Thursday, May 26, 2011

The reservoir of will and discipline

Researchers have suggested that "Choice, active response, self-regulation, and other volition may all draw on a common inner resource."


They conducted four experiments: "In Experiment 1, people who forced themselves to eat radishes instead of tempting chocolates subsequently quit faster on unsolvable puzzles than people who had not had to exert self-control over eating. In Experiment 2, making a meaningful personal choice to perform attitude-relevant behavior caused a similar decrement in persistence. In Experiment 3, suppressing emotion led to a subsequent drop in performance of solvable anagrams. In Experiment 4, an initial task requiring high self-regulation made people more passive (i.e., more prone to favor the passive-response option)."


They concluded that, "These results suggest that the self's capacity for active volition is limited and that a range of seemingly different, unrelated acts share a common resource."


Fascinating, methinks.


(HT: Tony Schwartz)

4 comments:

The Masked Badger said...

That makes it sound as though lazy, self-indulgent behaviour is the key to success...

Whooopeeeee!

minternational said...

You have a real aptitude for this sort of thing, don't you.

The Masked Badger said...

And now I have scientific justification. Right, I'm stopping prep.and going back to bed - it's the key to revival

minternational said...

Classic response....of a waster.