LITERATURE REVIEW: THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SOCIAL COMMITMENT AND FOLLOW-THROUGH
THE COGNITIVE STRUCTURE OF INTENTIONS AND COMMITMENTS
Robert Audi’s “Intention, Cognitive Commitment, and Planning” (1991) develops a cognitive-motivational account of intending that analyzes intentions as composites of belief and desire states. Audi argues that a person S intends to perform action A if and only if: (1) S believes they will (or probably will) A; (2) S wants to A and has not temporarily forgotten this want; and (3) either S has no equally strong or stronger incompatible want, or if they do, they have temporarily forgotten it or do not believe they have it. This account explains why intending involves predominant motivation, clarifies how intentions function in action explanation through the want-belief model, accounts for why agents cannot normally intend incompatible actions, and distinguishes intending from merely hoping by requiring a minimal level of belief about performing the action.
The account also reveals important connections between intentions and plans: while not every intention requires a full plan (as in spontaneous basic actions), having a plan to A necessarily involves intending to A, and rational planning must take account of one’s intentions precisely because they embody both motivational and cognitive commitments about one’s future behavior. This holistic account explains both how intentions are defeated when circumstances change and how they extend to encompass necessary means, providing a unified framework for understanding intention formation, planning, and rational agency that preserves the explanatory and normative importance of intentions while analyzing them in terms of more fundamental psychological states.
Building on this foundation, Cheshire Calhoun’s “What Good Is Commitment?” (2009) develops a more nuanced taxonomy of intentions that explains why some plans persist while others are abandoned. Calhoun distinguishes between three types of intentions that bind the future to varying degrees: mere-intentions, provisional plans, and commitments. The key difference lies in their resistance to reconsideration. Mere-intentions and provisional plans are designed to remain in place only “unless something comes up”—they take reconsideration off the table only until there is some deliberation-relevant change such as new information, changed circumstances, or shifts in values and desires. By contrast, commitments involve intentions to follow through despite developments that would normally make it rational to reconsider. For example, someone with a mere-intention to bike in the afternoon will reasonably reconsider upon receiving an attractive movie invitation, whereas someone committed to biking would treat such invitations as factors to resist rather than as triggers for redeliberation.
Calhoun’s analysis reveals that the depth of commitment determines what counts as a plan-threatening problem versus a problem to be overcome. She argues that commitments consist partly in adopting a distinctive “problem-handling policy” that treats unanticipated obstacles differently than mere-intenders would treat them. When someone commits, they prepare to see to the persistence of their intention through multiple mechanisms: reviving flagging motivation, seeking new reasons to support the original commitment, refraining from putting oneself in temptation’s way, and actively resisting reconsideration even when circumstances change dramatically. Plans structured as commitments can withstand the same challenges—boredom, difficulty, opportunity costs—that would cause mere-intentions to dissolve, not because the committed person ignores these problems but because they have adopted a policy of regarding such problems as obstacles to surmount rather than as signals to reconsider.
Plans fall apart when they are structured as mere-intentions or provisional plans rather than commitments, because they are designed with built-in exit ramps that become active when new options emerge or when the costs of continuation appear to outweigh the benefits. The weakness of this seeing-to preparation is what allows plans to fall apart: if someone has only shallow commitment or has made what Calhoun calls a “commitment” that is more accurately a mere-intention, they will not engage in the active work of sustaining their plans when interest fades, when competing desires emerge, or when costs accumulate.
Calhoun’s framework suggests that plans often fall apart not due to irrationality but due to the rational design features of different intention types. Mere-intentions and provisional plans are meant to be sensitive to new information and changing circumstances—they fall apart when they are supposed to. Moreover, Calhoun challenges the assumption that commitment is always the superior planning strategy, noting that decision-making contexts are often stable enough that mere-intentions persist simply because “nothing comes up,” and that sunk costs alone often provide sufficient reason to continue without genuine commitment. Plans can also fail even when commitment is present if the commitment itself is poorly designed: if someone commits to outcomes they cannot control, makes commitments based on unstable psychological attractions rather than authored decisions, or fails to engage in the “recapitulative processes” (like anniversary celebrations or retreats) that help sustain commitment over time. Understanding when plans fall apart thus requires attention to both the type of intention formed (mere-intention, provisional plan, or commitment), the depth of commitment (what one is prepared to weather), and the mechanisms one has in place for seeing to the persistence of one’s intentions across time.
