Lost by definition: Why boredom matters for psychology and society

Westgate, Erin C.; Steidle, Brianna

doi:10.1111/spc3.12562

Cited by 32 publications

(30 citation statements)

References 146 publications

(193 reference statements)

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“…Second, very little empirical research exists on state boredom (see Westgate & Steidle, 2020, for an overview), especially outside of American and Western European contexts. A strength of the present paper is its inclusion of a very large sample of participants from across the globe, including countries not well-represented historically in psychological research (e.g., Argentina, Indonesia, the Philippines).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pandemic boredom: Little evidence that lockdown-related boredom affects risky public health behaviors across 116 countries

Ec¹,

Buttrick²,

Lin³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Does boredom increase risk behaviors in real-world settings, and if so, might it contribute to failure to comply with public health guidelines during the COVID-19 pandemic? In a large cross-national sample of 63,336 community respondents from 116 countries, we examined the prevalence of lockdown-related boredom during the initial outbreak of COVID-19, as well as its demographic and situational predictors. Boredom was higher in countries with more COVID-19 cases, more stringent lockdown policies, and lower GDPs, as well as among men and less educated/younger adults. Additionally, we examined whether “pandemic boredom” predicted longitudinal decreases in social distancing behavior (and vice versa; n = 8031). We found little evidence that changes in boredom predict individual public health behaviors (handwashing, staying home, self-quarantining, avoiding crowds) over time, or that such behaviors had any reliable longitudinal effects on boredom itself. In summary, we found little evidence that boredom affects pandemic health behaviors.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pandemic boredom: Little evidence that lockdown-related boredom affects risky public health behaviors across 116 countries

Ec¹,

Buttrick²,

Lin³

et al. 2021

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The literature on boredom has struggled with the question of whether boredom is beneficial or harmful, particularly in interpersonal contexts (Pfattheicher et al, 2020;Westgate & Steidle, 2020). The present research adds additional evidence that boredom may be associated with serious negative interpersonal outcomes (e.g., school bullying and sadism), even among younger age groups and in controlled institutional settings.…”

Section: Contributions To Research On Boredommentioning

confidence: 62%

“…However, this should not be taken as evidence that boredom is "bad." As previous research has emphasized (Westgate, 2020;Westgate & Steidle, 2020), boredom is not inherently good or bad, but rather acts as a signal that more meaningful engagement is needed. As such, boredom promotes both prosocial tendencies and destructive tendencies (Pfattheicher et al, 2020;Westgate & Steidle, 2020;Westgate & Wilson, 2018).…”

Section: Contributions To Research On Boredommentioning

confidence: 97%

I enjoy hurting my classmates: On the relation of boredom and sadism in schools

Pfattheicher¹,

Lb²,

Nielsen³

et al. 2021

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Schools can be a place of both love and of cruelty. We examine one particular type of cruelty that occurs in the school context: sadism, that is, harming others for pleasure. Primarily, we propose and test whether boredom plays a crucial role in the emergence of sadistic actions at school. In two well-powered studies (total N = 1,038) using both self- and peer-reports, we first document that sadistic behavior occurs at school, although at a low level. We further show that those students who are more often bored at school are more likely to engage in sadistic actions. Overall, the present work contributes to a better understanding of sadism in schools and points to boredom as one potential motivator. We discuss implications for research on sadism and boredom, in the school context and beyond.

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“…Is it causal? Much of the above research is correlational, or reflects differences in boredom-proneness or trait boredom (which might be explained by confounds or third variables; see Westgate & Steidle, 2020). However, experimental studies suggest that boredom plays a causal role in many of these outcomes.…”

Section: Mental Health Risksmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the Western world, "bore" [1768], the predecessor of boredom, referred to the act of being "tiresome or dull"; boredom appeared as early as the 1760s as an English expression to describe the supposedly "French" experience of having a dull time (Westgate & Steidle, 2020). This does not mean that people in the past did not feel bored; for instance, boredom appears in ancient Chinese poetry, largely in the context of leisure boredom.…”

Section: Boredom Todaymentioning

confidence: 99%

The Origins of Boredom

Lin¹,

Ec²

2021

Preprint

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Why do people experience unpleasant, aversive emotions? Boredom is associated with a wide range of mental and physical health problems, including binge eating, substance use, anxiety, and depression. Nor does boredom feel good; many people are willing to shock themselves or even view upsetting images rather than be bored. Given such evidence, is it possible that boredom has adaptive value? We argue that it does; boredom provides an important evolutionary solution to minimizing prediction error by incentivizing learning. Reducing prediction error, it has been argued, is a core organizing principle underlying cognition; however, one way to reduce error is to isolate one’s self in extremely predictable environments (i.e., the “Dark Room Problem”). We argue that boredom evolved, at least in part, to prevent this. Specifically, boredom makes such a solution affectively undesirable, by aversively signaling a lack of successful attentional engagement in a valued goal-congruent activity. To reduce this aversive state, people are motivated to re-engage in meaningful activities and reallocate attentional resources. We review evidence from behavioral science and computational modeling supporting the role of boredom in maximizing learning and reducing prediction error. Furthermore, we suggest that these functions of boredom are not only present in modern humans, but have been conserved across species. We review evidence for boredom-like states in non-human animals and argue that animals likely experience boredom due to sharing many of the same psychological and physiological components of emotion as humans. For instance, animals in under-stimulated environments, such as cages or zoos, exhibit stereotyped behavior and other responses analogous to boredom in humans, including novelty seeking and play. In doing so, we address the adaptive value of boredom and its origins and prevalence in both human and non-human animals.

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Lost by definition: Why boredom matters for psychology and society

Cited by 32 publications

References 146 publications

Pandemic boredom: Little evidence that lockdown-related boredom affects risky public health behaviors across 116 countries

Pandemic boredom: Little evidence that lockdown-related boredom affects risky public health behaviors across 116 countries

I enjoy hurting my classmates: On the relation of boredom and sadism in schools

The Origins of Boredom

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