<p>It seems that what you are getting at might be related to “akrasia” or “weakness of the will” (those two are slightly different ideas). Roughly, it's the experience that you know something to be the right course of action, want (in some sense) to follow it but still do not succeed in actually doing it. Since classical Greek philosophers have written about it, it would seem to have been an experience humans made before modern times.</p>

<p>Another relevant observation is that being unable to do things one wishes to do and feeling bad about it is an important aspect of depression or even simply sadness. One would (hopefully!) not apply a pejorative word like laziness to someone who is suffering but that could be interpreted as a form of “motivation problem”. Since depression (or “melancholia”) has also been described a long time ago, this is further evidence that all this did not appear in modern times.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-30T21:50:40.467Z
Very good term. From the article on akrasia I also got the phenomenon of ego depletion: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego_depletion
Alex Stone
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-30T11:26:45.643Z
2013-08-26T16:43:02.180Z
2013-08-26T16:43:02.180Z
Gala
<p>Although it would be hard to experiment on dead peasants, I believe that the <code>Status Quo Bias</code> promotes the idea that laziness is a human trait. You can see the orignal research <a href="http://www.hks.harvard.edu/fs/rzeckhau/SQBDM.pdf">here</a>, or just google the term. </p>

<p>Samuelson, W., &amp; Zeckhauser, R. (1988). Status quo bias in decision making. Journal of risk and uncertainty, 1(1), 7-59.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-30T08:08:45.193Z
The funny thing is that we can often name a bias and its “opposite” (say sensation seeking?) leaving us with some plausible-sounding “explanation” for any set of observations we can come across but really not much in the way of useful prediction.
Gala
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-02-24T16:40:06.110Z
This is why we need personality assessment methodology :) Sensation-seeking is not a bias; it is a dimension of individual differences, a *trait*. Find a sample collectively low enough on it to achieve a significant effect on some behavioral outcome, and you've got status quo bias (in a publication from before some social psychologists had fully acknowledged the legitimacy of personality psychology). On the other hand, [it does seem to still be a thing](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status_quo_bias), so it might be more than just one side of a trait dimension. A bias is not a trait though.
Nick Stauner
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-29T23:09:07.167Z
2013-07-29T23:43:35.987Z
2013-07-29T23:43:35.987Z
Izhaki
<p>Your question "I will do this tomorrow" is well studied under term procrastination. 
As you can see on wikipedia page:</p>

<p>There are a lot of causes and "how to measure"....</p>

<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procrastination" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procrastination</a></p>

<p>It is true that some form of procrastination was noticed in ancient Greeks, but it is became very important in industrial revolution with concept of time was valued more...</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-31T14:33:59.387Z
2013-07-31T14:33:59.387Z
ICanFeelIt
<p>A possible way to try to answer this, is to analyze usage of words such as lazy versus words such as diligent over the years. As a toy example, I used <a href="http://books.google.com/ngrams" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Google Ngram viewer</a> to compare the frequency in which the words <strong>lazy</strong>, <strong>indolent</strong> and <strong>slothful</strong> are used in the main part of a sentence, to the frequency in which the words <strong>diligent</strong>, <strong>industrious</strong>, and <strong>laborious</strong> are used in the main part of a sentence (<a href="http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=_ROOT_=%3Elazy%20%2b%20_ROOT_=%3Eindolent%20%2b%20_ROOT_=%3Eslothful,_ROOT_=%3Ediligent%20%2b%20_ROOT_=%3Eindustrious%20%2b%20_ROOT_=%3Elaborious&amp;year_start=1800&amp;year_end=2008&amp;corpus=15&amp;smoothing=3&amp;share=" rel="nofollow noreferrer">link</a>). </p>

<p><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/l4OBQ.png" alt="Figure comparing frequency of the 2 term groups"></p>

<p>It seems that indeed people were more hard working back in the 1800's, and are more lazy today. Or at least, that is what is what is reflected in what book authors write.</p>

<p>A similar trend exists if we omit the "main part of a sentence" thing, and simply look at the frequency of appearance of these words (<a href="http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=lazy%2Bindolent%2Bslothful%2Cdiligent%2Bindustrious%2Blaborious&amp;year_start=1800&amp;year_end=2008&amp;corpus=15&amp;smoothing=3&amp;share=" rel="nofollow noreferrer">link</a>).</p>

<p><a href="http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=hard%20working%20%2b%20motivated%20%2bsuccess,failure%20%2bdemotivated%20%2blazy&amp;year_start=1800&amp;year_end=2008&amp;corpus=15&amp;smoothing=3&amp;share=" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Word analysis is pretty powerful</a> :</p>

