a new study has shown there’s a link between living overseas and creativity.

using a multi-method approach, 5 studies explored the relationship btwn creativity and living abroad. it seems the act of adapting to a different culture and how much you adapt is the key to improved creativity. and it seems just traveling overseas doesn’t have the same link.

“It may be that those critical months or years of turning cultural bewilderment into concrete understanding may instill not only the ability to ‘think outside the box’ but also the capacity to realise that the box is more than a simple square, more than its simple form, but also a repository of many creative possibilities.”

the authors state this is just the beginning of the research needed but i think they are onto something. living overseas exposes you to different ideas, ways of doing things, mindsets, cultures, etc. you may be exposed to these same things when traveling but it’s not until you need to do those mundane daily things like ordering a coffee or leasing an apartment that the brain needs to kick some creativity into the process and re-learn.

one research question i’d love to see further developed by folks going into this stream is – is your creativity enhanced by the degree of foreignness of the country you choose to live in? for example, an american in japan vs an american in the UK. i think this study was european & americans but i’m not sure what countries the cultural experiences were in (i haven’t read the full article).

hmmm…. had i moved to a country that didn’t speak english and didn’t use the same characters, would my creativity be enhanced more than it is now (having lived in 3 english speaking countries)? maybe i should head to tokyo to find out…

Maddux, W., & Galinsky, A. (2009). Cultural borders and mental barriers: The relationship between living abroad and creativity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 96 (5), 1047-1061

summary on BPS

the chief happiness officer blog has a post on a study out Penn State of showing telecommuting is good for both employee and employer.

the study was a review of 46 studies including 13k employees. the blog post has a fantastic summary of the main points so i won’t steal his thunder.

i need to read the full study but the most interesting part caught by the summary IMO is working 1-2 days a week outside the office doesn’t hurt the co-worker/manager relationships although 3 days away from the office has a negative effect on office relationships. wow. an extra 8 hours and damage is done.

the full report is here (pdf)

carolin horn’s mfa thesis project was around visualising information. out of her research came anymails.

it is a very cool way to both visualise and think of emails. every email is represented as an animal (ameba looking but cute). the colour and shape of the animal tells you what sort of email it is (ie filtered – friend? family? work? spam?).

For instance, all received emails from school are blue and look a bit like croissants.

very cute!

the colour also determines the age of the email – it fades as it sits in your email. knowing whether you have read/not read/replied to an email is also important and visually represented by the motion of the beast (it pulsates faster when it needs attention) and how many hairy little feet it has (hairs fall out as you go from unread -> read -> replied).

it looks fantastic but IMO would fall apart if you had more styles of animals (ie more categories). i receive a lot of email and i filter a lot. i also sub-filter (sure it’s a friend but which friend?). the critters could be images of my friends faces or icons representing each mailing list but i think it might go into visual overload fairly quickly.

will be really interesting to see if this gets developed further.

article on how different cultures respond to different forms of persuasion.

employees at 4 locations of citibank participated in research concerning how they decided to handle a request from a colleague. the thought process varied based on their location (usa, hong kong, germany and spain) and illustrates how people working in cross cultural environments need to work differently depending on their audience. the research blurb does not specify if these were f2f or virtual teams but i’m guessing f2f (had it been virtual i think they would mention it).

the research found americans were more concerned with what was in it for them & if they owed the person asking a favor. germans wanted to know if the request conformed to the rules & regulations. the spanish looked at friendship & your connections and the chinese at rank & group affiliation. if you were a project manager of a team that consisted of members in the states, hk, germany & spain, you’d have to work all of these angles. it’s a fantastic illustration for people who are in those situations.

ref:
Morris, M., Podolny, J., & Ariel, S. (2001). Culture, norms, and obligations: Cross-national differences in patterns of interpersonal norms and felt obligations toward coworkers.” In The Practice of Social Influence in Multiple Cultures, edited by W. Wosinska, D. Barrett, R. Cialdini, and J. Reykowski, 97-123. Mahwah, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum.

research on telecommuting is out by a swedish company who relocated offices and allowed people to telecommute for 3 days each week. the company was particularily interested in the work/life balance of its new teleworking employees.

turns out there wasn’t much difference on work/life balance between those telecommuting and those who always worked in the office. BUT they discovered a gender difference. guys who worked at home part of the time reported LESS work/personal life overlap than guys who worked at the office. i wonder if this could be contributed to less ‘social’ activities since they were out of the office (ie no pressure to have a beer after work by co-workers). women who telecommuted reported MORE work/personal life overlap (insert women multi task better joke here). article (subscription needed) and summary

cite:
Hartig, T. Kylin, C. & Johansson, G. (2007). The telework tradeoff: Stress mitigation vs. constrained restoration. Applied Psychology: An International Review, 56, 231-253.