#General thoughts about psychology full

In recent years, verbal overshadowing (Schooler & Engstler-Schooler, 1990) has been investigated in the various contexts of perceptual memory (i.e., sights, sounds, tastes etc.

#General thoughts about psychology full

Recent research has shown that putting one’s thoughts to words might very well impede access to the full complexity of nonverbal thought. In this context, an accumulating body of evidence on the effects of verbalization on cognition may demand that it be incorporated into creative cognition research. From the arts to technological innovation to mathematics and physics, the creative process is often nonverbal.

Rothenberg and Sobel (1980) linked the overlapping of visual imagery to enhanced originality of metaphors. Finke (1990) showed that people who mentally combined visual forms were able to generate ideas for inventions and discoveries in a wide variety of domains. Nonverbal processes are often considered central to the creative process. The psychological entities that serve as building blocks for my thought are certain signs or images, more or less clear, that I can reproduce and recombine at will” (Hadamard, 1945, p.142). In a letter written to Jacques Hadamard, Einstein articulated this view clearly: “Words and language, whether written or spoken, do not seem to play an important part in my thought processes. Prominent thinkers themselves often reinforce the idea that creative thought can take place outside of language processes. Eugene Ferguson, a chronicler of innovation, noted in an article written for Science, “Much of the creative thought of the designers of our technological world is nonverbal, not easily reducible to words its language is an object or a picture or a visual image in the mind” (1977, p. Perhaps this is most obvious of music and the visual arts, but nonverbal creative processes are documented in most domains. 'Anecdotally, the history of creative thought is rife with inspiration of a nonverbal nature.