FROM INTENTION TO ACTION: IMPLEMENTATION AND AUTOMATICITY
Even when commitments are properly formed, a critical gap often emerges between intention and execution. Peter Gollwitzer’s “Implementation Intentions: Strong Effects of Simple Plans” (1999) provides a foundational explanation for why people frequently fail to follow through on intentions, even when motivation is high, and how that gap can be reliably reduced. Gollwitzer distinguishes between goal intentions, such as “I intend to do X,” and implementation intentions, which specify the exact conditions under which an action should occur using an if-then structure, for example, “When situation X arises, I will perform behavior Y.” The central claim is that many failures of follow-through are not due to weak motivation, but to breakdowns at the point of action initiation.
Across a large program of laboratory and field experiments, Gollwitzer shows that forming implementation intentions dramatically increases the likelihood that people act on their goals. These effects are strongest when the behavior is difficult, unpleasant, or easy to postpone, which closely mirrors the conditions under which flaking typically occurs. For instance, studies summarized in the paper show that participants who specified when and where they would act were far more likely to complete tasks such as writing reports during holidays, exercising regularly, taking medication on time, or performing health behaviors like breast self-examinations. In many cases, implementation intentions more than doubled completion rates compared to goal intentions alone.
The paper explains these effects through automaticity. By pre-linking a specific situational cue to a specific response, implementation intentions shift control of behavior from effortful, deliberative processes to automatic ones. When the cue is encountered, the response is triggered quickly and with little conscious effort, even under distraction, fatigue, or cognitive load. Gollwitzer describes this as “passing the control of behavior to the environment,” allowing people to act without needing to re-decide or re-motivate themselves in the moment.
Importantly, the paper also shows that implementation intentions are effective not only for initiating desired behaviors, but for inhibiting undesired ones. Experiments demonstrate that people can use if-then plans to resist distractions, suppress habitual responses, and block automatic behaviors that conflict with their goals. This is particularly relevant for flakiness, which often arises when competing goals, distractions, or avoidance impulses override earlier commitments.
From a behavior change perspective, this paper is highly actionable. It suggests that reducing flakiness does not require increasing motivation or social pressure, but restructuring commitments so that follow-through becomes automatic. Designing systems that prompt people to specify when, where, and how they will show up, or when and how they will cancel early, can meaningfully reduce last-minute drop-offs. Rather than relying on reminders alone, implementation intentions help ensure that people act when the critical moment arrives. In the context of social commitments, this framework supports interventions that transform vague plans into concrete, situationally anchored commitments, thereby narrowing the gap between intending to show up and actually doing so.
SIGNALING COMMITMENT AND MANAGING UNCERTAINTY
Social commitments differ from individual intentions in a crucial respect: they depend on coordination between multiple parties, each of whom must assess the other’s likelihood of following through. Understanding the factors that drive people to commit and to signal that commitment is essential for designing interventions that increase commitment to social plans. Signaling commitment helps inform interaction partners before decisions are made; in the context of socializing, communication is a crucial part of helping someone determine if a friend or acquaintance will follow through on their social plan.
Drawing on game theory methodologies, Kapetaniou et al. designed a modified prisoner’s dilemma to understand how participants decide to signal their commitments. They gave participants the opportunity to signal their moves over multiple rounds of prisoner’s dilemma payoffs to motivate reciprocal cooperation. The researchers found, correlationally and causally in two experimental designs, that participants used costly signaling when they had low confidence in their prediction of the other’s behavior. When they had high confidence about what the other would choose, they were less likely to use costly signaling.
