summary: Research shows there is a strong link between impulsivity, boredom, and stress, and impulsive people respond to boredom by releasing more of the stress hormone cortisol. This physiological response explains why impulsive people are more likely to make rash decisions when they’re bored.
The findings pave the way for targeted interventions that could help improve stress management and mental health in people with impulse control problems. Future research aims to develop strategies to break the vicious cycle of boredom, stress and impulsivity.
Key Facts:
- When impulsive people are bored, they release more cortisol and have a stronger stress response.
- Impulsivity and boredom are related, and boredom acts as a psychological stressor.
- This study suggests that managing stress may help reduce unhealthy impulsive behaviors.
sauce: University of Portsmouth
A study from the University of Portsmouth looked into the relationship between impulsivity and boredom, seeking to understand what leads to thoughtless and sometimes unhealthy decisions.
Impulsivity is the tendency to act quickly and without thinking things through. Impulsivity is associated with several mental disorders, including ADHD, borderline personality disorder, and substance use disorders.
It’s well known that there is a strong link between boredom and impulsivity, but two new studies shed light on the role that stress plays in this relationship.
The results are: Physiology and behavior, They found that participants with higher impulsivity traits reported higher levels of boredom following the boring task.
While this result was expected, the new finding is that these people experienced a greater physiological response, with greater release of the stress hormone cortisol.
“Our findings shed light on the biological basis of why some people, particularly those with high impulsivity, find boredom more stressful than others,” said lead author and researcher Dr. James Clay, from the Canadian Institute on Drug Use and Dalhousie University.
“By identifying how the stress response is triggered, and that cortisol is a key mediator, we can better understand why this happens and begin to consider targeted interventions that can help manage these responses.”
“This opens new avenues for developing personalized approaches to reduce stress and improve mental health, particularly for people who struggle with impulse control or the negative effects of boredom.”
Boredom is a form of psychological stress for most people because it is a state of restlessness and dissatisfaction that often leads to stimulation-seeking. However, an impulsive person’s innate response to stressful events may be why they are more likely to be stimulated by boring situations.
Lead author Dr Matt Parker, a neuroscientist specialising in stress research, now at the University of Surrey, said: “We know that people with high impulsivity are more likely to develop addictions across their lifetime. There has always been an association between impulsivity and boredom, but the mechanisms behind this relationship are not fully understood.”
“For example, early theories suggested that people with ADHD suffer from boredom because they dislike waiting and therefore tend to act thoughtlessly. But what makes them impatient? And how can we alleviate this feeling and help them get used to being bored?”
“That’s where stress comes in. Our study supports the hypothesis that highly impulsive people have a greater physiological response to boredom. Finding ways to reduce these stress symptoms may prevent people from seeking unhealthy ways to relieve stress, such as drugs or gambling.”
In the first study, 80 participants completed a boring task and then reported how the task made them feel. The results supported existing evidence that impulsive people are more prone to boredom than others.
A second study monitored 20 participants’ physiological response to boredom by testing cortisol levels in saliva samples before and after the task. They found that the system that manages the body’s stress response – the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis – increases levels of stress hormones in the body during the task.
“Knowing that the stress response links boredom and impulsivity brings us one step closer to developing potential solutions to break this vicious cycle,” explained co-author Juan Badaliotti, from the University of Portsmouth’s School of Psychology, Sport and Health Sciences.
“We hope that this discovery will inspire future research into potential interventions to break the feedback loop between boredom, stress and impulsivity, and ultimately develop more effective coping mechanisms for mental illness.”
The authors recommend that future research should replicate the second study with a larger number of participants and measure how prone participants are to boredom and their impulsivity.
About this research news on stress and impulsivity
author: Robin Montague
sauce: University of Portsmouth
contact: Robin Montague – University of Portsmouth
image: Image courtesy of Neuroscience News
Original Research: Open access.
“HPA activity mediates the link between impulsivity and boredom” James Clay et al. Physiology and behavior
Abstract
HPA activity mediates the link between impulsivity and boredom
Boredom is a complex emotional state that impacts mental health and well-being and has attracted attention across disciplines, but is relatively understudied in psychiatric research.
Here, we explored the complex relationships between trait impulsivity, stress, and boredom across two studies.
Participants completed self-report measures of impulsivity and boredom, as well as boredom-inducing tasks.
Study 1 involved 80 participants (42 women, 38 men, ages 20–63 years) and demonstrated that impulsive people tend to feel more bored after a boring task, replicating previous findings.
In Study 2, we extend this and show in 20 participants (9 women, 12 men, age 18–24 years) that activity in the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, specifically increased salivary cortisol response, mediates the association between impulsivity and boredom following a boring task.
Collectively, these results indicate that HPA axis activity may highlight the relationship between trait impulsivity and boredom, extending previous research and providing new insights into the underlying mechanisms.
These findings suggest that tailored interventions designed for highly impulsive individuals may reduce the negative effects of boredom and break the identified feedback loops.
