Think of doodling as “recess” for your brain.
Humans have been doodling for centuries. In fact, researchers recently discovered the first known doodle, a hashtag figure drawn in crayon, discovered in a cave. The drawing dates back more than 70,000 years.
Over the years, research has established that the ancient practice of doodling has surprising health benefits. If done right, doodling can be therapeutic, reducing stress and anxiety, and can even improve your memory, alongside other benefits.
“Art is a way that you can express what you might not have words for, and to have access to that on your own time when you're feeling something intensely is wildly therapeutic,” says Maggie Ritnour, an NYC-based art therapist. And you don’t have to be an artist or even a legible drawer to reap doodling’s benefits, she adds.
“I like doodling because there's no wrong way to do it,” Ritnour says. “It gives us a connection to being a kid again and is sort of like recess for our brain.”
Below, we break down the unexpected myriad benefits of doodling and how you can let go and lean into the practice in your everyday life.
The Benefits of Doodling
It can reduce stress and increase creativity.
Doodling puts our bodies at “psychological ease,” says Ritnour. The research backs this up. Making art, including doodling, causes a creative high which allows for an emotional release, and reduces stress, according to multiple findings, including a 2020 study that found a positive correlation between coloring and reduced anxiety in older adults.
While doodling has led some artists, like Leonardo Da Vinci and Edward Hopper, to develop groundbreaking masterpieces, many of us just doodle and throw away the evidence. That lack of pressure that comes with doodling can actually be helpful for anyone with artist’s block. A 2017 Drexel University study found that free-flow doodling can activate your brain’s reward pathway, leading to a flood of new ideas and the desire to solve more problems.
“It’s a way to approach art without judgment,” says Josh Brancheau, an art therapist and clinical director at The Art Therapy Project in New York City. “And so just by lowering the aesthetic standard that is imprinted upon us, it gives people an opportunity to make something that is more emotional, as opposed to something that’s more planned.”
It can improve memory…sometimes.
Multitasking is often considered to cause more harm than good. Yet absent-mindedly doodling some hearts, flowers or shapeless blobs in the margins of your notebook during a work meeting, may be more beneficial, and less of a distraction, than you might think, says Ritnour.
“A lot of people doodle when they're doing something else,” she says. “It helps them focus.”
In one 2009 study published in Applied Cognitive Psychology, 40 participants listened to a monotonous phone call. The half of the participants that doodled recalled 29 percent more information on a surprise memory test, than the rest of the participants who refrained from doodling. Medical students have also reported that art-making can help with note-taking, learning, and studying.
Some researchers think this occurs because we draw on limited resources to focus on long lectures or calls. As these resources decrease, and our minds wander, fidgeting or doodling can be a way to “combat waning attention,” according to a study published in Frontiers in Psychology. Or in simpler terms, it helps you not check out.
However, there is a caveat. Another study in the UBC Undergraduate Journal of Psychology suggests that doodling can help improve memory if you’re learning something that requires a different cognitive process. The study found that a group who doodled while looking at images, recalled less of the images than a non-doodling control group.
It can improve your mental health.
While doodling on your own can be beneficial, working with an art therapist can help you dig deeper into your doodles.
Art therapy was formally established as a curriculum in 1940 after doctors observed that people with mental health conditions found it helpful to express themselves through art work. Working with an art therapist can also help you process trauma by offering a method to fill in gaps you can’t find words for.
“When you work with an art therapist, it gives you a space to explore non-verbal symbols and metaphors for feeling an experience,” says Brancheau. “The story emerges in the art without necessarily the plan for it to emerge.”
“Art therapists are always using art as a way to activate the experience, the internal experience, externalize it, and then we can talk about it,” he adds.
Research published in the Cureus Journal of Medical Science has also found that art therapy can help improve depression and anxiety symptoms because it can aid with emotional regulation.
It can increase mindfulness.
The American Psychological Association defines mindfulness as awareness of one’s internal states and surroundings. Being mindful can help you learn how to observe thoughts and feelings, and take a beat before reacting to them.
Taking a pen to paper can feel meditative because it allows you to focus on the task and sensations at hand. “Doodling can be a way to retreat, to be present with that one act of filling in a blank piece of page,” says Ritnour.
To practice this mindfulness, Brancheau suggests people lean into the physical feelings that come with drawing, like the tension of the pen on the paper and any movement that comes along with it.
Doodling Best Practices
Doodling isn’t one-size fits all. It can be straight lines, squiggles, shapes, animals, or anything else that comes to mind when your pen hits paper. Winston Churchill used to doodle airplanes. Theodore Roosevelt liked doodling animals, and John F. Kennedy liked to doodle dominos.
Brancheau stresses that “really anything goes.” You can use a pen, pastels, or whatever material feels right for you to doodle.
“I often encourage people to just doodle with something like a pencil or a ball-point pen,” Brancheau says. “If anything, a big pen is a better choice because you don't have to sharpen it ever and you always get the same consistent lines.”
“Just explore it, engage with it, and enjoy it,” he adds.