LAZINESS EXPLAINED

Science is trying to unravel why some people do not have the drive to meet the minimal demands of daily life.

There’s a neurological reason for apathy and laziness, according to new research. Inefficient connections between certain areas of the brain may make it harder for some people to decide to act.

Although inefficient neural connections don’t explain away everyone’s laziness, new research could shed some light on the kind of pathological, extreme apathy that sometimes plagues people with Alzheimer’s disease or recovering from certain types of stroke. 

To understand the neurological basis of apathy, neurologists at Oxford University looked for differences in the brains of young people who appeared motivated (based on a questionnaire) and those who appeared more apathetic. Participants played a decision-making game while researchers watched what happened in their brains, using an MRI.

In each round of the game, the researcher offered the subject a reward in return for some effort. Participants had to decide whether to accept the offer, based on whether the reward as worth the effort. Predictably, the participants who had already been identified as apathetic were much less likely to accept offers that required effort, even if the reward was large - but when apathetic subjects did choose to accept an offer, their MRIs showed much more activity in the pre-motor cortex, an area of the brain involved in taking actions, than in more motivated participants.

That was the opposite of what researchers expected. They had assumed that lazy people’s pre-motor cortices would show less activity when deciding to take action.

“We thought that this might be because their brain structure is less efficient, so it’s more of an effort for apathetic people to turn decisions into actions,” said lead researcher Masud Husain, a professor of neurology and cognitive neuroscience at Oxford University.

 After further investigation, it turned out that people who identified as apathetic had less efficient connections between the anterior cingulate cortex, a part of the brain involved in making decisions and anticipating rewards, and the supplementary motor area, a part of the brain that helps control movement.

“The brain uses around a fifth of the energy you’re burning each day. If it takes more energy to plan an action, it becomes more costly for apathetic people to make actions,” explained Husain. “Their brains have to make more effort.” Husain said.

What motivates people used to be tied to environmental upbringing and the need to feed any or all of the Seven Deadly Sins. But the Oxford research seems to explore that there may be a physical neurological basis why certain people are slackers while others are motivated Type A personalities.

Even brilliant people can be apathetic in certain areas of their daily lives. Take for example, Jack. He was a brilliant surgeon, but he failed to put in the time and effort in his social relationships. He had no friends, only distant colleagues at work. He had no real social life; his marriage failed from jealousy and rage because he failed to work on his communication with his spouse. 

In fact, most of the main characters had a clear lack of attitude toward being social animals. They were basically loners. They shied away from commitment or change for fear of rejection. 

Of characters like Shannon used their spoiled, rich upbringing to conclude that they did not have to put themselves on the line in order to get what she wanted from men. Even when she was rejected or abandoned, she did not have the mental strength to change or adapt to the island circumstances.

If one looks at LOST as an experiment in human neurology, did the base line of the island trauma and need for survival override the inherent physical neurological deficits that cause them to be normally apathetic? It would seem that despite the need for the characters to change their behavior, very few did except to form loose friendship bonds. A lazy friend is a bad friend.