Jessica Massonnié

Who they are

The work of Jessica Massonnié reaches this site through the papers listed below. The name is tied to Moderate Ambient Noise Effect, Cognitive Flexibility. Their paper reports: 42 undergraduate adults did a Dimensional Change Card Sort and an Alternative Uses Task in silence and with ambient noise through headphones; on average more and more original ideas with noise; higher flexibility went with more ideas in noise.

Key papers

Mones, P., & Massonnié, J. (2022). What can you do with a bottle and a hanger? Students with high cognitive flexibility give more ideas in the presence of ambient noise. Thinking Skills and Creativity, 46, 101116. What it reports: 42 undergraduate adults did a Dimensional Change Card Sort and an Alternative Uses Task in silence and with ambient noise through headphones; on average more and more original ideas with noise; higher flexibility went with more ideas in noise.

Massonnié, J., Rogers, C. J., Mareschal, D., & Kirkham, N. Z. (2019). Is classroom noise always bad for children? The contribution of age and selective attention to creative performance in noise. Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 381. What it reports: 44 children aged 5 to 11, within-subjects, two idea-generation tasks in silence and with 64 decibels multi-talker noise. Noise did not promote creativity; younger children with low selective attention gave fewer and less original ideas; children with good selective attention were protected.

Key ideas

Moderate Ambient Noise Effect: Better creative performance at a moderate background noise level than at a low one, reversing at a high one.

Cognitive Flexibility: The ability to shift between ways of thinking.

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