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How Mobile Devices Kill Your Creativity
FuzzNugget writes "ReadWrite has posted a thought-provoking piece on how mobile devices killing our boredom may also be killing our creativity. Quoting: 'Numerous studies and much accepted wisdom suggest that time spent doing nothing, being bored, is beneficial for sparking and sustaining creativity. With our iPhone in hand — or any smartphone, really — our minds, always engaged, always fixed on that tiny screen, may simply never get bored. And our creativity suffers. ... For example, psychology professor Gary Marcus distinguishes between the two primary types of pursuits we use to defeat boredom. "Boredom is the brain's way to tell you you should be doing something else. But the brain doesn't always know the most appropriate thing to do. If you're bored and use that energy to play guitar and cook, it will make you happy. But if you watch TV, it may make you happy in the short term, but not in the long term." So much of what we do on our smartphones, however, is decidedly short-term: a few moments playing a game while we stand in line, a minute to scan Instagram as the person in front of us at the grocery store pulls out their checkbook. ' Of course, you'll probably be reading this on a smartphone."
It's perfectly possible to be "bored" while using an iPhone or iPad or whatever smart device you prefer.
I think point missed by this type of research is assuming that everyone is actively engaged by the device when idly surfing Facebook or Slashdot. In this situation the user may simply be waiting for inspiration to strike (when that happens is unpredictable, otherwise we'd milk it for all it's worth).
Obviously this doesn't apply to everyone in every situation, but to suggest that having access to smart phones is killing creativity is a bit of a stretch.
Peace,
Andy.
I have TTC courses, Coursera Courses, and iTunesU courses on my iPhone/iPad. So in my downtime I have learned discrete math/cryptography among others and am presently plowing through a great Coursera course in Computational Investing. I also have Algebra Touch on my iPhone and hand it to my younger daughter when we are stuck waiting. For both of my daughters I have TTC math on the iPad to hand to them when bored (some bribery involved).
So I would not say that Mobile devices are inherently bad but that many people use them to peruse the junk food isle. I go to the grocery store an my cart is devoid of palm oil or HFCS. Often I see other people's carts full of products containing both. We are shopping in the same store.
Hanging out with friends doesn't leave you with anything to show for the time spent, but I doubt you'd find many people who would opt for knitting a scarf or building a shelf instead.
Not everything valuable can be held up and shown; not everything that can be held up and shown is valuable.
Creativity depends in what medium you're working. If you're bored zoning out on the PC reading /., you may get an insight into how to change the design layout of your pet project while doing that. Doing things online doesn't spell a death to all boredom, far from it. There's also a limit how interesting on-line life can be, and the masses are quickly approaching that point as we speak.
My favourite is watching a movie alone while working on a project. Suddenly getting sparks of ideas and then seeing them unfold, pausing the movie while doing so. The most important thing is not to write down your idea, it is to IMPLEMENT IT THERE AND THEN. (Writing it down may catalog your idea for future reference, but implementing it right away provides even more insight and later discoveries while doing so). Today's technology makes prototyping even more simpler and accessible, so is bettering the chances even more of CATCHING THE IDEA.
As someone who has had years of creativity behind me, I'm finding this article bogus (of course I didn't read it!).
Each creative type has their own quirks and ways of tapping the source. And it is very much about getting in touch with yourself, your true interests and mission in life (yes, everyone has at least one mission - but most forget it through the painful / shameful conditionings of society).
The ABSOLUTELY WORST thing you can do to your mind however, is becoming a sceptic. It'll MURDER your ideas even before they get a chance to hatch, over and over again. Scepticism is a serial killer of great ideas!
Some of the time I most value is time spent with my family, particularly my parents since they are aging and it isn't something I'm going to be able to do forever. I have nothing to show for it, I take home with me nothing but memories, and yet I value those memories highly.
I'll never understand the attitude I see online sometimes where people value only actually creating something, or accomplishing something. That as though if you aren't spending your time building something, fixing something, creating something, etc you are just useless.
On the contrary, I find that much of my time spent with non-tangible results to be of value. Even simple personal things. If I spend a weekend lazing around, playing video games, petting my kitty, sleeping in, and so on I have nothing to show for it. However I enjoy it, and I feel relaxed and happy, so how can you call that worthless?
It seems to me to be a rather empty existence if you define your worth by nothing but what you make. I'm not saying don't take pride in things you create, I know I do (well, when they are good at least) but if your definition of self is only in what you make, then what does that really say? What is the point? If personal happiness and enjoyment don't matter, then why bother? If they do matter, then why define them so narrowly to only include the tangible?