Is It Worth It? How Your Brain Decides to Make an Effort

Everything you do requires you to exert effort. For instance, basic things like walking or cycling require physical effort and have to do with using your body. Another type of effort is cognitive effort, which has to do with thinking and using your brain. For instance, think about trying to master a Rubik’s cube. Would you want to put in your effort here? The pleasure of finding a solution might outweigh the effort of thinking hard. Or you may decide that finding a solution is not worth your effort. Why and when would you decide to think hard? In this article, we will explain how you decide to exert cognitive effort and what is happening in your brain while you make this decision.


INTRODUCTION
At school, your teachers may say that if you had put in a little more e ort, you would have passed a test, or that, with a bit more e ort, you would have gotten a higher grade. While you may feel that putting in more e ort could lead to better outcomes, it is not always clear what that e ort is, exactly. E ortful actions can be seen as the opposite of automatic actions [ ]. For example, you do not have to do anything special to make your brain see colors: it is an automatic process. In contrast, other actions involve non-automatic processes and take e ort. E ortful actions are everywhere. Think about the e ort it takes to walk or cycle to school. Such bodily actions require physical e ort. On the other hand, actions that require cognitive e ort have to do with your thinking. Cognitive

COGNITIVE EFFORT
The thinking e ort you put in to achieve a complicated task. e ort is the thinking e ort you put in to achieve a complicated task. For instance, you exert cognitive e ort when studying for school, solving a complicated puzzle, or trying to solve a riddle.
Many people report that e ortful behaviors that are helpful in the long-run, such as studying for a test, feel unpleasant in the moment [ ]. Why would exerting cognitive e ort feel unpleasant? And maybe more interestingly, why does it sometimes feel like fun? In this article, we will explain why and when you may decide to put in cognitive e ort, and what happens in your brain when you make this decision.

COSTS AND BENEFITS
Imagine that you have a test tomorrow that you need to study for. How much cognitive e ort will you put in? Researchers have found that your behavior can be predicted by the calculation of the costs and benefits of studying [ ]. What might these costs and benefits be?
To keep it simple, we can say that the benefit of studying is to obtain a good grade. Obtaining a good grade is better for your final report, and you may just like getting good grades. An important cost has to do with the level of cognitive e ort you must exert-to obtain a good grade, you will sometimes have to think harder.
Researchers describe your decision to use cognitive e ort as a function of the potential benefits and costs. You could think of this as a math equation: the sum of costs and benefits results in a certain value. The more you value something, the more likely you are to put cognitive e ort into it.
In Figure , you can see that if you have to study very hard for a good grade, the value of getting that grade decreases. That means cognitive e ort probably also decreases or discounts the value a good grade. This is what scientists call e ort discounting.

EFFORT DISCOUNTING
The phenomenon that something loses its value if more e ort is needed to obtain it.

Figure Figure
The blue line represents the value a good grade as a function of how hard you have to study for it. As you can see, the value of a good grade will decrease if you need to exert more cognitive e ort (study harder). This is what scientists call e ort discounting: you like something less because of the e ort it requires. The blue line is therefore called an e ort-discounting curve.
Box | How do neuroscientists measure brain activity?
Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is a brain imaging technique used by scientists to visualize what the brain is doing in di erent circumstances. The brain consists of around billion cells, called neurons. These neurons communicate with each other through chemical and electric signals. If neurons send more signals to each other, they need more oxygen. This oxygen is delivered via the blood, and if the blood contains more oxygen, it is more magnetic. Thus, with fMRI techniques, we measure how much oxygen di erent brain regions use by measuring its magnetic signal. This tells us indirectly how active a certain brain region is. For more information about how MRI scanners work, see another Frontiers for Young Minds article [ ].

BUT … WHAT HAPPENS IN THE BRAIN WHEN DECIDING TO EXERT COGNITIVE EFFORT?
To measure what happens in your brain when deciding to exert FUNCTIONAL MAGNETIC RESONANCE IMAGING (FMRI) A brain imaging technique used to visualize which brain areas are active at a given moment. cognitive e ort, researchers can use a technique called functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) (for an explanation of fMRI, see Box ). With fMRI, we can find out which brain areas are active, meaning which ones you are using at that very moment. From fMRI studies, we learned that your brain constantly computes the values of your future actions, by considering the costs and benefits of these actions. A specific brain region that is important for signaling potential benefits is called the ventral striatum. This region lies deep in the VENTRAL STRIATUM A brain area involved in signaling benefits of expending cognitive e ort. brain and is involved in signaling all kinds of benefits [ ], for instance, money, yummy food, or getting a good grade. But what about costs? Scientists observed that the cost of cognitive e ort is signaled mainly by a di erent brain region, which is called the anterior cingulate cortex [ ].

