Mental Fatigue Led ‘Ego Depletion’ Could Trigger Violent Outbursts 

Mental Fatigue Led 'Ego Depletion' Could Trigger Violent Outbursts. Credit | Unsplash
Mental Fatigue Led 'Ego Depletion' Could Trigger Violent Outbursts. Credit | Unsplash

United States: Prolonged mental fatigue can wear down certain brain regions that are important for an individual’s regulation of self-control, which makes them act more violently. 

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This is a new study encompassing multidisciplines, whose findings were published in the PNAS, which was done by a group of scientists from neuroscience and economics at the IMT School of Advanced Studies Lucca, connected the much-discussed concept of ego depletion, that is, the depletion of willpower as a result of the previous exploitation of it, to the changes in the brain areas that regulate executive functions in it. 

About Fatigue  

Specifically, fatigue seems to be linked, in the waking state, to an increase of the EEG waves characteristic of sleep in the area of the prefrontal cortex that is responsible for decision-making. 

In the scientific literature, theories concerning so-called ego depletion were published in the early 2000s. 

At their base, there is the concept that self-regulation is a form of cognitive capacity for all and that as this is used, it disappears. 

The literature in behavioral economics has used types of cognitive manipulations typical of economic games such as short or long self-control tasks, to elucidate behavioral effects of ego depletion like reduced empathic concern for others, reduced predisposition towards prosocial behaviors, or increased incidences of aggression. 

In more recent years, however, this theory has been criticized: In subsequent studies, researchers have not always succeeded in reproducing the impact of “consumption” of willpower; if they have succeeded at all, it has been much less than what was observed in the first study. Furthermore, it is unclear what kind of neural effect would underlie such an effect, medicalxpress.com reported. 

Mental Fatigue Led 'Ego Depletion' Could Trigger Violent Outbursts 
Mental Fatigue Led ‘Ego Depletion’ Could Trigger Violent Outbursts 

The new study is an attempt to add a neuroscientific angle to this old problem. 

The research on sleep has identified a phenomenon called “local sleep”: it occurs when some areas of the awake person’s brain start showing a typical electrical activity of sleep, for example, delta waves on the EEG. 

As pointed out earlier, this is found to occur, especially when one is feeling mentally drained. 

According to Erica Ordali, a research fellow at the IMT School and first author of the paper, “Our starting hypothesis was that local sleep would be the neuronal manifestation of the phenomenon of ego depletion known to psychology,” medicalxpress.com reported.