Abstract
The aim was to create and study a possible behavioural measure for trait(s) in humans that reflect the ability and motivation to continue an unpleasant behaviour, i.e., behavioural perseverance or persistence (BP). We utilised six different tasks with 54 subjects to measure the possible BP trait(s): cold pressor task, hand grip endurance task, impossible anagram task, impossible verbal reasoning task, thread and needle task, and boring video task. The task performances formed two BP factors. Together, the two-factor solution is responsible for the common variance constituting 37.3% of the total variance in the performances i.e., performance times. Excluding the impossible anagram task, the performance in any given task was better explained by performances in the other tasks (i.e., “trait”, η2 range = 0.131–0.253) than by the rank order variable (“depletion”, i.e., getting tired from the previous tasks, η2 range = 0–0.096).
Highlights
Previous research has made some attempts to study human behavioural perseverance or persistence in multifaceted behavioural experiments
Principal Axis Factoring and Maximum Likelihood methods were used in the factor analysis and revealed no relevant differences with each other
It is important to note that hand grip strength was not significantly associated with the first or second hand grip endurance task, indicating that the categorisation and selection of the pre-prepared hand grip endurance devices to different strength levels of the subjects was successful
Summary
Previous research has made some attempts to study human behavioural perseverance or persistence (abbreviated in this study generically as “BP”) in multifaceted behavioural experiments. Examples of ways to measure persistence behaviourally include Hartshorne, May, and Mailer [2], Crutcher [3], and Rethlingshafer [4]. The mentioned studies included several different ways to possibly measure persistence and to correlate them with each other. These tasks include multi-story resistance, puzzle mastery, paper and pencil puzzle solution, fatigue and boredom in mental work, hunting for hidden objects, continued standing on the right foot, eating cracker and whistling, and solving a toy puzzle. Crutcher [3] found some evidence for general persistence factor among school children (tests included card-house building, mechanical puzzle solution, addition, picture copying, and cancelling As), and found there to be a 0.3 correlation between persistence and intelligence. On the other hand Eysenck measured persistence behaviourally by a
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