The central finding is that participants committed to costly signaling particularly when they had low confidence in their prediction of the other’s intention. Signaling cooperation was less commonly used in later rounds, suggesting that once trust had been established, it was less necessary. The research demonstrates a causal link, not just a correlation, between uncertainty in predicting others’ actions and the willingness to use costly signals of cooperation.
If applicable to real-world social situations, this finding suggests that communication is a key part of resolving uncertainty related to social commitments, although it may not be necessary when both parties perceive the other as highly committed. In strategic social interactions, it is essential not only to have an estimate of what the other will do, but also an internal representation of how reliable this estimate is. For intervention design, this implies that systems facilitating social plans should make commitment levels visible and provide mechanisms for early communication when uncertainty is high, while avoiding excessive signaling demands when mutual confidence already exists.
THE INTERPERSONAL CONSEQUENCES OF CANCELLATIONS
When plans do fail, the manner of cancellation profoundly shapes its relational impact. A key factor in understanding plan failures is how cancellations are interpreted by the person being cancelled on. Lee et al.’s study “How to Cancel Plans With Friends: A Mixed Methods Study of Strategy and Experience” (2023) and the work by Caron et al. (2023) reveal how minor logistical and communication changes impact people’s perception of whether a plan was cancelled with respect, or conversely, as a signal of rejection or disrespect.
This research examines a core behavior underlying what is often described as “flake culture”: cancelling plans with friends and the emotional consequences of being cancelled on. The authors frame cancellations as a form of interpersonal disappointment that can threaten both self-image and relationship quality, especially when the cancelled interaction involves a close friend. Drawing on theories of politeness and commitment, the studies situate plan cancellations as moments where people must balance autonomy with the desire to maintain social approval.
Using mixed-methods approaches, the researchers collected both open-ended responses and quantitative ratings about how people cancel plans, how they prefer to be cancelled on, and what emotional reactions cancellations provoke. The research surveyed participants regarding what they considered an acceptable versus an unacceptable way to cancel plans with a friend—evaluating factors such as the notice window for cancellation, communication, and the reason the plan fell through.
Participants consistently emphasized that timing is the most important factor in a “good” cancellation. Providing advance notice was seen as a sign of respect for the other person’s time, while last-minute cancellations were more likely to be interpreted as careless or dismissive. Participants also preferred direct communication through text or phone calls rather than indirect or delayed messages, suggesting that avoidance itself is perceived as a violation of social norms.
The study also identifies clear distinctions between acceptable and unacceptable reasons for cancelling. Health-related issues and family obligations were widely viewed as legitimate, uncontrollable reasons for cancelling plans. In contrast, cancelling because a better opportunity arose was considered the most inappropriate explanation, as it communicates an implicit ranking of relationships. Discovering that a cancellation excuse was dishonest further intensified negative emotions such as annoyance, offense, and frustration. These findings highlight that cancellations are not evaluated solely on outcome, but on the perceived intent, honesty, and relational regard of the person cancelling.
The study introduces a framework called the “Investment Model,” which details the way in which friendships are selected based on reciprocity, perceived alternatives, and, critically, time invested. By these metrics, cancelling a plan lowered each of the factors in the investment model. Overall, participants reported that cancellations were emotionally impactful, and that they were most upset when the cancellation was unexpected or signaled a lack of prioritization of the relationship—particularly so when the reason for cancellation was disingenuous.
Importantly, the authors note that cancellations often involve an asymmetry of effort, where one person has already invested time or emotional energy into the plan. This imbalance helps explain why being cancelled on can feel like rejection or social exclusion, even in non-romantic contexts. The paper argues that recurring unreliability and failure to repair cancelled plans may erode trust over time, ultimately weakening friendships.
