Sometimes the so-called bragging promise is attributed, when great men in 13th century Iceland praised their coming deeds, as the origin of the New Year's promise.
But the fact is that the bragging promise was not necessarily made at the turn of the year, and there are many indications that the New Year's promise is from the beginning an American phenomenon.
The 18th century inventor and one of the United States' founding fathers, Benjamin Franklin, is said to be the man behind the concept.
In the 1940s, the New Year's promise has become a tradition in the USA and comes as a cultural import to Sweden.
Then people talk mostly about it as good intentions or New Year's wishes.
One of the earliest printed sources where the word New Year's promise appears is in the magazine Arbetaren på nyårsafton 1952, with the poem Nyårslöfte by Stig Dagerman.
See New Year's resolutions through history in the clip above.