We tend to associate boredom with negative concepts; lack of engaging stimuli, slowing down of brain processes and overall a sluggish disposition towards life. A new study by researchers at the University of Central Lancashire however, reveals that boredom actually fuels our creativity as it urges us to daydream more.
In an experiment carried out, a group of participants were asked to engage in a boring task – copy phone numbers from a directory and then engage in a creative task that required them to come up with innovative uses for cups. The other group was immediately asked engaged with the creative task. The experiment showed that the participants first dealing with the boring task, did better than those who didn’t first participate in the boring task.
Now, in a different experiment, one group had to copy phone numbers while the second group had to read them out loud. In the subsequent creative task, those reading out the numbers did better than those copying them, suggesting that the more tedious a task the more daydreaming takes place, which leads to more creative expression later on.
This study comes to overhaul our perception of boredom as something negative and looked-down-upon. Boredom, activates daydreaming, which is the pathway to more creativity.