The Science Behind Freewriting

June 07, 2024 | 3 min read

In the world of writing and creativity, the concepts of freewriting and the messy first draft have gained significant traction. Embraced by seasoned authors, aspiring writers, and creative thinkers alike, these methods embody the idea that the initial stages of creation should be totally free, messy, unstructured, and devoid of perfection.

But what does science and psychology have to say about it?

Many experts have written about the underlying mechanisms that make these methods not only effective but essential for the creative process. Let’s delve into what they have to say.

 

Ditching Perfectionism

Perfectionism can be a significant barrier to creativity and productivity. When attempting to create perfect content in the first draft, writers tend to feel constricted and limited by their self-imposed expectations. But with freewriting, you can express your thoughts without worrying about grammar or quality and without worrying about the future of the manuscript or your career.

This is an ego-free zone.

Letting go of perfectionism isn’t as easy as it sounds, because what it really means is being vulnerable — simply being with yourself as you are and accepting your thoughts as they come. Scary, right?

Psychologist Dr. Carol Dweck has done extensive research on mindset and the effect of a person’s mindset on their work and results. Dweck reveals in her book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success that embracing a growth mindset, instead of a fixed mindset, is critical. What does that mean?

  • A fixed mindset is when you view yourself, your qualities, your personality — and thus your work — as unchangeable.
  • On the other hand, a growth mindset is open to change, new experiences, and, ultimately, the possibility of failure. It means accepting that the writer you are in this moment may not be the same writer you are at the end of this book.

The messy first draft method is the embodiment of the growth mindset for a writer.


 

Productivity

We all know writers who have spent an hour or more honing a single sentence when they were meant to be finishing a scene. (Maybe you are that writer.) The draft-first method saves time because the goal is shifted from perfection to plain old words on the page, enabling you to find your writing flow and hit your word count goals faster.

And flow, or being “in the zone,” isn’t a myth. In 1990, renowned psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi first introduced the concept of flow, a state of intense focus and immersion in an activity. It’s a state of deep concentration that feels nearly impossible to find in our modern world of dings, rings, and notifications.

But freewriting on a distraction-free device helps overcome those obstacles by allowing writers to enter a state of creation where ideas flow freely without judgment or inhibition, no matter how random or silly they may seem in the moment.

Let’s say you’ve reached your word count goals more quickly and typed “the end” way before you expected to. Will editing take longer when you’re working with a messy first draft? It might. But we think it’s worth it. In fact, we bet you’ll be surprised by what your unhindered mind came up with. After all, according to Csikszentmihalyi’s work, the state of flow is conducive to creativity and innovation.

And, most importantly, you can’t edit a blank page.

 

Creativity

Ironically, not paying attention to perfection and final-draft quality as you write does inspire better quality in the end. Maybe your grammar isn’t perfect in this first draft, but it’s likely your level of creativity will be higher.

This is because when no thoughts are deemed “wrong” or “stupid,” your brain begins to engage in lateral thinking — kind of like an internal brainstorm. You’re free to play in the writing world without worrying about getting it right the first time.

Lateral thinking is when your brain approaches problem-solving in ways that aren’t straightforward or obvious. Instead of following step-by-step logical thinking, also known as deductive reasoning, your brain side-steps convention and discovers new ways of doing things. This is exactly what you want when writing.

Often, the true essence of a story doesn’t reveal itself until the act of freewriting. It serves as a discovery process, helping a writer uncover hidden layers of their narrative. It’s a journey of exploration and revelation.

Allow your brain the freedom to explore and experiment without the fear of failure, and you’ll discover new ideas and fresh perspectives. 

Joy

The benefits of a messy first draft are clear and grounded in science and psychology. By overcoming perfectionism, increasing your productivity, and fostering a freedom to explore and create, this method provides a powerful framework for unleashing your creative potential.