These findings are important because they show that cancellations are most damaging to friendships when specific logistical and communication tactics used by the person cancelling signal a lack of investment. This study directly informs behavior change efforts aimed at reducing flakiness. It suggests that interventions should encourage earlier decision-making, make respectful cancellation easier than avoidance, and support relationship repair through rescheduling or accountability mechanisms. Rather than treating flakiness as a personality flaw, the findings point to concrete social norms that can be reinforced through design, including advance notice, clear communication, and signals of continued commitment after a cancellation. For intervention design, this implies it is important to make commitments visible and simple to remember—in order to avoid the emotional impact of cancellations in the first place—and to provide tools that support timely, honest communication in the case of a cancellation. In doing so, interventions can reduce the guilt associated with rescheduling commitments, as well as the fear surrounding making plans that could eventually fall through—as people will be more aware of how to communicate last-minute changes in a respectful manner.
MISPERCEPTIONS OF CANCELLATION ACCEPTABILITY
While cancellations undeniably carry social costs, people may systematically overestimate their severity, creating barriers to honest communication and flexible planning. In understanding why people choose to cancel their plans, it is also helpful to look at the impact of such cancellations. While canceling social plans generally carries a negative connotation, signaling lack of investment or poor planning skills, Majumder and Martuza find that people overestimate the negative impacts of canceling plans, demonstrating that canceling is more socially acceptable than is widely thought.
Across seven main studies and four supplemental studies, Majumder and Martuza find this effect in perception surveys and in reported compensatory actions. Perceptually, participants incorrectly estimated the acceptability of canceling plans, assuming it was more problematic than it actually was. In experimental designs around compensatory actions, the authors found that participants overestimated both the price of apology gifts and the amount of time required for make-up activities. While replicated in American and French populations, the study was not broad enough to make cross-cultural claims. Within these target populations, however, one implication of the study is that the findings could reduce social stress for those who are considering canceling plans.
This misperception manifests both perceptually and behaviorally, suggesting that fear of social consequences may lead people to avoid necessary cancellations or to maintain commitments they cannot realistically honor, ultimately increasing the likelihood of last-minute failures or no-shows that create worse outcomes than timely cancellations would have. Interventions that calibrate expectations about cancellation acceptability—while still encouraging advance notice and honest communication—may reduce social anxiety and paradoxically improve overall reliability by making early cancellation psychologically easier than maintaining untenable commitments.
THE APPEAL AND LIMITATIONS OF SOCIAL WITHDRAWAL
As flaking has become more culturally visible, a counter-narrative has emerged celebrating withdrawal from social commitments as psychologically beneficial. As we design interventions that encourage people to stay committed to their plans, it is simultaneously important to understand why certain people may find satisfaction in missing out on social activities. Barry et al.’s study on JOMO—”Joy of missing out”—interrogates popular culture’s recent flattery of withdrawing from social commitments and examines whether this behavioral tendency is truly psychologically healthy.
The researchers studied two groups of approximately 500 adults ages 18-59, using both person-centered and variable-centered approaches to evaluate the relationship between the “joy of missing out (JOMO)” and variables such as social media use, loneliness, and mental health. They characterized JOMO as a combination of enjoying solitude, disconnection, and independence, and compared these joys to variables including social anxiety, mindfulness, life satisfaction, distress, and the inverse of JOMO—FOMO (fear of missing out).
Across the two samples, Barry et al. found that JOMO was not a true or healthy opposite to FOMO as described in popular culture, but instead moderately correlated with FOMO. This indicated that people who reported enjoying missing out on social activities often faced similarly strong levels of social anxiety, loneliness, depression, and stress, even while reporting high mindfulness and life satisfaction. These findings suggest that JOMO was not a true strategy for well-being but rather a withdrawal tactic that improved awareness but left individuals feeling a lack of connection—increasing monitoring and avoidant behaviors.
Contrary to popular portrayals of JOMO as a psychologically healthy orientation, the research reveals a more complex and concerning pattern. Rather than representing authentic preference for solitude, JOMO appears to increase monitoring and avoidant behaviors that ultimately fail to satisfy fundamental needs for connection. In the context of intervention design, this is valuable information, as it suggests that excuses made by people when flaking on commitments in the context of JOMO do not leave them truly fulfilled. This leaves a valuable opportunity for persuading these same individuals to follow through with their commitments—either by informing them of JOMO’s false perceived value or by suggesting behaviors that steer them away from defaulting to JOMO.
