Destroying Psychology Books!

Hi All,

Interesting title right....? Well that's exactly what we did in my last PSY327 class in the name of creativity! To preface this post, let me begin by giving you all some background. Our instructor introduced us to the show craft corner showdown, which pits experienced craftsmen and women against each other in the context of who-can-make-the-best-craft duel. The only constraints applied were the materials they could use as well as a ungenerous ten minute time limit. Our instructor thought it would be a good exercise to replicate this in the context of our class--by using none other than old psychology text books, yarn and paper clips ! I must admit ripping Freud's face apart was very hard considering my adornment for him.  Either way--we began the challenge by brainstorming in groups what the most creative structure would be make considering our materials and our limited diversity of materials.

Immediately, we thought of making a paper bouquet of flowers using the different the colors of paper. We then transitioned to considering making  making a boat, with the yarn being the rope of the boat sail. Then we thought of designing a house. However, I then thought, we are only suggesting things within one category--physical structures in our outside world. What were other categories?? Then I thought--how about structures that are abstract or ones that we don't typically see. Then I thought--A BRAIN. We could make a brain from the crumbled psych books, make the sulci and gyri from the yarn and hold it together with the paper clips! It would also be metaphorical since we would be making a model brain from the materials used to understand a brain (psych textbooks). We committed to this idea due to its novelty and went forth to make it with 20 minutes left!

We finished--even with enough time to add a brain stem! I was impressed with our teams collaboration and creative process under pressure. Only one other groups project stuck out to me--the ones who made a costume from the psych books! This functional approach to creativity was interesting and absolutely demonstrated the groups divergent thinking.  All in all this activity was a fantastic experience and left me thinking, what exactly are the ideal conditions to facilitate creativity? Give me your thoughts!

Until my next post,

Ryan