According to research involving over 1,200 participants, impatience arises when individuals encounter delays that appear to be unfair, unreasonable, or inappropriate. Examples include being stuck in traffic outside rush hour or sitting through a meeting that should have finished 15 minutes ago. Patience, on the other hand, is the emotional regulation strategy we employ to manage these feelings of impatience.
Patience—much like its counterpart impatience—has always been a somewhat ambiguous concept. UC Riverside psychology researcher Kate Sweeny found this lack of clarity troubling.
“Philosophers and religious scholars often regard patience as a virtue. However, most individuals identify themselves as impatient,” Sweeny noted. “This made me curious if patience is more about our reactions to everyday frustrations than about moral character.”
In her research, Sweeny aimed to more clearly define patience and impatience, as well as the factors influencing these emotions.
Through three studies involving 1,200 people, she determined that impatience is the feeling experienced during seemingly unfair, unreasonable, or ill-timed delays, such as being stuck in traffic during an off-peak time or waiting for a meeting that has overstayed its welcome. Therefore, patience is our method of coping with these uncomfortable feelings.
The findings from these studies were recently published in the journal Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin in an article titled “When Time is the Enemy: An Initial Test of the Process Model of Patience.”
Psychologists often refer to “emotion regulation” to encompass the various strategies individuals use to either decrease or sometimes amplify their emotional responses. According to Sweeny in a related theoretical paper, patience is a specific kind of emotion regulation designed to address feelings of impatience.
The first studies testing this concept were shared in the article “When Time is the Enemy: An Initial Test of the Process Model of Patience,” published in the journal Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.
Participants in the studies were asked to reflect on their reactions to various frustrating scenarios that might occur in daily life. These scenarios included being stuck in traffic, enduring a long and tedious meeting, and waiting in a doctor’s office.
They reported their levels of impatience regarding each situation and whether they would counter their impatience using techniques like distraction, deep breathing, or focusing on the positive aspects of the situation.
The results identified three specific conditions that create the ideal environment for impatience: high stakes (such as being late to a concert), unpleasant waiting conditions (like cramped quarters and no distractions at the DMV), and situations where someone is clearly responsible for the delay (like a lab’s failure to process a medical test). Participants also reported feeling more impatient when delays were longer than expected, though interestingly, not when delays were deemed relatively long or short.
While nearly every participant in the studies indicated they would feel at least some impatience in these frustrating instances, some individuals demonstrated greater patience than others. Those who felt more comfortable with uncertainty and exhibited emotional stability (low levels of need for closure and neuroticism) indicated they would not feel too impatient. Additionally, participants with higher emotional intelligence and better self-regulation skills suggested they would respond with greater patience, despite initial feelings of impatience. Traits like agreeableness and higher empathy also correlated with higher patience levels.
“Our preliminary findings reinforce many of our ideas surrounding patience and impatience,” Sweeny states. “There is still much to learn, but our approach shows promise in assisting people with managing feelings of impatience, ultimately leading them to cultivate greater patience in their daily lives.”
Co-authors of “When Time is the Enemy” include graduate researchers Jason Hawes and Olivia T. Karaman. The related theoretical paper, “On (Im)Patience: A New Approach to an Old Virtue,” was published in the journal Personality and Social Psychology Review.