For interventions aimed at strengthening social commitments, this research provides important context. It suggests that when people cancel plans citing preference for solitude or celebrating missing out, these justifications may mask underlying social anxiety or avoidance rather than reflecting genuine wellbeing. This creates opportunities for interventions that help individuals distinguish between authentic needs for alone time and patterns of social withdrawal that leave them feeling isolated.
SYNTHESIS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR INTERVENTION DESIGN
Together, this body of research reveals that social plan failures emerge from multiple interacting factors operating across different timescales and levels of analysis. At the cognitive level, the distinction between mere-intentions, provisional plans, and commitments (Calhoun, 2009) explains why some plans are designed with built-in flexibility while others are meant to persist through obstacles. The gap between intention and action (Gollwitzer, 1999) accounts for failures even when commitment exists, while Audi’s (1991) analysis clarifies the belief and desire states that must align for intentions to form in the first place.
At the interpersonal level, commitment signaling (Kapetaniou et al.) becomes essential when uncertainty is high, while the manner of cancellation (Lee et al., 2023; Caron et al., 2023) determines whether plan failures damage or preserve relationships. Misperceptions about cancellation acceptability (Majumder & Martuza) may create unnecessary anxiety that paradoxically increases unreliability, while cultural narratives celebrating withdrawal (Barry et al.) may provide face-saving justifications for avoidance that ultimately fail to enhance wellbeing.
For intervention design, these findings suggest several concrete strategies. First, systems should help people distinguish between different types of commitments and choose the appropriate level of binding for each situation, rather than treating all social plans as requiring maximum commitment. Second, implementation intentions—specifying when, where, and how follow-through will occur—can substantially reduce the intention-action gap without requiring increased motivation. Third, commitment signals should be encouraged when uncertainty is high but not demanded when mutual confidence exists, reducing unnecessary friction while addressing genuine coordination problems.
Fourth, interventions should make early, honest cancellation easier than avoidance or last-minute failures, while building in mechanisms for relationship repair such as streamlined rescheduling. Fifth, expectation calibration about cancellation acceptability may reduce anxiety without undermining accountability. Finally, interventions should help people recognize when withdrawal patterns reflect underlying social anxiety rather than authentic preference for solitude, offering pathways to address these needs while maintaining connection.
By addressing plan failures as emerging from identifiable psychological and social mechanisms rather than as expressions of character or personality, these interventions can reduce both the frequency of cancellations and their relational costs when they do occur. The goal is not to eliminate all cancellations—which would be neither realistic nor desirable—but to help people make and keep commitments that genuinely serve their wellbeing while handling inevitable changes with respect, honesty, and care for their relationships.
REFERENCES
Audi, R. (1991). Intention, cognitive commitment, and planning. Synthese, 86(3), 361–378. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00485266
Barry, C. T., Chui, W. H., Christofferson, J. L., & Dryjanska, L. (2022). JOMO: Joy of missing out and its association with social media use, self-perception, and mental health. Telematics and Informatics Reports, 8, 100030.
Calhoun, C. (2009). What good is commitment? Ethics, 119(4), 613–641. https://doi.org/10.1086/605564
Caron, S., Thomas, J., Torres, A., Oh, J., & Chopik, W. J. (2023). How to cancel plans with friends: A mixed methods study of strategy and experience. Collabra: Psychology, 9(1), 57549. https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.57549
Gollwitzer, P. M. (1999). Implementation intentions: Strong effects of simple plans. American Psychologist, 54(7), 493–503. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.54.7.493
Kapetaniou, G. E., et al. Social metacognition drives willingness to commit. [Full citation details not provided in source material]
Lee, E., et al. (2023). How to cancel plans with friends: A mixed methods study of strategy and experience. Collabra: Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.57549
Majumder, S., & Martuza, A. (in press). People underestimate the acceptability of canceling plans with others. [Preprint]
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