Abstract

Boredom is common, appears to be inextricably linked to Attention, and causes significant problems for individuals and society—yet we know very little about the psychological mechanisms underlying boredom. We propose that boredom can be usefully conceptualized as the Aversive emotional concomitant of “unused cognitive potential.” We use the term unused cognitive potential to refer to “slack” in processing that could be utilized if the task became more difficult/engaging or if the observer became motivated to engage. The UCP model is consistent with the idea that boredom may be Functional in that it represents a regulatory alarm to the presence of cognitive slack and serves to keep us moving toward MeaningfulEngagement and the accomplishment of critical imperatives. We situate boredom as an instance of feeling of thinking. We explore it along with other feelings of thinking that work together to keep us optimally engaged. We demonstrate that these feelings—whether positive or negative—are functional in that they provide feedback about our mental processing and motivate our behavior. However, these feelings can also act as double-edged swords because we have engineered our environment in a way that makes us vulnerable to easy engagement outlets. Understanding the Affective mechanisms that underlie moments when we are bored and struggle to engage our attention will lay the foundation for developing ways to ameliorate problems associated with the “unengaged mind”—such as errors in medical monitoring, driving, airline piloting, and nuclear military monitoring.