Sustainable development requires individuals to make mindful, long-term choices that preserve the planet for future generations. Becoming a sustainable citizen involves awareness, responsibility, and a commitment to long-term thinking-qualities that rely heavily on self-control. Although self-control is a limited resource, it can be trained and applied across various domains, contributing to healthier lifestyles and reduced environmental impact. Yet, this ideal faces strong resistance in societies that prioritize immediate gratification, consumerism, and comfort. Bridging the gap between sustainable intentions and actual behavior requires supportive social, educational, and institutional frameworks as proposed by the conceptual model of the two-way dynamics of sustainable citizenship. By fostering environments that make self-discipline easier and more meaningful, individual actions can eventually lead to collective change and the redefinition of societal norms. This suggests that effective sustainability policies should combine individual self-control interventions with structural changes that reduce the cognitive burden of pro-environmental choices.

This study explores mental fatigue using a professionally relevant and cognitively demanding task: a 33-minute simultaneous interpretation task. While mental fatigue is often characterized by a decline in cognitive performance, its effects on psychophysiological indicators such as the pre-ejection period (PEP)-a marker of sympathetic beta-adrenergic activity and effort mobilization-remain underexplored. Forty-seven participants with a minimum level of B2 in English (mean age = 23.57 years) completed a sequential task protocol comprising a 2-back task performed before and after an interpreting task (fatiguing task) or a comprehension task (less-demanding task). Behavioral results revealed stable translation quality throughout the interpreting task, but the frequency of long pauses (>2 s) increased over time. Post-task performance on the 2-back task significantly declined after the interpreting task compared to the less-demanding condition, indicating mental fatigue. Analysis of PEP data showed a sharp decline in sympathetic beta-adrenergic activity during the first 11 min of interpretation, after which PEP values resembled those of the less-demanding task. These results suggest that interpreters initially mobilize effort, followed by a phase of physiological adaptation marked by reduced sympathetic beta-adrenergic activation. A correlational analysis showed that the decline in performance does not reflect boredom or loss of motivation, but rather a combination of effort disengagement, stress reduction, and cognitive resource management. The study demonstrates that simultaneous interpretation induces measurable mental fatigue observable both behaviorally and physiologically. Moreover, it underscores the complexity of using PEP as a continuous marker of effort in prolonged cognitive tasks. Over time, PEP reflects adaptation.

PURPOSE:Cancer cachexia affects up to 80% of patients with advanced cancer. While exercise has shown benefits for early-stage cancer patients, its role in managing cachexia remains unclear. This study examined whether severe weight loss impedes the benefits of exercise in cancer patients. METHODS:This prospective study analyzed the feasibility and efficacy of a 12-week supervised exercise program in cancer patients with BMI-adjusted weight loss grades 3-4. Feasibility was the primary outcome and was evaluated through attrition, attendance, and safety, while secondary outcomes included changes in nutritional status, physical performance, exercise levels, and fatigue. Outcomes were compared with those of matched cancer patients without advanced BMI-adjusted weight loss who followed the same exercise program. RESULTS:Twenty-three patients with BMI-adjusted weight loss grades 3-4 were enrolled and 14 completed the program, attending an average of 17.1 ± 4.3/24 sessions. No adverse events occurred. Intervention improved endurance (+7.06% of theoretical 6MWT distance, p < 0.001). Positive trends emerged for lower limb strength (+2.69 repetitions at 30-s sit-to-stand test, p = 0.005), lean mass (+1.78 kg, p = 0.003), and dietary intake (+ 2.5/10 SEFI, p = 0.003). Functional benefits were also observed in patients without weight loss (n = 14, endurance = +11.33%, lower limb strength = +4, p < 0.001). CONCLUSION:The exercise intervention demonstrated promising efficacy in managing cancer weight loss, providing benefits like those observed in non-cachectic patients, with added gains in nutritional status. While no exercise-related adverse events occurred, feasibility criteria were only partially met due to a higher-than-expected attrition rate. Further research is needed to optimize recruitment strategies, energetic balance, and tailor interventions for this population. TRIAL REGISTRATION:The study is registered on ClinicalTrial.gov (Trial registration: NCT06651125).

