Leafing through old (very old, these days) notebooks from college attests to the fact that I was back then (and occasionally still am) a doodler. Which does not mean I wasn’t paying attention in class. In fact, the secondary task of doodling can demand just enough cognitive function to keep the mind more attentive to the primary task (listening to a lecture, speech or discussion, for example) than it would be otherwise. And according to a study by Jackie Andrade published in Applied Cognitive Psychology last Wednesday, doodlers actually have better recall of material they listened to than those who weren’t doodling. Wired Science blog described the experiment: “Andrade’s team asked 40 people to listen to a recording containing the names of people and places. Afterwards the people wrote down the names they could remember. While listening, half of the test subjects were also required to shade in shapes on a piece of paper. Afterwards, they remembered one-third more names than test subjects who didn’t doodle while listening.”
I think most note-taking is just a form of doodling, at least for me. Unless I’m recording an event for minutes, I seldom ever look at my notes later, and if I do, I often can’t imagine what I was thinking when I wrote them down: literary doodles, obscure things to do, streams of consciousness, etc. But I know for a fact that I remember meetings better when I’m scribbling something. I have three basic art doodles. One is geometric, one is globular and one is eye-shaped. Your doodle (above) shows an artistic skill I didn’t know you had. I know you have design chops from your web sites, but not everyone can draw, let along draw, write, play guitar, code and raise incredible kids. I think you should be happy with all these talents and leave distance running to others. By the way, I’d mentioned a dark-fiction podcast site I had seen (it turns up on my Facebook ad bar for some reason, must be something I wrote). Here’s the link: http://web.me.com/normsherman/.....dcast.html Is this not the most random reply you’ve ever gotten on your blog?
Thanks for posting this. I used to doodle compulsively, but I no longer do. I will start again directly.
Thanks for the comments, guys! Rick, yours finally showed up! Took a week after you’d mentioned you posted it… odd. Thanks for the compliments, even if they were a clever bridge to another poke at my running! ;> To defend I’d point out, the running helps provide some of the foundation for all those other things, gives me the strength and energy to keep at them, etc. Looking forward to checking out the podcast you pointed me to…