Plenty of studies have linked regular physical activity not only to better physical health, but also to psychological paybacks like stress reduction and memory enhancement. But a new one from Stanford University, published in “The Journal of Experimental Psychology,” links a boost in creativity to as little as a daily stroll.
We already know the benefits of walking for the body. A new study says it might just take your mind to new heights too. Photo by Shutterstock
If you need an incentive to get off your booty, knowing that moving could inspire imagination—even innovation at work—might just be the motivation you’ve been waiting for.
Taking a cue from her own invigorating walks with advisors during graduate school, Stanford professor Dr. Marily Oppezzo decided to test an inkling that activity might just spur ingenuity. Student volunteers repeated a creativity test—one at a desk and one while walking on a treadmill facing a blank wall—in the same intentionally uninteresting room. The results were conclusive. Almost every study participant, when in this case asked to identify uses for an object, came up with about 60 percent more appropriate yet original uses for the object while walking. In fact there appeared to be lasting effects from such simple activity: Students produced more creative answers to questions after walking, even while sitting.
“I think the take-home message here is that moving is good for mind and body,” says Dr. Monika Fleshner, who has studied the effects of exercise and activity on stress at the University of Colorado Boulder. “The short-term impact of moderate exercise on mood and concentration are well documented in the literature, and exercise is known to activate reward pathways in the brain (i.e., dopamine and endorphin neurons).”
One surprising thing about the study, however, was that walking outdoors, even on a picturesque campus like Stanford’s, didn’t seem to boost creativity any further. While students were definitely more imaginative when moving versus sitting stationary at a desk, outcomes showed it didn’t seem to matter where that activity took place.
Dr. Oppezzo has speculated that such an acute effect from activity could be because creativity simply blooms when mood is elevated. Fleshner adds that there’s new evidence around a recently discovered hormone called irisin that’s released from muscles after acute exercise. “Perhaps walking stimulates the muscles to release irisin into the blood, where it crosses into the cerebrospinal fluid and interacts with the brain to produce a combination of changes in mood and concentration—and these changes blend to increase creativity.”
Whatever the reason, it doesn’t take a whole lot of creative thought to deduce that activity accelerates the body—and now, perhaps equally motivating, the mind. Here’s to the next step in enlightened exercise.
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