And if you’re anything like us, you likely haven’t written like this — unrestrained and anxiety-free — since you were a kid. It’s more fun this way, we pinky promise. 

The Ultimate Guide to Freewriting

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But what if, in the future, your choice had larger implications on the state of literature as a whole?

This is the question that’s being raised from a new study by the University of Exeter Business School: If you could use AI to improve your own writing, at the expense of the overall literary experience, would you?

Let’s explore some context before you answer.

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The 2024 study recruited 293 writers to write an eight-sentence “micro” story. The participants were split into three groups:

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Then, 600 evaluators judged how creative these short stories were. The results confirmed a widely accepted idea but also offered a few surprising findings.

Prompts from AI Can Jumpstart the Creative Process

Right off the bat, the reviewers rated the AI-guided stories as being more original, better written, and more enjoyable to read. (Interesting to note that they did not find them funnier than the fully human-inspired stories.)

This actually isn’t that surprising. Most writers know the “blank page dread” at the beginning of a project. Even as I write this, I can’t help but wonder, “If I had been tasked with writing an eight-sentence story, what the heck would I have written about?”

Many writers share this sense of needing to pick the “right” story to tell. And that uniquely human concept of perfectionism can end up actually inhibiting our creative process.

A prompt, then, can help us quickly clear this mental hurdle. To test this, I’ll give you one, courtesy of ChatGPT: “Write a story about a teenager who discovers a mysterious journal that reveals hidden secrets about their town, leading them on an unexpected adventure to uncover the truth.”

Can you feel your creative juices flowing already?

Since its release, AI has been celebrated for its ability to assist in idea generation; and this study confirms how effective using artificial intelligence in this way can be for writers — some, it seems, more than others.

AI-Generated Ideas Helped Less Creative Writers More

It doesn’t feel great to judge a writer’s creative prowess, but for this study, researchers needed to do just that. Prior to writing their short stories, the writers took a test to measure their creativity.

Researchers found that those considered less creative did substantially better when given AI-generated ideas — to the point where getting the full five ideas from AI “effectively equalizes the creativity scores across less and more creative writers.”

This isn’t the case just for writing. Another study by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship WZ also found that AI tools most benefit employees with weaker skills.

So is AI leveling the playing field between okay and great writers? It seems it may be. But before we lament, there’s one more finding that proves using AI isn’t all perks.

AI-Aided Stories Were More Similar — And Needed to Be Credited

The researchers took a step back to look at all the AI-supported stories collectively. And what did they find?

The AI-assisted stories were more similar as a whole, compared to the fully human-written stories.

Additionally, when reviewers were told that a story was enhanced by an AI idea, they “imposed an ownership penalty of at least 25%,” even indicating that “the content creators, on which the models were based, should be compensated.”

This leads us to that all-important question about AI-assisted work: who owns the content?

According to Originality.AI, an AI and plagiarism detector, “When there’s a combination of AI and human-generated elements, the human elements may receive copyright protection if they meet the requirements.”

So right now, if a writer uses AI to generate ideas — but writes the content themselves — they retain rights to the work.

However, Originality.AI even admits that “the legal system is having a hard time keeping up” with the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence. Time will only tell what AI regulations will look like in a few years.

What Does an AI-Assisted Literary Future Look Like?

The researchers from the University of Exeter Business School study raise an interesting point about what the future landscape for writers may look like. If droves of authors begin using AI to come up with ideas, we may end up with a lot of well-written yet dime-a-dozen stories.

So will human beings choose the easier, but less diverse, path? Or will we stick to fighting through writer’s block armed with nothing but our own brain?

Or, a third option: can we somehow learn to harness AI to supercharge our writing process without sacrificing the wholly unique creativity that infuses human creation?

That’s one question that even ChatGPT can’t answer.

Editor's Note: Artificial intelligence may have already transformed writing, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't be in control of your own words. Read Astrohaus Founder Adam Leeb's statement on AI and privacy.

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