Was chatting with my wife about some particularly challenging revisions to manuscripts, saying that I was struggling to push through them. She asked how I persisted and we ended up framing manuscript revision as a self-regulation issue. A not-so-short thread. 1/x

I have intrinsic motivation to write manuscripts about things I care about and find interesting. But requests for revisions, while usefully helpful, typically require self-regulation because I'm usually not intrinsically motivated to redo prior work. 2/x

So, goal pursuit has shifted, meaning I need to self-motivate by reminding myself of the value of what I am doing ("I care about this work and think it will be mildly helpful, so I should revise even though it is painful"). 3/x

And revisions often lead to negative attributions ("The reviewers want me to change a lot of things, which means I am dumb/incompetent/etc.") that I have to actively manage ("The reviews are about the work, not about me as a researcher, or my qualifications." etc.) 4/x

Quick aside: I've seen people post some truly awful reviewer comments here on Twitter (e.g., "This work is terrible. You are a terrible researcher. Why are you even trying?" etc.) and that is appalling. There's a special place in scholarship hell for reviewers like this. 5/x

Quick aside cont: But, I also blame editors here. As an editor, if I ever got a review like that back, I'd simply withdraw/delete it. Nothing good comes from a review that attacks the person, makes people feel small, etc. And I'd have a serious talk with that reviewer. 6/x

Quick aside cont: I haven't counted, but I'd guess I've handled 400 manuscripts as action editor and I don't recall ever getting a review back like that. Maybe I've been fortunate, but I really hope those reviews are the exception and not the rule. Just awful. 7/x

Quick aside cont: Anyway, aggressive, mean reviews fuel negative attributions, requiring even more self-regulation to persist through. Not good. Don't do that, reviewers. You can be critical of the work and still be constructive and benevolent to the authors. 8/x

After getting started, effective self-regulation while revising often requires a lot of self-regulated self-talk ("I can do this. It's not fun but it'll be over if I just keep working. I can take a break when I need to. I'll be happy if/when this revision is published" etc.). 9/x

But self-motivation isn't enough. Strategies matter. There's lots of helpful "how to revise a manuscript" guides out there; I suspect they are field-specific. But synthesizing the revisions into a set of to-dos and then tackling them one at a time seems helpful. 10/x

Achieving proximal goals (e.g., tackling one revision to-do and crossing it off the list) can be motivating to continue self-regulating toward a distal goal (e.g., resubmission). That's why breaking it up into separate tasks helps. 11/x

Knowledge and practice matter, too. With each time I revise, I learn some new tricks and tips that make the next revision a bit easier. In the beginning, I had to rely a lot on others to help me gain that knowledge and provide feedback on my practice. 12/x

So getting help with knowledge, strategies, motivation (e.g., "Ugh, revising is the worst, right? Let's commiserate"), and affect (e.g., "I need some cheering up after a long revision session. Send cat pictures.") is normal and a good thing. Community support matters. 13/x

Finding one's community and nurturing it is really important. Everybody has down times, struggles, etc. It helps to have a community to support me, and in turn it helps me when I support others. It's a self- and social-regulation win-win. 14/x

So, revising manuscripts, for me, is a self-regulatory task. It involves motivation, volition, self-talk, strategies, knowledge, practice, help-seeking, and context management. Some days it goes okay and some days it really doesn't. That's ok, too. 15/x

But, consistent, positive self-regulation predicts persistence which predicts incremental progress which predicts increased likelihood of success. Sometimes even after all that, the manuscript doesn't get published. Knowing that happens to everyone helps, too. 16/x

I'll never forget sitting with one of my advisors (I needed many) and complaining about a manuscript that got rejected. He smiled, reached into his drawer, pulled out three giant stacks of paper, and dropped them loudly on his desk. 17/x

He said, "I love these manuscripts. No one else does. I can't get them accepted anywhere. That's just how it goes sometimes." Now, he's super-successful, so him normalizing that for me was really instructive. 18/x

Thus, even after lots of self-regulating during revision, sometimes I have to do a bunch more after rejection ("It's about the work, not about me as a person. This happens to other people, too. etc.") 19/x

Do I wish the scholarly publishing system was fairer, kinder, easier to navigate, more equitable, etc.? Absolutely. I wish people didn't have to self-regulate so much and I like to think I'm making some small contribution to making that system better. 20/x

But I suspect even the best system will still require people to self-regulate a bit to manage their cognition, motivation, emotions, and behaviors while revising. Learning to do that, to persist through to resubmission, has been helpful to me. Research is me-search. 21/21