In early 2025 Chantal Trudel, a PhD candidate in Psychology, co-published a paper with Drs. James Danckert and Evan Risko along with researchers from other institutions on boredom titled Boredom signals deviation from a cognitive homeostatic set point. It was part of a significant body of research from the Danckert Lab on the meaning and purpose of boredom.
One year later, that research was covered and made accessible for broad audiences in a documentary film produced by Radio-Canada’s popular television program Découverte titled L’ennui : ami ou ennemi? À quoi sert-il et comment peut-il nous transformer? (Boredom: friend or foe? What purpose does it serve and how can it transform us?).
The documentary first aired on Découverte's March 15, 2026 episode, and just a month later had more than 50K views on YouTube.
From the YouTube video description: “Is boredom a necessary evil? What if it were a warning signal to motivate us to act and refocus our attention? Researchers at the University of Waterloo in Ontario are investigating this curious subject.”
Making research findings accessible
“After reading our paper last year, a journalist from Découverte contacted me to assess the feasibility of a documentary,” said Trudel. “That spring I was attending a conference in Montreal, so we agreed to meet and began filming then.”
In June 2025, the crew came to Waterloo’s campus for a full day of filming in the Danckert Lab and other spaces within the PAS building – featuring Trudel, Danckert and other psychology students. Trudel also played a major part in facilitating the documentary, including coordinating the show’s producers with Waterloo staff to make the formal arrangements necessary for media to come to campus for filming.
“Our research is publicly funded, so it is imperative to make our findings accessible to broader audiences in both official languages,” said Trudel. “Découverte has been popularizing science since 1988. I grew up watching it on television! Now on various streaming platforms, over a million people watch it every week. Being featured on such a well-known francophone science program gave us a fantastic opportunity to interface with all Canadians, but also to reach international viewers. This kind of impact is exciting.”
The Découverte production offers a perfect example of knowledge mobilization—together, the Waterloo psychology scholars and the CBC documentary crew turned research into an engaging and creative illustration of how boredom serves us as a call to action.
Credit: Radio Canada Découverte. The photo above is a still image from the documentary showing Chantal Trudel; this news story's preview photo shows journalist André Bernard speaking with Dr. James Danckert.