Born with Couch Potato Genes?

An anonymous reader writes "Science Daily is reporting on an experiment that suggests that an individual's activity level shows a genetic basis. From the article: 'Research conducted by scientists at the Oregon National Primate Research Center at Oregon Health & Science University reveals that a person's level of activity is likely an intrinsic property of that individual. [...] Overall, these findings suggest that it is likely to take a significant conscious effort to change one's level of physical activity and override one's intrinsic inclination to be active or inactive. To state it more plainly, if you're a couch potato, suddenly becoming active may be harder than you think,'"

Comments

Dangerous game

[Anonymous Coward]

How soon before we can blame everything we do on genetics?

Naturally

[elronxenu]

It seems obvious that if a person is habitually lazy or idle that it would take more of an effort to break out of that than, say, a person who typically had a high activity level but was forced to be idle by sickness.

The article summary looks wrong. I don't see anything in TFA itself which indicates that laziness is a result of some genetic factor. All they say is that it's intrinsic to the individual - being a rhesus monkey in this case - that a given individual displays similar activity levels in both a stimulating and a non-stimulating environment.