Kevin Williams, a former athlete as well as a former cross-country and track coach at SUNY Albany, is now part of its industrial organizational psychology department. He has a degree is human psychology focusing primarily on motivation and performance. Williams gave a lecture at Hamilton College titled "The Goal Striving Process in Athletes: Raising the Bar and Missing the Mark." The primary question driving this inquiry was why some are resistant and others motivated to succeed? The lecture outlined a research project based on this question. Two studies of track and field athletes looked at what the processes are by which people set, pursue and revise personal goals and why people of similar ability respond differently to goal failure. Williams cited work from Edward Locke, University of Maryland, to outline what effective goal setting is and how it is important to whether or not we resist or succeed. By setting specific, challenging, and salient goals for ourselves we can be successful inside and outside of the classroom or playing field.
