It is no longer secret: arts and crafts make good scientists
What is it really that makes a scientist more successful in their career path, from another; The Program Scientist (Scientist Project) a longitudinal study of different scientists, revealed a secret that no one could have suspected: arts and crafts hobbies.
The 1958, psychologist Bernice Eiduson, of UCLA University (California – USA) brought together forty young scientists from the Los Angeles area, who agreed to undergo psychosynthesis analyzes and IQ tests, every five years for an indefinite period. The scientists also agreed to interviews in which they would answer about their work habits, their expectations, their successes and failures, cultural activities, etc. Statistics related to their publications and references were also collected.
Within twenty years it was clear that the Scientist Program, it could indeed reveal the secrets of great science. Until the 1978, four members of the group had won the Nobel Prize (including Linus Pauling & Richard Feynman) and two more had been nominated for this award several times. Eleven others, were elected to the National Academy of Sciences. Based on publications and reports, the rest of the scientists had a fairly mediocre career. Some even failed to pursue a career as a scientist and turned to non-academic jobs. Comparing these groups, Eiduson and her researchers, they had hopes of finding clues to scientific success.
However, extracting these clues from the data proved difficult. After Eiduson's death in the middle of his decade 80 hosted by Maurine Bernstein and her son Bob. Statistics expert Helen Garnier also participated. The new team makes every possible change of the various psychological & IQ tests with various parameters for scientific success. However, they were left empty-handed. It turned out that the very successful scientists, it is difficult to differentiate them psychologically from their less successful colleagues.
The team decides to return it to the scientists 1988, in a new attempt, focusing this time on the arts and crafts aspects, in their entertainment habits, in their technical and intellectual "tools" that they used to solve their scientific problems. This time the statistics had significant differences between highly successful and average or below average scientists. Nobel laureates and members of the National Academy were much more likely to:
- Have one or more occupations (up to twelve) from their less successful colleagues (here is Feynman playing drums and Pauling, guitar).
- They believe that knowledge of art, of poetry, of music etc. it is part and parcel of the being of the scientist-in-training.
- They mention the ways in which their occupations, they promoted their scientific work and
- To use a much wider range of mental "tools" to solve problems, than their less successful colleagues, including the different forms of visual display, verbal and written, charts and so on.
This last finding particularly concerned the researchers. The more intellectual "tools" scientists use, the more likely they are to be unusually successful. The number, the type and variety of intellectual tools used by scientists correlated with their hobbies. Poets for example tend to be verbal thinkers, painters and musicians tend to be visual thinkers. Sculptors tend to be kinesthetic thinkers and those who enjoy electronic pursuits tend to use the widest range of spiritual tools, perhaps because of the need to interpret abstract diagrams through manual skills in 3D, functional devices.
These correlation results of occupations, they are further related to the time of practice management among the different groups of scientists. The very successful scientists, they claimed they were lazy even though they had worked long hours, because they valued relaxation as a way to refresh their minds. also, they limited the time they spent on programs that had no hope, before turning to something more hopeful. Successful scientists tend to have more projects, of shorter duration and greater variety than their less successful counterparts.
Conversely, almost everyone, the less successful scientists believed that if they spent more time in their lab and program, which was usually one and only, they would be more successful. Therefore, took on significantly fewer projects, throughout their career, from their successful colleagues. Furthermore, less successful scientists had the fewest pursuits and expressed the view that these pursuits ate up valuable time and energy, to the detriment of their scientific objective.
The way too, by which scientists understood their preoccupations, proved crucial. There is a difference between erudition (which dominates the knowledge and skills of many subjects) and the amateur (which fumbles without depth in many areas). There is also a difference between learning many unrelated things and realizing the connection between many things. Scientific creativity does not depend only on a well-oiled imagination combined with the habits of hard work, but mainly from the ability to integrate in a functional way, a wider range of ideas, concepts and skills than usual.
Consider the following: for many its biophysicists 19u century, there was a direct correlation between the number of their occupations and the range of discoveries they made (Cranefield). Ο Helmholtz (German scientist and philosopher), for example, he played the piano in his spare time and pioneered the biophysical study of music, applying his knowledge of both physics (resonances) as well as for psychology (perception of harmony). Similarly Charles Darwin brilliantly connected his diverse interests in geography, geology, paleontology and economics in exploring the theory of evolution by natural selection (Gruber).
Science historian Howard Gruber, called this and other fruitful combinations of occupations and professions "business networks". Philosopher John Dewey called them “integrated sets of activities” (Root – Bernstein, 1989). Regardless of the term used, means the same thing. Creative people find ways to incorporate unusual amounts of what they know. Their professional and personal activities work together, instead of competing.
In fact the historian of erudition Minor Mayers argued that creation is inherently combinatorial. The more diverse knowledge one understands and actively contrasts, the greater the probability of finding useful and innovative combinations. The Program Scientist, proved that arts and techniques are essential components in this creative mix.
Bibliography:
- Cranefield, P. (1966) Τhe Philosophical and Cultural Interests of the Biophysics Movement of 1847. Journal of the History of Medicine 21, 1-7.
- Dewey, J. (1934) Art as Experience. New York: Balch.
- Eiduson B. (1962) Scientists: Their Psychological World. New York: Basic Books.
- Root-Bernstein, R.S. (1989) Discovering. Cambridge, M. A.: Harvard University Press.
- Root Bernstein, R.S., Bernstein, M., Garnier, H.W. (1993) Identification of scientists making long-term, high-impact contributions, with notes on their methods of working. Creativity Research Journal 6: 329-343.
- Root Bernstein, R.S., Bernstein, M., Garnier, H.W. (1995) Correlations between avocations, scientific style, and professional impact of thirty eight scientists of the Eiduson Study, Creativity Research Journal 8, 115 137.
- Michele and Robert Root-Bernstein
