two types of activities. They (1) evaluate what it is that they actually wish to do and how best it can be accomplished; (2) they actually go ahead and, (as a Nike commercial felicitously puts it), ‘just do it’, that is, invest efforts in realizing their intentions and channeling them into concrete undertakings. European Journal of Personality Eur. J. Pers. 20: 355–375 (2006) Published online 19 June 2006 in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/per.600 *Correspondence to: A. Pierro, Dipartimento di Psicologia dei Processi di Sviluppo e Socializzazione, Universita ` di Roma ‘La Sapienza’, Via dei Marsi, 78, 00185 Roma, Italy. E-mail: antonio.pierro@uniroma1.it Contract/grant sponsor: NSF; contract/grant number: SBR-9417422. Copyright # 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Received 18 January 2005 Accepted 15 June 2005