Yerkes-Dodson law
The relationship between arousal and performance: too little holds you back, and so does too much.
The Yerkes-Dodson law describes the relationship between arousal and performance as an inverted U. As tension rises, performance first improves, reaches an optimum, and then declines. For complex tasks the optimum lies lower than for simple ones. The law goes back to animal experiments published in 1908.
Last updated: September 20, 2026 · Editorially responsible: MindBright editorial team
A model for the dose of pressure at which alertness and clear thinking coincide.
Not an exact law of nature. It is a thinking model with limited evidence.
Because it illustrates why more pressure leads to worse decisions beyond a certain point.
Origin and research
In 1908, psychologists Robert Yerkes and John Dodson studied how quickly mice learned to tell a light chamber from a dark one. Wrong choices were paired with electric stimuli of varying strength. For difficult discriminations, the animals learned fastest at medium stimulus strength. For easy discriminations, stronger stimuli helped.
The familiar curve linking stress and performance is a later generalization. In 1994, Karl Halvor Teigen traced how much the law had been reinterpreted over the decades. As a thinking model it is useful, but it does not work as a precise prediction.
For high performers
The curve gives you a yardstick for observing yourself. Where is your optimum for routine tasks, and where for decisions with many unknowns? On complex tasks, performance tips earlier, and that is exactly where extra pressure does the most damage.
Schedule complex decisions for windows of moderate tension: alert, focused, and without time pressure. Trying to settle a strategy question between two escalations puts you past the optimum. Routine tasks can run at a higher pace, where a bit of pressure even helps.
Distinctions
vs. Performance pressure
Performance pressure is one source of tension. The Yerkes-Dodson law describes how that tension affects performance.
vs. Eustress
Eustress refers to stimulating stress. It roughly corresponds to the rising part of the curve before the optimum.
vs. Stress resilience
Put simply, stress resilience shifts the curve: those who can handle more stay in the range of good performance for longer as tension rises.
Frequently asked questions
What does the Yerkes-Dodson law say?
That performance first rises with increasing tension and falls again beyond a certain point. For difficult tasks this point comes earlier than for simple ones. Plotted on a graph, the result is an inverted U.
Is stress good for performance?
In moderate doses, yes, because it increases attention and effort. If it gets too strong, concentration and decision quality decline. Where the line lies depends on the task and the person.
Is the Yerkes-Dodson law scientifically proven?
The original 1908 experiment was based on mice. Its later application to stress and human performance is plausible, while the evidence for it as an exact law is thin. It is useful as a thinking model.
Related terms
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