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What Are the Benefits of Mind Wandering to Creativity?

Publication ,  Journal Article
Murray, S; Liang, N; Brosowsky, N; Seli, P
Published in: Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts
September 16, 2021

A primary aim of mind-wandering research has been to understand its influence on task performance. While this research has typically highlighted the costs of mind wandering, a few studies have suggested that mind wandering may be beneficial in certain situations. Perhaps the most-touted benefit is that mind wandering during a creative-incubation interval facilitates creative thinking. This finding has played a critical role in the development of accounts of the adaptive value of mind wandering and its functional role, as well as potential mechanisms of mind wandering. Thus, a demonstration of the replicability of this important finding is warranted. Here, we attempted to conceptually replicate results of a highly cited laboratory-based experiment supporting this finding. However, across 2 studies (N = 443), we found no evidence for the claim that mind wandering during a creative-incubation interval facilitates a form of creativity associated with divergent thinking. We suggest that our failed conceptual replication stems from an inadequate characterization of mind wandering (task-unrelated thought), and that there are good reasons to think that task-unrelated thought is unlikely to be causally related to creativity. Our results cast doubt on the claim that task-unrelated thought during an incubation interval enhances divergent creativity while also offering some prescriptions for how future research might further elucidate the cognitive benefits of mind wandering.

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Published In

Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts

DOI

EISSN

1931-390X

ISSN

1931-3896

Publication Date

September 16, 2021

Volume

18

Issue

3

Start / End Page

403 / 416

Related Subject Headings

  • 5205 Social and personality psychology
  • 5204 Cognitive and computational psychology
  • 1901 Art Theory and Criticism
  • 1702 Cognitive Sciences
  • 1701 Psychology
 

Citation

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Murray, S., Liang, N., Brosowsky, N., & Seli, P. (2021). What Are the Benefits of Mind Wandering to Creativity? Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 18(3), 403–416. https://doi.org/10.1037/aca0000420
Murray, S., N. Liang, N. Brosowsky, and P. Seli. “What Are the Benefits of Mind Wandering to Creativity?Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts 18, no. 3 (September 16, 2021): 403–16. https://doi.org/10.1037/aca0000420.
Murray S, Liang N, Brosowsky N, Seli P. What Are the Benefits of Mind Wandering to Creativity? Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts. 2021 Sep 16;18(3):403–16.
Murray, S., et al. “What Are the Benefits of Mind Wandering to Creativity?Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, vol. 18, no. 3, Sept. 2021, pp. 403–16. Scopus, doi:10.1037/aca0000420.
Murray S, Liang N, Brosowsky N, Seli P. What Are the Benefits of Mind Wandering to Creativity? Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts. 2021 Sep 16;18(3):403–416.

Published In

Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts

DOI

EISSN

1931-390X

ISSN

1931-3896

Publication Date

September 16, 2021

Volume

18

Issue

3

Start / End Page

403 / 416

Related Subject Headings

  • 5205 Social and personality psychology
  • 5204 Cognitive and computational psychology
  • 1901 Art Theory and Criticism
  • 1702 Cognitive Sciences
  • 1701 Psychology