THE ALCHEMY OF EMOTIONS - SL'OTH

As with all personality traits, laziness is a combination of genes and environment

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MICHAEL INZLICHT 

You say humans are wired to be lazy. Why is that so?

If we are faced with an option that requires more effort, we tend to avoid that. Our brain works in a reward and punishment sort of way. If you really want something and that requires effort, that effort becomes the cost. If your brain overcomes that cost, then you go for it.

But if our brain decides that desire for something is less than the effort cost, then we try to reduce the effort cost as much as possible. Suppose you have an apple in front of you and you want to eat it. There are many ways to reach the fruit. You could just walk straight or jump three times to reach it. But jumping does not make sense. You want to minimise your energy to get to the apple. We try to reduce that physical activity as much as possible. It is a very rational strategy any organism can adapt to.

Are effort costs also applicable for mental activities?

Fundamentally, yes. We are designed to reduce unnecessary effort, regardless of whether it is mental or physical. What scientists are working on is to figure out how the brain decides what is necessary and what is not. So, that is a big question.

Humans care about high order things like decision-making or how we see the world. But our body is the only way we can interact with the environment. I am interested in how we move our bodies, figure out the world and how we interact with the environment.

What do brain scans look like when we exert effort or are being lazy?