Today, there is a greater need for creative thinking than ever before. Many organizations require innovative individuals to join their teams, while our society’s intricate and multifaceted issues could benefit from a healthy dose of creativity.
According to a music study, exposure to music can boost divergent thinking, which is a critical component of creativity.
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Friday, June 9th
A study funded by Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research explored music as a source of creativity to shed light on the potential association of music listening for optimizing divergent and convergent creativity.
During the experiment, the participants were asked to complete creativity exercises that measured their divergent and convergent thinking while being exposed to either silence (the control group) or classical music designed to evoke four different emotional states: happiness, calmness, sadness, or anxiety.
After evaluating the performance of the participants on divergent and convergent thinking across all five scenarios, the researchers discovered that those who listened to happy music had notably higher scores on divergent thinking than those who worked in silence. This indicates that they generated a greater number of ideas, including more innovative and creative ideas (as assessed by individuals unfamiliar with the study’s objective). The other types of music tested did not have the same effect.
The findings imply that exposure to happy music can lead to improvements in overall divergent thinking. They suggest that this effect is due to enhanced cognitive flexibility, which enables individuals to generate creative solutions by switching between different concepts and perspectives rather than being confined to a rigid viewpoint.
Notably, the study showed that participants’ enjoyment or preference for music did not affect their performance. This suggests that the benefits of listening to music come from factors other than simple enjoyment.
Therefore, the study indicates that individuals may benefit from listening to happy music while working, especially when seeking novel approaches to a particular problem.
More so, the authors suggest that music listening could be an economical and effective strategy to promote creative thinking in various scientific, educational, and organizational settings where creativity is sought.
This article is a re-post, with minor modifications, of “How Music Helps Us Be More Creative,” published on greatergood.berkeley.edu
