Performance in Planning: Processes, Requirements, and Errors

Planning is not only an aspect of our day-to-day lives, it represents a critical aspect of performance on many high-level tasks. Although few of us would dispute the need for planning, the psychology of planning remains relatively undeveloped. With this point in mind, the intent in the present article was to review the available literature on planning. The authors begin by examining alternative models of planning and delineating their implications for performance. Subsequently, the findings obtained in various studies of planning are reviewed with respect to 8 key questions ranging from when planning is useful to how errors in planning should be minimized. The implications of current answers to these questions are discussed in terms of research needs and development of a more comprehensive theoretical understanding of performance in planning.