Did you know why dogs are fed sugar after obeying commands for some time? It's because a dose of glucose restores the willpower. This stays true for humans. In

Did you know why dogs are fed sugar after obeying commands for some time? It's because a dose of glucose restores the willpower. This stays true for humans. In supermarkets, we are offered sweet snacks at checkout—when we have little willpower, the reason being lots of choices we had to make while shopping. So both a) our brain requires more glucose and b) we can't resist sugar snacks anyway. No matter how junk that food might be. And here's the key— ’Your brain does not stop working when glucose is low. It stops doing some things and starts doing others. It responds more strongly to immediate rewards and pays less attention to long-term prospects.‘ Unfortunately there are areas where decision fatigue might be critical: ‘In midmorning, usually a little before 10:30, the parole board would take a break, and the judges would be served a sandwich and a piece of fruit. The prisoners who appeared just before the break had only about a 20 percent chance of getting parole, but the ones appearing right after had around a 65 percent chance.’ Also, that might be the reason people stay poor: when you don't have a lot of money, you need to make much more tough choices. This depletes people's willpower, and consequently they are worse at other important stuff like education. How to deal with decision fatigue? ‘People with the best self-control are the ones who structure their lives so as to conserve willpower. <…> Even the wisest people won’t make good choices when they’re not rested and their glucose is low. <…> The best decision makers are the ones who know when not to trust themselves.’ Very interesting article, actually. A lot of interesting stuff there. Is there no workaround to access nytimes from your area?