Photo by inottawa
Once upon a time, a creativity researcher asked a group of schoolchildren to write her some stories. She encouraged them to write about whatever they liked and let their imaginations run free.
Reading through the stories, she was disappointed. Instead of wild imaginations she found tame thoughts and lame tales.
The tales tended to be very tedious and unimaginative, as if the children were stuck with this very restricted way of thinking. Even when they were encouraged to think creatively, they didn’t really know how.
The researcher was Teresa Belton of East Anglia University in the UK. Determined to find the root of the problem, she monitored the children’s daily activities for several months. Jonah Lehrer summarises her findings in an article for Boston.com called Daydream Achiever:
Belton came to the conclusion that their lack of imagination was, at least in part, caused by the absence of “empty time,” or periods without any activity or sensory stimulation. She noticed that as soon as these children got even a little bit bored, they simply turned on the television: the moving images kept their minds occupied. “It was a very automatic reaction,” she says. “Television was what they did when they didn’t know what else to do.”
The problem with this habit, Belton says, is that it kept the kids from daydreaming. Because the children were rarely bored – at least, when a television was nearby – they never learned how to use their own imagination as a form of entertainment. “The capacity to daydream enables a person to fill empty time with an enjoyable activity that can be carried on anywhere,” Belton says. “But that’s a skill that requires real practice. Too many kids never get the practice.”
Lehrer also cites research by Jonathan Schooler, showing that those who spend more time daydreaming score higher on experimental measures of creativity.
Other researchers have used brain scanners and EEG sensors to monitor neural activity in people engaged in solving problems. They found that the brain was working much harder in those subjects who solved the problems by daydreaming resulting in a flash of insight, than in those who used logical reasoning:
These sudden insights, they found, are the culmination of an intense and complex series of brain states that require more neural resources than methodical reasoning. People who solve problems through insight generate different patterns of brain waves than those who solve problems analytically. “Your brain is really working quite hard before this moment of insight,” says psychologist Mark Wheeler at the University of Pittsburgh. “There is a lot going on behind the scenes.
In fact, our brain may be most actively engaged when our mind is wandering and we’ve actually lost track of our thoughts, a new brain-scanning study suggests. “Solving a problem with insight is fundamentally different from solving a problem analytically,” Dr. Kounios says. “There really are different brain mechanisms involved.”
By most measures, we spend about a third of our time daydreaming, yet our brain is unusually active during these seemingly idle moments. Left to its own devices, our brain activates several areas associated with complex problem solving, which researchers had previously assumed were dormant during daydreams. Moreover, it appears to be the only time these areas work in unison.
Robert Lee Hotz, ‘A Wandering Mind Heads Straight Toward Insight’
So What’s This Got to Do with the iPhone?
Some of you might be feeling a little smug at this point. If you’re anything like me – a new media enthusiast who spends more time in front of a computer screen than a television – the research seems to confirm all our prejudices against the ‘couch potato’ behaviour fostered by TV.
After all, we’re the creative ones engaged in ‘lean forward’ not ‘lean back’ media. We like our culture read/write, not read-only – right?
Well stop and think for a moment about the iPhone. Whether or not you’ve actually given in and bought an iPhone yet, don’t tell me you haven’t considered it. Or daydreamed about the wonderful creative possibilities of carrying this digital box of tricks with you wherever you go.
In a sense, it doesn’t really matter whether you buy an iPhone or not. What the iPhone represents is the arrival of portable cloud computing, a world where everyone is ‘always on’, always connected, wherever they go.
A world with no downtime.
Think about the last time you found yourself ‘killing time’ – at an airport, between meetings or on a solitary train journey.
With an iPhone, you’re never bored – just whip it out and you’re instantly entertained. In fact, you’re spoiled for choice: Browse the web? Play with an app? Start Tweeting? Check your e-mail (again)?
Next time you find yourself automatically reaching for your phone to banish boredom, stop and ask yourself: Is this really so different from those schoolkids who can’t do nothing for a moment without switching on the TV?
Without an iPhone, you’re in serious danger of being bored. What can you do? Examine your surroundings? Stare into space? Let your mind wander…?
Do you see what I’m getting at? How many creative discoveries have you made while daydreaming in odd moments? How often has boredom been the mother of your invention?
Could the death of boredom mean the death of your creativity?
About the Author: Mark McGuinness is a poet and creative coach.
View Comments (25)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
« Previous 1 2 3 Next »Shower and car are my great places for ideas (as is lying in bed waiting to get up in the morning--I've had whole essays spring forth already written from my head that way!). I don't listen to the radio in the car usually.
My best tip is to take a "computer off day" once a week. We leave ours off all day Sunday. It is amazing how much "present" to real life you are without the invisible umbilical drawing you back to the computer to just "check one more thing..." (fast forward life two hours...;-). I've been having computer-off-day for over a year now. It is amazing!
