Becky Ripley and Sophie Ward take a cold hard look at the psychology behind each of the seven deadly sins, in the order established by Pope Gregory the Great: pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth. Why have we evolved these emotions? What’s going on in the brain and the body when we feel them? And how best can we live alongside them - in ourselves and with others?

Sloth is, unsurprisingly, the final sin of the series. Lethargic, languid, lazy old sloth. Such sluggishness is often caused by a lack of dopamine, the neurochemical that helps drive motivation and movement. And it's not always a bad thing. Our brains and bodies need rest in order to recharge, perhaps especially in today's world of hyper-productivity and stimulation. But too much sloth, and you can get stuck in a downward spiral of apathy or depression. How best can we get ourselves out of a slump? And how can we get the balance right between uptime and downtime?

To guide us through this mess is evolutionary anthropologist Dr Anna Machin from the Department of Experimental Psychology at the University of Oxford, geneticist and writer Dr Adam Rutherford from the Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment at University College London, neuroscientist and clinical psychologist Professor Ian Robertson from the Department of Psychology at Trinity College Dublin, author and human rights activist Yasmin Khan, and some parting words of wisdom from Katherine May's memoir 'Wintering', read by Tyler Cameron.

Producer: Becky Ripley Show less