<p><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/Fg74l.png" alt="enter image description here"></p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-07-25T16:54:02.223Z
I love this answer. It doesn't prove anything but it's a novel way of fudging supporting data.
Nick
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-30T11:08:38.537Z
Thanks for introducing the Ngram tool, it looks really powerful
Alex Stone
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-30T11:17:24.133Z
The second-to-last paragraph is total nonsense. People were *writing* about laziness or industriousness, an interesting fact in itself but not something to be confused with people *being* lazy, however defined. Also, all the words you used for “hard-working” have a definite literary or outdated feel about them whereas “lazy” does not, I would therefore expect them to become relatively less frequent in the corpus, no matter what.
Gala
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-30T12:52:14.727Z
@Gaël Laurans, that's why I called it 'Toy example'. Its an example of how one can use such data to address this question, and not an actual study.
Ofri Raviv
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2013-07-30T21:49:15.557Z
I feel the approach is a good one, we just need to replace laborious or industrious with "hard working"
Alex Stone
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-31T06:30:42.213Z
Perhaps counter-intuitively, "hard working" is very rare, relative to the other words I used, according to the Ngram data. Maybe it has to do with it being a two-word phrase, as opposed to the others that are one word phrases.
Ofri Raviv
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2013-07-31T06:59:02.850Z
@OfriRaviv My point is that you should avoid confusing the questions you think you are answering…
Gala
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2013-07-31T14:37:05.603Z
It is very modern way to answer the question and I appreciate that. This psycholinguistic approach added something valuable to answer.
ICanFeelIt
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-31T19:08:37.657Z
I agree with what and others, in that the texts primarily represent what people wrote about.  But!...the texts also represent what the people who *read* those texts thought about.  It's not just the producers, but also the consumers, that we must consider.
BenCole
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-31T19:36:25.403Z
@BenCole Good point but unfortunately the corpus tells us very little about the audience, for example all books have the same weight, the frequency does not reflect the popularity of the various texts. Also simply looking for words is quick and easy but does not account for the way they are used (e.g. texts using the word “laborious” could be lamenting the fact that people are not laborious anymore, etc.)
Gala
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-31T20:28:08.260Z
Oh, absolutely agreed.  There's literally no context to the information.  I merely wanted to point out the possible, if ultimately unprovable, existence of a feedback loop - using your example: people reading a text about the decline of laboriousness may seek out and propagate examples of people not being laborious (confirmation bias), and thus we get more texts about the (apparent) decline of laboriousness - regardless of actual labor being done.
BenCole
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-30T08:48:58.880Z
2013-07-31T16:06:48.663Z
2013-07-31T16:06:48.663Z
Ofri Raviv
<p>I originally wanted to ask a question "Is there a drug for motivation or laziness", but google search revealed that people have been asking this question for years and there's no drug that is currently prescribed to fix those issues.</p>

<p>This makes me interested in the the following question: <strong>Did "motivation issues" or laziness always exist for humans, or is it something that became a much bigger problem because of the modern lifestyle or cuture?</strong> </p>

<p>For example, I'm thinking of peasants of "ye olde days", who had to work really hard to get by, or early factory workers, who apparently did 12+ hour shifts from a very early age. Those people had no drugs or cognitive-behavior therapy to correct their issues. </p>

<p>Maybe there's some "laziness scale" that could be used to look at historic trends in laziness and motivation?</p>

<p>UPDATE: it would be very interesting to examine if a correlation exists between laziness and workforce moving from working physically/outdoors(ex: farmers) towards working mentally indoors(office workers) over the years.</p>

<p>I would define laziness or motivational issues as <strong>"I will do this tomorrow"</strong> attitude (procrastination) or promising to do something, but delivering excuses as to why the task wasn't done. The task never gets started.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-29T23:19:46.273Z
I would imagine when I society gets "fat and happy" is when the laziness kicks in on a large scale. If you have everything, why work for anything? It also has to do with how bad we want something, i.e. China and America, China wants to be a world leader really bad, and they are working to the death, literally. It also transfers to a personal scale. I always have wondered what happened to those rich spoiled kids I knew growing up, they sure weren't into working, where some of the less off kids worked very hard, even taking care of their parents. Many factors need to be analyzed in such a study.
Greg McNulty
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-30T08:05:39.460Z
How exactly do you define laziness or motivation issues? This seems so contingent on many notions that are far from obvious (e.g. “work” being distinct from other spheres of activity, people having a general level of “motivation” independent of its object, etc.) and full of assumptions (people might engage in some activities depending on circumstances without any need for a personal “laziness” trait to explain it) as to be very difficult to answer meaningfully. Not to mention the moralistic overtone of the word “laziness”, which is not helpful.
Gala
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-07-30T08:13:20.357Z
Note that to a large extent we make “laziness” a problem through objectively dreadful life conditions (case of the early factory workers) or norms basically associated with the European middle-class. Aristocrats often valued a way of life and occupations that can easily be derided as “lazy”, hunter-gatherers can subsist while spending limited time gathering food and aren't particularly unhappy about it, etc.
Gala
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-08-19T20:20:44.447Z
I think they call it __coffee__
bobobobo
<motivation><behaviorism>
Have humans always had problems with motivation and laziness?
Alex Stone
# Have humans always had problems with motivation and laziness?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2013-07-29)