Nice piece!
Molly
For me, my devices have allowed me to carry what I need in a smaller package, making me lighter and my work more flexible.
Far from disrupting my creativity by keeping me connected, my iPhone in particular has given me more freedom to create, knowing that I can spend the day with my dog, go to the beach, letting my mind wander and wonder with greater regularity.
I also use binaural technology on my iPhone to help bring me into different and deeper brain states at least a few times a week.
However, I grew up wandering in nearby woods, spending time in what I called my thinking tree, surrounded by paints and blocks and chalkboards and stories and, most importantly, story tellers.
My greater concern is the generations who grow up never disconnected from television in particular, which helps engender Beta brain states, possibly making the subconscious more susceptible to advertising triggers.
But who cares, right?
We need people to be better consumer patriots to keep our economy growing. Concerned and creative citizens only cause trouble.
The choice of delivery method is the least of our troubles, the same way syringes don't cause heroine addictions.
I just got an iPhone two days ago, and I can totally see the temptation to whip it out whenever boredom threatens. The effect on my creativity hasn't yet shown itself, but I do see how kids could learn to completely rely on technology instead of their own imagination.
Still, I wouldn't give this baby up for anything. LOL
I have an acrylic board and a pen mounted in my shower so when a good idea comes along whilst showering I can capture it. I played around with a voice-activated recorder once but all I got was shower noises and some mumbling in the background ;-)
Also, I have had what some people would call a "rich fantasy life" since I was a kid, so whenever I want downtime for creative thinking I can just go into my "play world" in my head. Caveat: Don't try this while driving.
@Ben Jones: I think you meant "heroin" addictions ;-)
Personally, I'm proud of my heroine addictions - Kate Hepburn, Faye Dunaway ...
@ Ayd - Boredom and car sickness -- who said creativity was glamorous? :-)
@ Nick -- Indeed, not all apps are created equal. ;-)
@ Molly -- A computer off day sounds a great idea. I try to leave mine alone in the evenings and most of the weekend.
@ Ben -- Yes, the iPhone does have wonderful creative potential. My point is that there's an art to using these things creatively and effectively, and most of us (including myself) are in the early stages of figuring out how to get the benefits without the drawbacks. Sounds like you're finding some great ways to use the iPhone to enhance your life and work.
@ Sarah -- Enjoy your phone! Don't let me spoil it for you. As if. ;-)
@ River -- Apparently Seamus Heaney's wife gets nervous when she sees him tapping his fingers on the steering wheel while driving. It means he's composing a poem and tapping out the meter. So you're in good company -- but I guess you are right to be cautious!
A thought from the shower just now...
I remember a story from my Art History teacher.
Michaelangelo was apparently reported to have sat for days on end in front of a quarried lump of marble, just staring at it.
When finally asked by someone what on earth he was doing, he replied, 'Working.'
What he created next was his David.
Relevant? Probably not.
Actually, for our family or 2 teens, 2 adults, the iPhone has let us really be creative...we turned our love of playing games in the car (word games, singing games), into a collection of 100 car games...that now an iPhone app called Family Car Games that gives instructions for all those games...most of which we created ourselves.
So we use the iPhone as a resource, not a refuge...randomly pick a game to play, since we can't remember all of 'em. Then the iPhone goes off and we play word games, storytelling games, singing and radio games, mystery and invention games.
The iPhone can spark ideas and provide a library full of resources. The iPhone is great for answering questions in discussions, giving song lyrics so we can sing along with the radio...but it's isolating if overused (and, in the car, nausea sets in, just like with DVDs and books).
Playing games together completely stretches our creativity (we are all writers and songwriters, my daughter does artwork too). It's nice to have the iPod Touch (in our case) to jot down ideas.
What matters to me is that lots of my leisure time is spent doing things that make me smile, as I remember them...and I can still remember parts of our wildest story games from trips a year ago. We created our app because we wanted other families to be able to use their iPhone to find ways to make the most common time together (in the car going somewhere) creative and happy and fun for everyone, including the driver.
That's the key, I think...an iPhone app that makes >real< life richer.
A sample game was included in a recent mention by a FoxNews.com columnist:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,529599,00.html
Finally! Someone telling me I don't have to buy an iPhone. Everyone seems to say, you gotta get one of these. I have resisted. I know what it would do to me. It's bad enough just having wifi in my house! I'm already on the computer far too often. I don't need to log on in the bathroom at work. :)
@ Chris 17 - The sadly-defunct Scamp blog used to have the tagline "When you see me staring out the window, that's when I'm working".
@ Ruth - "we use the iPhone as a resource, not a refuge". That would be a great motto for ALL communications technology.
@ Chris 19 - Seriously, you've got to get one, they are awesome. ;-)