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Stanford study finds walking improves creativity (2014)
- dang 11y agoArguably a dupe of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7669818 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7669818, but creativity through walking is such a great thing we'll give it a pass. But why was this posted 3 times today?
- denzil_correa 11y ago> But why was this posted 3 times today? Completely a co-incidence for me. Yesterday, I had a discussion with some friends about creative process and how I like long walks. Today, I saw this 2014 article on my Twitter TL. Hence, the share.
- VladimirGolovin 11y agoProbably because today it was on the homepage of Reddit.
- ExpiredLink 11y agoThis was known for centuries if not millennia.
- hrnnnnnn 11y agoIt's still worth studying formally. In the 19th century everyone knew that you could determine if someone was a criminal by studying the shape of their skull.
- pibefision 11y agoI hate how everyone references Steve Jobs like the only one who walked to be creative.
- astrodust 11y agoI hate how when people hate that Steve Jobs walked to be creative they don't mention others as counter-points.
- yellowapple 11y agoI hate how people implicitly demand counter-points when others express their hatred regarding Steve Jobs being commonly referenced as an example of walking to be creative.
- hownottowrite 11y agoFrédéric Gros' Philosophy of Walking is a great ramble on the subject. There's a little preview in this Guardian interview from 2014: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/20/frederic-gros-walk-nietzsche-kant http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/20/frederic-gros-w...
- hellameta 11y ago> It's an examination of the philosophy of various thinkers for whom walking was central to their work – Nietzsche, Rimbaud, Kant, Rousseau, Thoreau (they're all men; it's unclear if women don't walk or don't think) This little line came out nowhere, hah! Well done. Thank you for sharing this.
- antonp 11y agoOn a related note; I really enjoyed this[1] podcast. It's an interview with Olivia Fox Cabane - the author of a book that explores the science behind creative thinking. [1]http://theartofcharm.com/podcast-episodes/olivia-fox-cabane-the-science-of-creativity-and-genius-episode-395/ http://theartofcharm.com/podcast-episodes/olivia-fox-cabane-...
- benguild 11y agoI agree. I walk all of the time back and forth between home and the office and it's great to have time to reflect and reconnect using an idle mind.
- awjr 11y agoIs it the act of just moving? I'm assuming this also goes for cycling? I cycle to work (5 miles each way) and the 25 minutes each way have sections where I can mentally focus on other things and just let my body ride. I can pretty much set myself up for the work that day in the morning thinking through issues very deeply. In the evening, I find it clears my head and lets me think around any issues I've had during the day or just get myself prepped for any side projects I'm working on that evening. I like the idea of a walking meeting however the dynamics of having 5 people walk together and be able to have good conversations might not work. I'm guessing 2-3 people maximum would work. How does this relate to standing desks? Standing desks with treadmills underneath them? ;)
- amelius 11y agoSometimes, I get the best ideas while in the shower, so I'm not sure it is even the act of "moving" that does it.
- awjr 11y agoAnd sleeping on a problem.
- ignorabilis 11y agoFor me it is anything that helps me not fix on the problem. Standing in front of the computer, staring at the code always pushes me in the same direction; once I am up to something else, but still 'lightly' thinking about the problem I come up with better solutions. It's almost as if I am thinking about it I can't think of anything valuable; once I stop thinking about the issue at hand everything just happens to fall in place.
- danieltillett 11y agoFor solving problems showers are faster, but walking is better for higher level problems requiring greater thought. A shower is great for knocking out a block quickly, while if I have a really hard problem a long walk is better.
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- thomasfromcdnjs 11y ago“Thoughts that come on doves’ feet guide the world.” - Thus Spoke Zarathustra
- ausjke 11y agoDo we really need study like this...this is like eating well is good for your health.
- noir_lord 11y agoYes we do. These studies put "that which we already know" on a testable basis and also allow us to look at the underlying mechanisms, often we find that the underlying mechanism is counter-intuitive to our assumptions (this is often the case, the universe rarely works the way we'd expect) so dismissing it with "Of course, we knew that" is frequently wrong. You say "eating well is good for your health" but of course eating well is predicated on knowing which things to eat for health and how do we know that via studies on human nutrition of course!.
- pxck 11y agoIt's time to install a treadmill in front of my standing desk.
- jessriedel 11y ago> researchers at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, recruited 75 healthy young men and women and randomly assigned them to workspaces outfitted with a computer and either a chair or a treadmill desk....Then the volunteers were asked to complete a series of tests of their manual and mental dexterity...The manual task was simple enough, consisting of using the keyboard to type words that flashed onto the computer screen as quickly and accurately as possible while the volunteer either sat or slowly walked. > The cognitive tests were more demanding, designed to measure practical aspects of cognition, such as working memory and delayed recall, and the ability to concentrate, all of which are important in performing office work. In one of these tests, volunteers had to learn and later recall lists of words; in another, they were asked to juggle lists of numbers and add them up in their heads even as new numbers were added to the list... > The results, when the researchers compared the treadmill walkers with the people sitting at their desks, substantially favored sitting. The people who had walked during the testing performed worse on almost all aspects of thinking, including the ability to concentrate and remember, compared with those who had been seated. http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/06/10/the-downside-of-treadmill-desks/ http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/06/10/the-downside-of-tre...