I originally wanted to ask a question "Is there a drug for motivation or laziness", but google search revealed that people have been asking this question for years and there's no drug that is currently prescribed to fix those issues.

This makes me interested in the the following question: **Did "motivation issues" or laziness always exist for humans, or is it something that became a much bigger problem because of the modern lifestyle or cuture?**

For example, I'm thinking of peasants of "ye olde days", who had to work really hard to get by, or early factory workers, who apparently did 12+ hour shifts from a very early age. Those people had no drugs or cognitive-behavior therapy to correct their issues.

Maybe there's some "laziness scale" that could be used to look at historic trends in laziness and motivation?

UPDATE: it would be very interesting to examine if a correlation exists between laziness and workforce moving from working physically/outdoors(ex: farmers) towards working mentally indoors(office workers) over the years.

I would define laziness or motivational issues as **"I will do this tomorrow"** attitude (procrastination) or promising to do something, but delivering excuses as to why the task wasn't done. The task never gets started.

**Tags:** motivation, behaviorism

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: I would imagine when I society gets "fat and happy" is when the laziness kicks in on a large scale. If you have everything, why work for anything? It also has to do with how bad we want something, i.e. China and America, China wants to be a world leader really bad, and they are working to the death, literally. It also transfers to a personal scale. I always have wondered what happened to those rich spoiled kids I knew growing up, they sure weren't into working, where some of the less off kids worked very hard, even taking care of their parents. Many factors need to be analyzed in such a study.  
> **username_2**: How exactly do you define laziness or motivation issues? This seems so contingent on many notions that are far from obvious (e.g. “work” being distinct from other spheres of activity, people having a general level of “motivation” independent of its object, etc.) and full of assumptions (people might engage in some activities depending on circumstances without any need for a personal “laziness” trait to explain it) as to be very difficult to answer meaningfully. Not to mention the moralistic overtone of the word “laziness”, which is not helpful.  
> **username_2**: Note that to a large extent we make “laziness” a problem through objectively dreadful life conditions (case of the early factory workers) or norms basically associated with the European middle-class. Aristocrats often valued a way of life and occupations that can easily be derided as “lazy”, hunter-gatherers can subsist while spending limited time gathering food and aren't particularly unhappy about it, etc.  
> **username_3**: I think they call it __coffee__  

---

## 4 answers

### Answer by username_7 on 2013-07-30. Score: 7 | Accepted answer

A possible way to try to answer this, is to analyze usage of words such as lazy versus words such as diligent over the years. As a toy example, I used [Google Ngram viewer](http://books.google.com/ngrams) to compare the frequency in which the words **lazy**, **indolent** and **slothful** are used in the main part of a sentence, to the frequency in which the words **diligent**, **industrious**, and **laborious** are used in the main part of a sentence ([link](http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=_ROOT_=%3Elazy%20%2b%20_ROOT_=%3Eindolent%20%2b%20_ROOT_=%3Eslothful,_ROOT_=%3Ediligent%20%2b%20_ROOT_=%3Eindustrious%20%2b%20_ROOT_=%3Elaborious&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=)).

![Figure comparing frequency of the 2 term groups](https://i.sstatic.net/l4OBQ.png)

It seems that indeed people were more hard working back in the 1800's, and are more lazy today. Or at least, that is what is what is reflected in what book authors write.

A similar trend exists if we omit the "main part of a sentence" thing, and simply look at the frequency of appearance of these words ([link](http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=lazy%2Bindolent%2Bslothful%2Cdiligent%2Bindustrious%2Blaborious&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=)).