This scoping review examines the implementation of exercise interventions aimed at reducing fatigue in patients with cancer. Effective programs typically involve moderate-intensity aerobic or combined aerobic and resistance exercises, performed about 30 min per session, three to five times weekly over 12 weeks. Above these FITT-based parameters, it has been found that exercise effectiveness depends on treatment context, patients’ characteristics, and the alignment between program demands and individuals’ capacity. The review identifies three key issues: current programs emphasize physical training over holistic rehabilitation, often neglecting patients’ broader functional needs; process evaluations of interventions are insufficient, limiting understanding of how and why programs succeed or fail; and methodological weaknesses, including inadequate measures of adherence and a lack of theoretical frameworks, reduce the reliability and generalizability of findings. To enhance exercise effectiveness for fatigue, future interventions should adopt patient-centered, theory-driven approaches that integrate both outcome and process evaluations, addressing physical, emotional, and social dimensions to support long-term engagement and improve quality of life.

Purpose:Mental fatigue is highly prevalent in chronic low back pain (cLBP) but rarely assessed in clinical practice. Standard physical capacity tests may underestimate functional abilities when mental fatigue is present. This study investigated whether a simple handgrip endurance task could objectively detect mental fatigue effects on physical performance in cLBP patients. Patients and Methods:One hundred twenty participants (60 cLBP patients, 60 pain-free controls) performed a handgrip endurance task at 13% of maximal voluntary contraction before and after either a mentally fatiguing Stroop task (30 minutes) or watching a neutral documentary. Time to exhaustion (TTE) was compared between conditions within each group using analysis of variance. Results:cLBP patients who performed the Stroop task showed significantly greater reduction in endurance (mean decrease: 118 seconds) compared to those who watched the documentary (mean decrease: 71 seconds), p <0.05. This mental fatigue effect was not observed in pain-free participants (p =0.644). Importantly, both groups performed similarly on the Stroop task itself, indicating that cognitive performance did not differ between populations. Conclusion:Mental fatigue selectively impairs physical endurance in cLBP patients. The handgrip endurance test offers a practical, low-cost tool to objectively assess mental fatigue in clinical settings. These findings have important implications for functional capacity evaluations and return-to-work assessments, as standard tests may systematically underestimate patients' true abilities when mental fatigue goes unrecognized.

IntroductionA growing body of literature showed that mental fatigue induced by an effortful task leads to an impairment in a subsequent physical performance. The principal aim of this experimental study was to reproduce the effect of mental fatigue on endurance performance while investigating the effort deployment in the fatiguing and control tasks that precede the physical task.MethodsParticipants performed the following task sequence in a between-subjects design (N = 16 in each group): a time-to-exhaustion handgrip task at 13% of maximal voluntary contraction, a 30-min mental task (Stroop task or documentary watching task) and the handgrip task again. Psychophysiological data were recorded on a continuous basis during the whole experiment.ResultsMental fatigue was induced successfully: behavioral and psychophysiological data suggest gradual disengagement of effort in the fatiguing task but not in the control task (increased reaction time and error rate as the function of time in the Stroop task; higher mid-frontal theta during the Stroop task compared to the control task; decreased stimulus-locked theta rhythm over time during the Stroop task; increased low frequency heart rate variability during the Stroop task). In addition, performance decrement in the time to exhaustion handgrip task was larger after the Stroop task than after the documentary viewing task (d = 0.818).ConclusionThis study highlights the importance of assessing both performance and effort engagement to understand mental fatigue. Despite signs of effort disengagement during the Stroop task, mental fatigue still impaired the subsequent physical performance.