- crusso 11y agoYeah, but: > None of the participants had used a treadmill desk before, so they received a few minutes of instruction and practice A few minutes? Jeez, I'd expect that getting acclimated to a completely different way to work would take at least several weeks or months.
- jessriedel 11y agoFair enough, I guess. This still lowers my expectation that there is a significant positive improvement in the long term, and is strong evidence against the sort of anecdotal claims that "you immediately feel better and more alert" that I hear all the time.
- saturdaysaint 11y agoIt is remarkable how a really high percentage of the biographies I've read (of famous/"great" people) mention walking as a critical routine - Jobs, Beethoven, Jefferson, Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt spring to mind.
- armaxt 11y ago, Franklin Roosevelt,
- HenryTheHorse 11y agoCharles Dickens, another "compulsive" walker.
- sogen 11y agoDali exercised a lot (swimming).
- victorhn 11y agoAdd Friedrich Nietzsche.
- Toast_ 11y agoKant and Marx too.
- widdershins 11y agoDarwin was another.
- swah 11y agoThere weren't as many fun things to do, though..
- executive 11y agoPerhaps walking in California, but not walking in -40 with wind chill shearing your face off.
- brlewis 11y agoMinnesotan Fitbit users average 8675 daily steps in summer (64F) and 7486 in winter (16F), only 14% less. I infer that people in cold climates acclimate and dress for the weather, although walking indoors could partially explain it. https://blog.fitbit.com/50-states-no-excuses-see-which-states-are-active-all-year-long/ https://blog.fitbit.com/50-states-no-excuses-see-which-state...
- ChristianGeek 11y ago8,700 daily steps is a lot...it implies a conscious effort to exercise, so I wouldn't expect a significant drop with the weather.
- dragonwriter 11y ago> 8,700 daily steps is a lot...it implies a conscious effort to exercise Well, yeah, you'd kind of expect that with active Fitbit users. > so I wouldn't expect a significant drop with the weather. I would, though I'd expect it to be less than you'd see from more casual people. Conscious effort doesn't completely negate the effects of convenient opportunities vs. adverse conditions.
- ra1n85 11y agoYou would be surprised. On a day that I don't get to the gym, I average around 9000 and I spend most of my day working at a desk or moving between meetings (i.e. I don't consider myself very active).
- will_work4tears 11y agoOut of curiosity, do you move your hands a lot when talking? A coworker uses his Fitbit daily, but has mentioned that it falsely reads his arm movements when he talks (which he does a lot of hand waving and other movements). I worked a physical job, stocking books and filling book orders for a summer while in college[1]. I used a pedometer and rarely went much above 10k steps (for the 8 hour shift anyway). That's walking basically for 8 hours straight (with stops to place or grab a book). [1] - not my only physical job, but the one I walked the most, and the only one I ever had a pedometer on.
- troels 11y agoWhat if I also eat chocolate?
- gclaramunt 11y agoit might be pop sci, but the explanation I heard long time ago is: creativity is boosted by beta brain waves, (associated with daydreaming) Physical activities that don't fully engage your brain (walking, exercising, taking a shower, etc..) increment beta waves. On the other hand, increased focus and alertness, is associated with alpha waves, coffee produces that effect thus reduces your creativity
- a-guest 11y agoJohn Medina's Brain Rules: Rule #1: Exercise boosts brain power. http://www.brainrules.net/exercise http://www.brainrules.net/exercise And he also notes that two of the worst environments for the brain are: (1) the office (2) the classroom
- rdudek 11y agoThis is actually a great book and I highly recommend anyone that lives a sedentary lifestyle that today's work environments promote.
- tamersalama 11y agoBrain Rules mentioned that human ancestors walked about 12 miles/day (afair).
- ppradhan 11y agoduh, pacing!
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- g0v 11y agoWhen I'm wrestling with a problem I'll sometimes go outside and pace back and forth in my yard. Pacing has been a habit of mine since I was a kid, I remember doing it one time my mom told me "stop pacing, you're making me nervous." As an adult I love walking, I feel that it's when I can think the clearest. And as an adult I still pace, especially at the gym when I'm resting before my next set. Now I'm starting to wonder about myself. Anyways, go on walks!
- zwischenzug 11y agoMy most productive day of coding ever was the day I took a day off work and went for a 10 mile walk through London. Whenever I got stuck I would shut the laptop and walk. Eventually, the answer would come to me while walking and I'd carry on coding. I think I spent about 2.5 hours coding and the rest of the day walking. It's just a shame it was a) closed source and b) I didn't get paid for it!
- Chinjut 11y agoWhat circumstances caused you to be writing closed source code without being paid for it?
- zwischenzug 11y agoIt was for my job - a tool that I really wanted to implement to save time debugging live issues. Strangely enough I saw a similar tool that Facebook built being demoed at a meetup this week. Theirs was much nicer-looking (mine was text only). I enjoy writing time-saving tools, but now I try and profit from it myself.
