Do open conditions stimulate creativity?

What is it about high ceilings that attract us?

For thousands of years artists, architects, and everyone in–between has been drawn to high ceilings. The reasons that home buyers, famous artists such as Michelangelo, and general creative people look for spaces with high ceilings has been a mystery… until 2007 when a study reported that high ceilings do, in–fact stimulate creativity.

You can find a short, one page article about the study right here.

“…the researchers used two test rooms, one with an eight-foot ceiling and the other 10 feet high, and suspended colourful Chinese lanterns to emphasize the height. …They showed 100 volunteers pictures of a wine rack and a coffee table that were smooth and sleek except for a few awkward features. When they asked the volunteers to describe the products, those in the low–ceilinged room zeroed in on the imperfections, while the ones in the taller room took a more generalized view and ignored the glitches.”
The study is focused highly on the height of a ceiling in a room, but could the same research be applied to the openness of the outside world?
“…people in a high–ceilinged room are primed to think broadly because of the sense of freedom associated with the space…”

What do you think? Was this study biased in their research? Or is there really something about open space that stimulates creativity?

(via Swissmiss)