The prevalence of cancer with cachexia is rising sharply. More than 80

This article updates the "virtuous circle" model, which links physical exercise with cognition. This model, which originally focused on connectivity between the salience network (SN) and central executive network (CEN), now also incorporates the default mode network (DMN). It describes a bidirectional dynamic: exercise enhances executive functions (i.e., inhibition, flexibility, updating, planning, and problem-solving), which in turn strengthen long-term exercise adherence. This virtuous circle leads to cognitive, physiological, and motivational benefits through synergistic mechanisms induced by exercise such as the effort hypothesis (effort as an investment), the neurotrophic hypothesis, the cardiovascular hypothesis, the inflammatory hypothesis and the glucocorticoid hypothesis. These mechanisms improve connectivity within large-scale neuronal networks, thereby consolidating behavioral regulation. Compared with other behavior change models (e.g., regulation, dual-process, stage-based, and integrative models), the virtuous circle model is notable in light of its circular nature and emphasis on sustainability. In this theoretical framework, adherence to exercise is defined as an evolving strength of the attitude-behavior link, which is shaped by three interconnected processes: immediate motivation (pleasure, mood improvement, social interaction, and rewards), which initiates engagement; sustained effort, which enhances executive control, reduces perceived costs, and fosters habit formation; and behavior-driven attitude change, through cognitive dissonance and effort justification, which aligns beliefs with actions. Recent longitudinal studies have supported the reciprocal associations among exercise, cognition, and brain health, although further trials are needed. This model highlights the fact that early adoption of the virtuous circle promotes the development of health-protective habits, thereby slowing both physical and cognitive aging. In contrast, sedentary lifestyles foster a vicious circle that accelerates decline. See also the graphical abstract(Fig. 1).

Murayama and Jach offer valuable suggestions for how to integrate computational processes into motivation theory, but these processes cannot do away with motivation altogether. Rewards are only rewarding because people want and like them - that is, because of motivation. Sexual desire is not primarily a quest for rewarding information. Elucidating the interface between motivation and cognition seems a promising way forward.

Acute mental fatigue refers to a temporary decline in cognitive function resulting from prolonged mental effort pertaining to a cognitively demanding task. Previous studies have indicated that acute mental fatigue decreases performance on subsequent physical effortful tasks as well as the capacity and/or motivation to invest mental effort. Scholars have recently suggested that aerobic training can enhance willpower. We hypothesized that endurance athletes are less responsive to the detrimental effects of acute mental fatigue than are nonathletes. Two groups of participants (50 athletes vs. 50 nonathletes) completed a sequential task protocol involving 30 minutes of a modified computerized incongruent Stroop task (effortful task) and 30 minutes of watching a documentary (control task), which were counterbalanced between two separate sessions; these tasks were followed by a time-to-exhaustion (TTE) handgrip task at 13% of participants' maximal voluntary contraction (dependent task). Psychophysiological indices (preejection period, heart rate variability, and respiratory rate) were assessed continuously throughout the experiment. The behavioral results indicated that only nonathletes exhibited worse performance on the TTE handgrip task after performing the Stroop task. The performance of participants in both groups was similarly impacted by mental fatigue during the Stroop task, and all the participants reported higher levels of subjective fatigue after completing the Stroop task. The psychophysiological data suggest that sympathetic activity decreased over time during these two cognitive tasks due to habituation (i.e. decreased arousal). Overall, these results suggest that endurance athletes are less susceptible to the negative effects of acute mental fatigue.

Mental fatigue is a psychobiological state triggered by sustained mental effort, affecting subjective parameters, performance, and physiological responses. It impairs sports performance across various disciplines. Individual differences in mental fatiguability and physical fitness may moderate the effects of mental fatigue. Initial evidence suggests that endurance athletes are more resilient to the decrease in the capacity and/or willingness to deploy mental effort induced by mental fatigue, though the results are mixed. Brain Endurance Training (BET) aims to enhance resistance to mental fatigue by combining cognitive and physical training. BET typically uses dual-task designs (simultaneous mental and physical effort), which appear more effective than sequential-task designs. Cognitive tasks involved in brain endurance training often target executive functions, like sustained attention and inhibitory control. While BET consistently improves endurance performance, its effects on subjective mental fatigue are currently less conclusive, which offers intriguing possibilities for future research. Other outcomes, such as perceived exertion and brain oxygenation, suggest BET reduces the cognitive cost of mental and physical effort. BET may also influence brain networks related to attention and self-regulation, particularly the salience network, default mode network (DMN), and frontoparietal network (FPN). Functional connectivity studies hint that BET could lead to beneficial changes in how these networks interact, potentially reducing DMN activity and enhancing control by task-positive networks. Although evidence is still emerging, early findings support BET as a promising intervention to reduce the likelihood of getting mentally fatigued and improve endurance performance in cognitively demanding contexts. Future research should refine BET protocols and explore its underlying neural mechanisms using imaging techniques.

