Think resolutions are empty promises? Turns out they're not

It's time again to assess what we're doing wrong and how to change it.

But how much can people really change? Psychologists have been trying to answer this for decades.

Considering the economy, the environment and a hyper health-consciousness, we're reminded more than ever these days of the consequences of failing to change bad habits. Bringing lunch to work every day isn't just a matter of saving up for a vacation anymore. Do it right and you could be staving off bankruptcy, death and the end of the planet.

John Norcross, who teaches psychology at the University of Scranton, understands that people often ridicule New Year's resolutions as fruitless endeavors. But he noted that some of the most popular resolutions — quitting smoking and losing weight — can be lifesaving and nothing to mock.

Despite conventional wisdom, he said, New Year's resolvers do a pretty good job of achieving their goals.

According to a study led by Norcross, up to 46 percent of people who resolve to change their behavior are successful after six months. This was based on a series of telephone interviews with 159 people. The same study surveyed 123 people who recognized a need to change a particular behavior but were not ready to commit to doing so. Of these, only 4 percent had changed their behavior by the six-month mark.

The trick is to set out to change what you do, not who you are. If you weren't crazy about jogging before, a resolution isn't going to make you like it any better. But you do have a choice to exercise anyway.

"When it comes to changing personality, it can seem like a Sisyphean task," Norcross said. "We do much better at changing discrete behavior."

Felicia Jackson, 23, is promising herself a more healthful lifestyle, physically and financially, in 2009. She will take peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches to work instead of frequenting McDonald's for lunch (and sometimes breakfast), and walk to the subway instead of hopping in a town car.

"It's $5 each way, so that's $50 a week," said Jackson, who lives in Brooklyn, N.Y. "I'm going to make a tighter budget this year with the economy the way it is."

Resolutions for this recession year seem more serious than usual. The annual Marist College end-of-year resolution poll showed that 12 percent of Americans are vowing to spend less, the third most popular response after losing weight (20 percent) and quitting smoking (16 percent). Economic pressures are so heavy that "spend less money — save more" replaced "be a better person," which dropped to seventh place in the survey of 1,003 people nationwide during the second week of December.

"When you ask about New Year's resolutions, it's usually a fun thing, part of the holiday nostalgia," said Lee Miringoff, the director of the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion. "So when you're getting the answers that we're getting, it suggests that there's a lot of serious concerns that are overwhelming the typical tradition. It's a little bit more of a sobering time for people."

New Year's resolutions are at least as old as calendars. More than four millennia ago, the Babylonians had an 11-day new-year festival and started anew by returning borrowed farm equipment. The Romans honored the god Janus — who looked backward and forward — by designating January as the start of the year. They reflected on the past year while promising to do better in the new one.

Norcross said that by joining in the New Year's resolution tradition, you have company. Between 40 and 50 percent of the population also has made resolutions. Getting the support of friends, family and co-workers is key to making the changes stick.

Here are a few more tips from Norcross:

• Track progress.

• Reward successes.

• Remember that slipping is not the same as failing. As long as you can avoid getting down on yourself for the slip, you can get back on track. To avoid future slips, steer clear of situations where you're likely to give in to temptation.

• If it's wholesale change you're after, learn a new language. A recent study has shown that people can take on new personalities when they speak in a second language.

And consider the possibility that you don't need to change. In her recent book "Stuck: Why We Can't (or Won't) Move On," author Anneli Rufus writes that culture today presents life as an endless stream of excitement, which makes it a profitable business to make people think that they're in a rut.

"The main objective to all marketing is to make the consumer feel inadequate," she writes.

So, yes, people can change. But before you make that resolution, realize that change can sometimes be overrated.

Compiled from The Hartford Courant and The New York Times.