ANTERIOR CINGULATE CORTEX
A brain area involved in signaling costs of expending cognitive e ort. The brain from the front (left) and from the side (right) of your head. On the left, you can see the ventral striatum ("benefit region"). On the right, you can see the anterior cingulate cortex ("cost region") and the ventral medial prefrontal cortex ("sum-of-costs-andbenefits region").
After your brain has considered the costs and benefits, the ventral striatum and the anterior cingulate cortex will work together to exchange information. Thus, in our example, your brain weighs in the costs (cognitive e ort) and benefits (good grade) of studying, and then calculates how much you value obtaining a good grade and, as a consequence, whether it is worthwhile to study. Researchers think this

VENTRAL MEDIAL PREFRONTAL CORTEX
A brain area where the costs and benefits are weighted.
exchange of information happens in a brain region toward the front of your brain, called the ventral medial prefrontal cortex (Figure ).

WHEN DO YOU WANT TO EXERT COGNITIVE EFFORT?
Now that we know what cognitive e ort is and what happens in the brain when deciding how much cognitive e ort to put in, we can return to the question we started with: when do you want to invest cognitive e ort?
By now, you may realize that the brain considers cognitive e ort to be costly. Therefore, too much e ort typically feels unpleasant. You may think that your brain makes you lazy, but that is not necessarily the case. Your brain is trying to balance whether it is worth putting in cognitive e ort.
However, your willingness to exert cognitive e ort is not always the same. You may recognize that sometimes you feel like putting in cognitive e ort and sometimes you really dislike thinking hard. The willingness to exert cognitive e ort is not always the same-it is changeable! How hard you feel like thinking can depend on the time of day (morning or evening), how you feel (tired or rested), and whether or not you enjoy the activity that needs your e ort [ ].
kids.frontiersin.org June | Volume | Article | Figure   Figure (A) A standard e ort-discounting curve: the value of a good grade decreases with increasing cognitive e ort. The red cross in both pictures indicates a point where the value of a good grade is average, and the gray dotted line shows the amount of studying needed to get to that average-value grade.
(B) If you take away distractors, like your phone or the TV, adding more e ort now decreases the value of a good grade less quickly. This will lead you to study more, because the cognitive e ort feels less costly.

TIPS FOR EXERTING MORE EFFORT
If your willingness to exert cognitive e ort is changeable, then a very important question is: can you increase your willingness to exert cognitive e ort for your test tomorrow? Well, the answer is … yes! Based on the knowledge you now have, you can try three simple tips.
First, lower all other costs for your thinking brain [ ]. So, take away distractors, such as your phone, to help you focus. To see what might happen, take a look at Figure . Removing distractors makes cognitive e ort feel less costly.
Second, increase the benefits. For example, you could reward yourself with a treat after studying hard for h. Or you could tell yourself that if you get a good grade, you will buy yourself something nice.
Third, try to increase your enjoyment of the e ortful task itself. For example, if you do not like maths, use a math game to make it more fun. In this way, you might even come to enjoy the e orts you spend on learning maths.
With these tricks, you will surely get your homework done with more ease. Good luck!
. The subjective value of cognitive e ort is encoded by a domain-general valuation network. J. Neurosci. :

CONFLICT OF INTEREST:
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
COPYRIGHT © Kramer, Huizenga, Krabbendam and van Duijvenvoorde. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

SEAWELL ELEMENTARY, AGE:
Our amazing classroom in NC is full of sparking, learning minds. We love helping each other. We think, solve, and learn! We do projects that stretch our brain, and sometimes when we work together, our ideas can get messy but the results are always fun. One of the ways we love to be awesome? Embrace your inner editor! We love to read and peer edit, and were so excited to have the opportunity to work with Frontiers for Young Minds! AUTHORS ANNE-WIL KRAMER I am a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Amsterdam. I fill my time with a variety of e orts. I like to expend physical e ort by cycling through Amsterdam and swimming (not in the canals). I also enjoy expending cognitive e ort, for example by playing games or thinking about how things work. Sometimes I look at my cat, wondering why he can be fine not expending any e ort all day! But honestly, I also sometimes feel like that. Because of this, I wondered how this all works? To study e ort, we conduct research in which we let people make decisions about how much e ort they want to spend. *a.kramer@uva.nl HILDE M. HUIZENGA I am a professor in Developmental Psychology at the University of Amsterdam. I use a lot of math to study how children grow into adults and how adults grow into older people. Sometimes I think hard when I am standing at my desk, sometimes I also do so when I am running, or talking with our teenage daughters, or cycling through Amsterdam. While cycling, I came up with the figures in this paper. I hope you like them.
kids.frontiersin.org June | Volume | Article | LYDIA KRABBENDAM I am a professor in Developmental Neuropsychology at the Free University of Amsterdam. I know all about cognitive e ort in education, as I have three school-going children myself! I further investigate social interactions in classrooms and how this relates to the interplay between social interactions and brain and cognitive development. I find this an interesting topic, because if you work or study together with people you like, this may also make e ort feel much more fun.
ANNA C. K. VAN DUIJVENVOORDE I am an associate professor in Developmental Psychology and brain development at Leiden University. I want to know everything about motivation, learning, and how the brain works. Is not it interesting that your motivation changes as you age? Does that relate to the development of your brain? I was not always motivated in school, but when I got to choose my own studies of neuropsychology, I found it fascinating. Working hard was not di cult anymore! With my work, I hope to be able to build motivational experiences and help children learn.