Surely, everyone has experienced boredom, and many of them are easily attacked by boredom. Usually, boredom comes when waiting for someone or waiting in line for tickets. At times like that what will you do to get rid of boredom? Open social media, watch YouTube, listen to music, or just swipe through your cellphone menu? But what is definition of boredom in Psychology? And what is the cause of boredom?
Definition of Boredom
In Psychology, Boredom can be defined as an unfulfilled desire for an interesting activity (Eastwood et al., 2012). In detail, Eastwood describes that boredom as an aversive state, which occurs when:
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- Unable to engage internal or external attention.
- Focusing on the fact that we are unable to engage attention and participation in satisfying activities.
- Blaming the environment for their aversive state.
When you are bored, it feels like time slows down. You may feel that 10 minutes seems like an hour. Usually, if we are bored, we would find entertainment including playing games, watching YouTube, or going on social media; Instagram, Facebook or Twitter. However, most of our actions are only short-term solutions. It can even make us more bored.
By the way, how can boredom be measured? Frequently, Boredom scales use valence and arousal to measure a person’s type of boredom. Colombetti Giovanna (2005) explains that the term valence describes the positive and negative characteristics of aspects of an emotion. While the term arousal ranges from calm to restless.
In addition, study of Goetz, Frenzel, Hall, Nett, Pekrun, and Lipanovich (2013) provides empirical support for the types of boredom proposed by Goetz and Frenzel (2006).
Types of Boredom
Apparently, boredom is divided into five types based on the degree of valence and stimulation.
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- Indifferent Boredom
With minimal positive valence and minimal arousal, this type of boredom tends to be quiet, has a withdrawn attitude, and is indifferent to the surroundings. - Calibrating Boredom
This type of negative valence level is higher than indifferent boredom. However, it has a low level of arousal. This type of boredom brings a tendency to feel unsure, but open to a change of scenery or distraction. - Searching Boredom
The valence level is still higher than indifferent boredom. However, it has a higher arousal level. This type of boredom often brings a sense of restlessness and actively pursues a change of scenery or distraction. - Reactant Boredom
This type of boredom has a high level of negative valence and arousal. Also, this type of boredom has a high motivation to leave the bored state. - Apathetic Boredom
This type of boredom has minimal affective characteristics (positive/negative). Also, Apathetic boredom has a very low level of arousal. Goetx describes this type of boredom as “learned helplessness.”
- Indifferent Boredom
Causes of Boredom
So, what is the cause of boredom? Boredom can affect everyone in different intensities. There are many factors that make boredom occur such as personal, environmental, and cultural factors.
According to Chin, Markey, Bhargava, Kassam and Loewenstein (2017), humans are easily bored. Also, they said that we are often bored when studying, doing difficult work, or doing monotonous activities.
In fact, boredom is always synonymous with bad things. Sometimes, boredom can lead us to dangerous activities because we are looking for thrills, adrenaline, or something exciting. Need to know that all types of boredom will need different solutions. Probably, you need something attention-grabbing or something more meaningful. The way to deal with boredom will vary according to each person’s character.
Study of Erin C. Westgate (2019) said that boredom plays an important role in our lives. Boredom will be able to indicate the amount of attention we pay and the meaning behind the activities we do.
Conclusion
We are able to conclude that boredom is a feeling that arises when the activities we do are uninteresting, meaningless, or a combination of both. Usually, people are able to feel boredom at home, at work, in a relationship, or in life. Also, there are some types of boredom that are a combination of affective emotions (positive/negative) and arousal levels. The way to deal with boredom varies according to each person’s character.
A bookworm and researcher especially related to law and citizenship education. I spend time every day in front of the internet and the campus library.
