Willpower: Rediscovering the greatest human strength, by Roy F. Baumeister and John Tierney

The theme of Willpower features strongly in ancient mythical stories reaching as far back as the Odyssey (8bce). Willpower also emerged as a unifying theme during the Victorian era when the building of character and the exercise of self-control were considered synonymous with one another. However, willpower has not until contemporary times been subject to serious scientific scrutiny, partly due to a vague conception as to what willpower is. The book Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength, co-authored by Roy Baumeister and John Tierney addresses a vacuum in the literature on selfcontrol by combing both real life examples and scientific research in highlighting the importance of this strength. The authors refer to various studies that emphasise the positive aspect of having high levels of self-control. This is highlighted by Walter Mischel’s infamous marshmallow study on self control and a longitudinal study conducted in New Zealand (Moffitt et al., 2011), which found that having higher levels of personal self control as a child contributed to a more favourable and well adjusted adult life. The twenty-first century places considerable demand on our limited self control and without an understanding of how willpower works, we may succumb to ‘ego depletion’, a term Baumeister uses to describe the consequences of the over exertion of willpower. Baumeister and Tierney acknowledge that willpower and self-control have been traditionally viewed as not having much to offer outside of academic theory. However, it is increasingly recognised that willpower alongside intelligence predicts positive outcomes for individuals. In focusing on the relationship between personal control and success in life, Baumeister and Tierney provide the reader with an optimistic view on how to consciously control and influence one’s life. The book provides new insights into how one can use the finite amount of self-control one possesses whilst simultaneously limiting the effects of ‘ego depletion’. The book highlights the effect of ‘ego depletion’ on an individual willingness to stay involved in a task for a sustained period of time. Participants in a study (Baumeister, Vohs, & Tice, 2007) were shown an emotionally upsetting movie with one subgroup resisting the desire to express genuine emotional reactions. After watching the video, all the participants were tested for levels of persistence and stamina and those who had to consciously inhibit their emotions showed a marked decrease in levels of persistence. The authors refer to a similar study (Baumeister et al., 2007) involving an unsolvable jigsaw puzzle measuring the length of time each participant focused on a task. The results found that those who were asked to make many decisions in advance of the task spent less time and effort on the jigsaw task. Willpower according to the authors is not an entity that has no application in reality. It is a critical life strength that one needs if one wants to succeed in life. The book also highlights recent research on the effect that glucose deficiency has on self-control (Wang & Dvorak, 2010). In individuals with depleted levels of glucose, willpower is often diminished, resulting in an inability to effectively think and decide, which has consequences for adaptive behaviour in many situations. Both Baumeister and Tierney were surprised to find a biochemical effect playing such an important role in self-regulation abilities and they refer to the real world consequences of these findings including the potential impact of glucose depletion on court room decision making. However, a cautiously optimistic view presented in the book is that self-control and willpower can be increased and the book provides the reader with an opportunity to be pro-active in their efforts to achieve more effective behavioural control. Unsurprisingly, increasing willpower is not simply something ‘that happens in one’s head’. Baumeister and Tierney refer to a research study on posture and self-control, which showed that after two weeks of deliberately readdressing their posture participants’ self-control levels improved in unrelated areas (Muraven, Buameister, & Tice, 1999). The authors encourage the reader to engage in exercises to increase self-control such as brushing your teeth with your opposite hand and changing your speech patterns. They also reinforce and reiterate their central argument