The Role of Glucose on Executive Control Vigor: Evidence inSupport of Comparative Research

Abstract

The central executive is theorized to be an overarching cognitive system responsible for coordinating processes that enable self-control (i.e., inhibiting habitual responses), persistence at mental and physical tasks, emotional regulation and working memory (Gailliot, 2008; Miller & Cohen, 2001). There is evidence that the executive system relies on glucose as its energy resource (Gailliot et al., 2007) and that when humans invoke the central executive they expend large quantities of glucose. When glucose levels are low, humans perform more poorly on other tasks that rely on the central executive (Gailliot et al., 2007). Similar results have been obtained with non-human animals. When dogs are required to exert self-control on an initial task they persist for a shorter duration at a subsequent unrewarding task and are more impulsive than if they were not required to exert self- control (Miller, DeWall, Pattison, Molet, & Zentall, in press; Miller, Pattison, Rayburn-Reeves, DeWall, & Zentall, 2010). Given the similarities between human and non-human animals, further research on executive control processing and glucose depletion with non-human animals is encouraged. Such research may lead to interventions that sustain and replenish executive control.