Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Clinical Psychological Science, Maastricht University, PO Box 616, 6200 MD Maastricht, The Netherlands.
Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Clinical Psychological Science, Maastricht University, PO Box 616, 6200 MD Maastricht, The Netherlands.
Appetite. 2015 Feb;85:52-7. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2014.11.007. Epub 2014 Nov 11.
In the present study it was investigated whether boredom promotes eating and if so, whether this effect likely reflects an increased drive for rewarding stimulation (positive reinforcement) or more plainly the drive to escape boredom (negative reinforcement). In the latter case, the valence of the stimulation should not matter and people might even be willing to look for negative stimulation, for instance to hurt oneself, just to escape boredom. In two parallel experiments, it was tested whether induced boredom promotes the consumption of chocolate (Experiment 1) and whether participants likewise are more inclined to self-administer electrocutaneous stimuli (Experiment 2). In both experiments, a total of 30 participants attended two separate sessions watching a documentary for 1 h (neutral condition) and a monotonous repetition of a single clip from the same documentary for 1 h (boring condition), in balanced order. During Experiment 1, participants had free access to M&Ms and during Experiment 2 participants could freely self-administer brief electrical shocks. It was found that participants ate more M&Ms when bored but also that they more readily self-administered electrical shocks when bored. It is concluded that eating when bored is not driven by an increased desire for satisfying incentive stimulation, but mainly by the drive to escape monotony.
在本研究中，研究人员探讨了无聊是否会促进进食，如果会，这种影响是否反映了人们对奖励刺激的需求增加（正强化），或者更简单地反映了人们逃避无聊的需求（负强化）。在后一种情况下，刺激的效价不应重要，人们甚至可能愿意寻找消极刺激，例如伤害自己，只是为了逃避无聊。在两项平行实验中，研究人员测试了诱导的无聊是否会促进巧克力的消费（实验 1），以及参与者是否同样更倾向于自我给予电刺激（实验 2）。在这两个实验中，总共 30 名参与者参加了两个单独的会议，观看纪录片 1 小时（中性条件）和单调重复同一纪录片的一个片段 1 小时（无聊条件），顺序平衡。在实验 1 中，参与者可以自由食用 M&M 巧克力豆，而在实验 2 中，参与者可以自由地自我给予短暂的电击。结果发现，参与者在感到无聊时会吃更多的 M&M 巧克力豆，但也会更愿意在感到无聊时自我给予电击。研究结果表明，人们在感到无聊时进食，不是因为对满足激励刺激的需求增加，而是主要因为逃避单调的需求。
