The cost of just saying 'no'
- From: Lance <LanceGary@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 11 Oct 2007 13:40:50 -0000
Why it is impossible for some to 'just say no'
Drug abuse, crime and obesity are but a few of the problems our nation
faces, but they all have one thing in common-people's failure to
control their behavior in the face of temptation. While the ability to
control and restrain our impulses is one of the defining features of
the human animal, its failure is one of the central problems of human
society. So, why do we so often lack this crucial ability"
As human beings, we have limited resources to control ourselves, and
all acts of control draw from this same source. Therefore, when using
this resource in one domain, for example, keeping to a diet, we are
more likely to run out of this resource in a different domain, like
studying hard. Once these resources are exhausted, our ability to
control ourselves is diminished. In this depleted state, the dieter is
more likely to eat chocolate, the student to watch TV, and the
politician to accept a bribe.
In a recent study, Michael Inzlicht of the University of Toronto
Scarborough and colleague Jennifer N. Gutsell offer an account of what
is happening in the brain when our vices get the better of us.
Inzlicht and Gutsell asked participants to suppress their emotions
while watching an upsetting movie. The idea was to deplete their
resources for self-control. The participants reported their ability to
suppress their feelings on a scale from one to nine. Then, they
completed a Stroop task, which involves naming the color of printed
words (i.e. saying red when reading the word "green" in red font), yet
another task that requires a significant amount of self-control.
The researchers found that those who suppressed their emotions
performed worse on the Stroop task, indicating that they had used up
their resources for self-control while holding back their tears during
the film.
An EEG, performed during the Stroop task, confirmed these results.
Normally, when a person deviates from their goals (in this case,
wanting to read the word, not the color of the font), increased brain
activity occurs in a part of the frontal lobe called the anterior
cingulate cortex, which alerts the person that they are off-track. The
researchers found weaker activity occurring in this brain region
during the Stroop task in those who had suppressed their feelings. In
other words, after engaging in one act of self-control this brain
system seems to fail during the next act.
These results, which appear in the November issue of Psychological
Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, have
significant implications for future interventions aiming to help
people change their behavior. Most notably, it suggests that if
people, even temporarily, do not realize that they have lost control,
they will be unable to stop or change their behavior on their own.
Source: Association for Psychological Science
http://www.physorg.com/news111240202.html
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