The Best Emotional State To Improve Creativity

Well, the answer to this one may not be too big of a surprise if you are a fan of the Big Bang … or you happen to be over 40 years old.

The answer is BOREDOM!

For fans of the Big Bang Theory, Sheldon once worked briefly as a waiter (a task he considered boring) to kick-start his creativity and solve a challenging physics problem.

For people 40 and over, if you told your parents you were bored, you were told to go outside and do something (which could get you to be creative by exploring something new such as making up a game or finding new and unique ways to get in trouble!).

The science community decided to do what they do best… run a study! Mann and Cadmarr (2013) had study participants copy phone numbers out of the telephone book for 15 minutes (their boring task), while a control group went straight to completing a creativity task.

Results showed that the group who completed the boring task first performed better on the creativity task (finding as many different uses as they could for a polystyrene cup).

Take Home Message

If you need a jolt of creativity or have become stuck on a problem, consider doing something boring for awhile to allow your insightful thinking process to kick into gear. Generally speaking, if you try too hard to force creativity, you’re likely to come up empty.