How come you press harder on a remote control when you know the battery is dead?

Question: How come you press harder on a remote control when you know the battery is dead?

Asked by yourfaceisabook to Hermine, Katy, Laura, Nathalie, Paula on 17 Jun 2010 in Categories: General.
- Nathalie Pettorelli answered on 17 Jun 2010:
  
  Hi there,
  
  Because we think the remote is alive and we are trying to perform CPR on it? 🙂
  More seriously, I’d say despair associated with hope & lack of self control 😉
- Paula Salgado answered on 17 Jun 2010:
  
  No scientific reason for that – that’s just us being a bit silly and assuming that pressing harder is going to make any difference! 😉
- Katy Mee answered on 17 Jun 2010:
  
  I don’t know but it works!! And i can confirm this because i was doing exactly that whilst watching TV last night (also because I was too lazy to change the battery)!
- Laura Dixon answered on 17 Jun 2010:
  
  Oooo – good question!
  It’s actually to do with operant conditioning (finally getting to use my animal welfare knowledge!). Normally, you push a button and the channel changes, so you become conditioned that every time we perform the behaviour (push button) something happens (channel changes). When you perform the behaviour and the expected response don’t happen, you work harder (keep pushing the button) to try and get the expected response.
  
  It’s the same reason people repeatedly push elevator buttons 🙂
- Hermine Schnetler answered on 17 Jun 2010:
  
  We are hoping that by doing that it will work because we are too lazy to get up. Actually we instinctively think that the button is not working anymore.

Question: How come you press harder on a remote control when you know the battery is dead?

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