Sometimes stories come along that just land in the wheelhouse.  This article would be one of them – Study of the Day: Why Crowded Coffee Shops Fire Up Your Creativity.

Hello.  I don’t need a study to tell me this fact.  In case you didn’t know:

Compared to a relatively quiet environment (50 decibels), a moderate level of ambient noise (70 dB) enhanced subjects’ performance on the creativity tasks, while a high level of noise (85 dB) hurt it. Modest background noise, the scientists explain, creates enough of a distraction to encourage people to think more imaginatively.

Which leads to this assertion:

The next time you’re stumped on a creative challenge, head to a bustling coffee shop, not the library. As the researchers write in their paper, “Instead of burying oneself in a quiet room trying to figure out a solution, walking out of one’s comfort zone and getting into a relatively noisy environment may trigger the brain to think abstractly, and thus generate creative ideas.”

Now add a large dose of highly-caffeinated black liquid and you have a perfect working environment.

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