Boredom Proneness

Boredom Proneness

Reviewed by Faisal Zaidi

The tendency to report boredom more readily, measured by the 28-item scale of Farmer and Sundberg.

What it is

Richard Farmer and Norman Sundberg published the Boredom Proneness Scale in 1986. Scores held steady when people were retested a week later and tracked other boredom measures and findings on interest and attention in class, which made the scale the standard way to study boredom as a trait.

In effect

In the article on why we get bored, it marks the point where boredom became something psychologists could measure as a stable difference between people.

What it does not say

It measures a tendency to report boredom. It does not label anyone, and it does not explain on its own why a given moment feels boring.

Sources

  1. Farmer, R., & Sundberg, N. D. (1986). Boredom proneness: The development and correlates of a new scale. Journal of Personality Assessment, 50(1), 4-17.