- poulsbohemian 11y agoI've been a remote worker for the past ten years. If I'm on the phone, I'm up walking around the neighborhood because it helps me to think clearly while talking but also it gives me an excuse to get out of my chair. Unfortunately, more and more groups want to video conference which is annoying because I can't really do that while on the move.
- Akkuma 11y agoThis made me think that perhaps part of the reason adults seem to often be less creative than young children is due to how little movement adults often do during the day at their jobs. Maybe we've been impeding ourselves by how much more of a sedentary lifestyle we live from sitting at a desk all day, to sitting in a car, to sitting to eat, to sitting to watch tv, etc.. If you could prove that the increased creativity leads to increased productivity, you might start seeing startups pushing for people to take walks whenever they hit a snag.
- dummy7953 11y agoYes, and while we're being creative, perhaps we can think of a way to solve the problem of increasing productivity while never seeing the benefit of any of it. /rant
- rokhayakebe 11y ago"Motion creates Emotion"
- robotkilla 11y ago> adults seem to often be less creative than young children I think there are a number of reasons for this. I don't have a lot of time to write it all out here, and I would like to get my thoughts more focused on the whole subject before I write too much but here are a few reasons that I think lead to a so-called loss of creativity. Inactivity and stress leads to a whole host of issues, which I think loss of creativity is a side effect of. I suffered a severe loss of creativity during my early to late 20s. I attribute this to high stress, too much work, and a loss of focus. Also depression didn't help at all. Inactivity and stress makes you feel like crap. So does depression. I would go through bursts of creativity even at my low points, but I could never finish anything I started. Depression would always make me fail. Learning to live with depression, getting rid of my stress and focusing in hard on the things I want to make has boosted me to (what at least feels like) a whole new creative level. I think people lose their creative focus. They forget the reason for creating in the first place and so they see no reason to remain creative perhaps, or they can't see whatever it may be they enjoy creating panning out into a profitable business, so they stop. They allow social norms to smash their creativity at various critical stages in their life perhaps. Some parents are pretty down on creativity as well. Society as a whole celebrates people who think differently, but in day to day life the people you encounter openly show their disapproval (if you speak your mind). If you don't practice your creativity, study techniques, test yourself, fail at whatever you're doing and learn from your mistakes (just like literally everything else) you will end up "losing" your creativity... though I like to think that some people who were "creative" never really found it in the first place. They perhaps started down the right path, and then abandoned it, like a child who gives up on reading. During my youth (I can remember as young as 5ish but I have one story saved which i wrote at age "3 1/2") I created things nearly every day. I have piles of papers saved from nearly every stage of my life, be they sketches, doodles, or something more. Most of it is unfinished and pretty much rubbish. I like to look at that pile of garbage and compare it to what I have now (just like I do with the stuff I made a few years or months ago). I think that kids are just less inhibited, are able to make weird connections because they don't know how the world works (this can be simulated though, so don't despair), have less stress, less obligations, have more time, are healthier and more active like you said.
- spacko 11y agoStanford study finds eating reduces hunger (2016)
- yellowapple 11y agoI don't know. There are some things, like veggie "burgers", that just leave me more hungry after I've eaten it.
- Snarkolx 11y agoPerhaps a boost in creativity isn't solely restricted to walking but other activities which don't involve the task at hand (as others have mentioned)? For example, even doing a simple crossword puzzle to distract yourself may boost your creativity vs concentrating solely on trying to do something 'creative'. I highly recommend Professor Richard Wiseman's book: '59 Seconds: Think a little, change a lot' which references some studies involving topics similar to this.
- pombrand 11y agoWe need a follow up study comparing the effect size to that of showering..
- mettamage 11y agoIntuitively I do this all the time. Whenever I have pressing life questions I go on a walk and from time to time think about the options I can take. I find for myself that it's easier to see the bigger picture than when I'm sitting. Perhaps it's also that the analogy of moving forward in life and moving forward in real-time helps. In the case of this study, I'd guess that walking excites the supplementary, pre-motor and the motor cortex, as well as some attentional processes devoted to it from the prefrontal cortex (PFC) compared to just sitting. If this is the case, then I have two hypotheses why this works. (1) Because the motor cortices are involved, the PFC are easier excited as well. (2) Since some attentional processes are devoted to walking it's easier to think in a divergent manner, because there's less conscious and sub-conscious room for convergent thinking. I don't know how to test hypothesis 1, but hypothesis 2 has probably already been tested in cognitive science (I just didn't look it up). Reports where people get distractor tasks in the experimental group and a similar task as the main task in the control group probably exists. What do you think?
- mark_l_watson 11y agoI usually work at home, which is in the mountains in Central Arizona. A big part of my daily routine is a combination of short and long walks on the trails starting behind our house (forest service land). Even when I had my office in La Jolla California, I favored business conversations during walks along the ocean. Absolutely being outside and getting light exercise helps creativity.
- m_alexgr 11y ago"Trust no thought while sitting" (Thoreau)