[Word analysis is pretty powerful](http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=hard%20working%20%2b%20motivated%20%2bsuccess,failure%20%2bdemotivated%20%2blazy&year_start=1800&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=) :

![enter image description here](https://i.sstatic.net/Fg74l.png)

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Thanks for introducing the Ngram tool, it looks really powerful  
> **username_2**: The second-to-last paragraph is total nonsense. People were *writing* about laziness or industriousness, an interesting fact in itself but not something to be confused with people *being* lazy, however defined. Also, all the words you used for “hard-working” have a definite literary or outdated feel about them whereas “lazy” does not, I would therefore expect them to become relatively less frequent in the corpus, no matter what.  
> **username_7**: @Gaël Laurans, that's why I called it 'Toy example'. Its an example of how one can use such data to address this question, and not an actual study.  
> **username_0**: I feel the approach is a good one, we just need to replace laborious or industrious with "hard working"  
> **username_7**: Perhaps counter-intuitively, "hard working" is very rare, relative to the other words I used, according to the Ngram data. Maybe it has to do with it being a two-word phrase, as opposed to the others that are one word phrases.  
> **username_2**: @OfriRaviv My point is that you should avoid confusing the questions you think you are answering…  
> **username_6**: It is very modern way to answer the question and I appreciate that. This psycholinguistic approach added something valuable to answer.  
> **username_9**: I agree with what and others, in that the texts primarily represent what people wrote about.  But!...the texts also represent what the people who *read* those texts thought about.  It's not just the producers, but also the consumers, that we must consider.  
> **username_2**: @username_9 Good point but unfortunately the corpus tells us very little about the audience, for example all books have the same weight, the frequency does not reflect the popularity of the various texts. Also simply looking for words is quick and easy but does not account for the way they are used (e.g. texts using the word “laborious” could be lamenting the fact that people are not laborious anymore, etc.)  
> **username_9**: Oh, absolutely agreed.  There's literally no context to the information.  I merely wanted to point out the possible, if ultimately unprovable, existence of a feedback loop - using your example: people reading a text about the decline of laboriousness may seek out and propagate examples of people not being laborious (confirmation bias), and thus we get more texts about the (apparent) decline of laboriousness - regardless of actual labor being done.  
> **username_8**: I love this answer. It doesn't prove anything but it's a novel way of fudging supporting data.  

---

### Answer by username_4 on 2013-07-29. Score: 8

Although it would be hard to experiment on dead peasants, I believe that the `Status Quo Bias` promotes the idea that laziness is a human trait. You can see the orignal research [here](http://www.hks.harvard.edu/fs/rzeckhau/SQBDM.pdf), or just google the term.

Samuelson, W., & Zeckhauser, R. (1988). Status quo bias in decision making. Journal of risk and uncertainty, 1(1), 7-59.

> **Comments:**
> **username_2**: The funny thing is that we can often name a bias and its “opposite” (say sensation seeking?) leaving us with some plausible-sounding “explanation” for any set of observations we can come across but really not much in the way of useful prediction.  
> **username_5**: This is why we need personality assessment methodology :) Sensation-seeking is not a bias; it is a dimension of individual differences, a *trait*. Find a sample collectively low enough on it to achieve a significant effect on some behavioral outcome, and you've got status quo bias (in a publication from before some social psychologists had fully acknowledged the legitimacy of personality psychology). On the other hand, [it does seem to still be a thing](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status_quo_bias), so it might be more than just one side of a trait dimension. A bias is not a trait though.  

---

### Answer by username_2 on 2013-07-30. Score: 5

It seems that what you are getting at might be related to “akrasia” or “weakness of the will” (those two are slightly different ideas). Roughly, it's the experience that you know something to be the right course of action, want (in some sense) to follow it but still do not succeed in actually doing it. Since classical Greek philosophers have written about it, it would seem to have been an experience humans made before modern times.

Another relevant observation is that being unable to do things one wishes to do and feeling bad about it is an important aspect of depression or even simply sadness. One would (hopefully!) not apply a pejorative word like laziness to someone who is suffering but that could be interpreted as a form of “motivation problem”. Since depression (or “melancholia”) has also been described a long time ago, this is further evidence that all this did not appear in modern times.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Very good term. From the article on akrasia I also got the phenomenon of ego depletion: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego_depletion  

---

### Answer by username_6 on 2013-07-31. Score: 1

Your question "I will do this tomorrow" is well studied under term procrastination.
As you can see on wikipedia page:

There are a lot of causes and "how to measure"....

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procrastination>

It is true that some form of procrastination was noticed in ancient Greeks, but it is became very important in industrial revolution with concept of time was valued more...


---