Research on ego depletion and mental fatigue (ED/MF) show that physical performance can be impaired by mental processes. Exciting directions for future research include mapping different effects of ED/MF on effort vs. skill aspects of sport, given that effort is directly controllable but skill relies on automatic, overlearned processes. Weakened attention control could contribute to both problems. Impairments of decision-making during competition could lead to indecision and status quo bias, selfish play rather than team play, and certain types of mistakes. Flow states and positive affect may counteract ED/MF. Physical training, self-control training, and mental practice may all help.

Acute mental fatigue, characterized by a transient decline in cognitive efficiency during or following prolonged cognitive tasks, can be managed through adaptive effort deployment. In response to mental fatigue, individuals can employ two main behavioral patterns: engaging a compensatory effort to limit performance decrements, or disengaging effort, leading to performance deterioration. This study investigated the behavioral pattern used by participants in mental fatigue conditions. Fifty participants underwent a sequential-tasks protocol with counterbalanced sessions who took place in two separate sessions: a 30-min incongruent Stroop task (fatiguing session) or a 30-min documentary viewing task (control session), followed by a time-to-exhaustion (TTE) handgrip task at 13% of maximal voluntary contraction. Psychophysiological measures included the preejection period, heart rate variability, blood pressure, and respiration. Behavioral results showed deteriorated TTE handgrip performance after the Stroop task compared to after the documentary viewing task. During the Stroop task participants were more conservative and prioritized accuracy over speed. Self-reported fatigue was greater after the Stroop task. Psychophysiological data revealed a gradual decrease in sympathetic activity over time in both tasks, with the Stroop task showing a more pronounced decrease. Taken together, these findings suggest a disengagement of effort for a large proportion of participants (49%) that could be partly attributed to a habituation to the demands of the Stroop task. This study illustrates the interplay of behavioral patterns of effort investment in the context of mental fatigue and underscores the role of disengagement as a dominant response to this phenomenon among healthy participants.

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.Correction StatementThis article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.Additional informationFundingThe author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.

Ego depletion theory proposes that self-regulation depends on a limited energy resource (willpower). The simple initial theory has been refined to emphasize conservation rather than resource exhaustion, extended to encompass decision making, planning, and initiative, and linked to physical bodily energy (glucose). Recent challenges offered alternative explanations (which have largely failed) and questioned replicability (which has now been well established). Methods have improved, particularly with emphasis on longer, stronger manipulations to ensure fatigue. New work extends ego depletion into workplace settings and sports. Interpersonal conflict may be both a major cause and consequence. New questions include the possibility of chronic ego depletion (e.g., in burnout), protective factors and coping strategies, individual differences, and recovery processes.

Adherence to exercise is a crucial aspect of behavioral changes related to exercise. However, current models fail to predict behavioral change, and exercise programs struggle to foster adherence. In this Current Opinion article, we defined adherence as a process linking behavior and attitude. More specifically, exercise adherence is the process by which people’s behaviors conform to their attitudes and vice versa. Behavioral change theories should be able to predict changes, transformations, and modifications of behaviors; however, this is not currently the case. Prediction models of behavior are mainly focused on how to predict behavioral changes by affecting attitudes; however, these models have not considered the target behavior as a facilitator of adherence. Herein, a behavioral perspective is considered in three directions: first, exercise is a therapeutic modality that has the potential to improve motivation; second, chronic exercise helps sustain effort over time and increase executive functions and willpower; and third, exercise is an active behavior that has the potential to facilitate attitude change.