Happy Thursday, Hubbers! I just wanted to pass along an exciting opportunity today. The Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania has recently gotten in touch with us to let us know about a new study for writers. Participation is free and open to adults 18 years and older who are native speakers of English. Each participant will receive a personalized Writer Profile at the end, along with a 1 in 25 chance to win a $50 Amazon.com gift card. If you’re interested, the details are listed below:
What Is InnerWriter?
You are invited to participate in a voluntary research trial to evaluate InnerWriter, an online creative writing intervention led by psychologists from the Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania. The mission of InnerWriter is to help aspiring creative writers discover, understand, and utilize their most valued reasons for writing. While most programs focus on how to write, InnerWriter takes a step back to help you figure out why you write!
Whether you are a casual writer seeking to further stimulate a growing interest, or an experienced author driven to nurture your passion, reflecting on your reasons for writing may help you develop and strengthen your identity as a writer, as well as fulfill your objectives and aspirations.
What does the InnerWriter Research Trial consist of?
The Positive Psychology Center is currently recruiting participants for a voluntary research trial designed to test the effectiveness of activities included as part of InnerWriter. All participants must be native speakers of English and 18 years or above.
If you participate in the voluntary InnerWriter research trial, you will complete a series of questionnaires and exercises lasting approximately 20-30 minutes, and obtain a personalized Writer Profile at the end summarizing your results! In addition, you will be entered into a raffle with a 1 in 25 chance of winning a $50 amazon.com giftcard (giftcards are only valid for amazon.com, not amazon sites from other countries). All data will remain confidential and kept on a secure server at our research center. The risks associated with this project are minimal, and do not exceed those encountered in everyday life. If you feel uncomfortable completing any portion of the study, feel free to end your participation at anytime.
Please note that we have put in place a number of safeguards to ensure that participants provide valid data for this study. If we have strong reason to believe your data are invalid, you will not be entered into the raffle for a gift certificate and your data will be discarded.
Why Did The Positive Psychology Center Develop InnerWriter?
Several decades of psychological research have shown that that the reasons why we do things affect how we do them. Preliminary research studies have shown that there are a wide range of reasons why individuals might dedicate time to the strange but fascinating task of crafting stories and putting words down on a page. InnerWriter seeks to put this knowledge to use by testing the effectiveness of exercises dedicated to helping you reflect on your reasons for writing, and your identity as a writer.
If this study sounds like a good fit and you’d like to give it a try, please follow this link to sign up. Happy Hubbing!
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That was very interesting. Glad I participated. I thought I was already pretty clear on the reasons I write, but I still learned some great new things about myself and how I see the world. Cool. 🙂
That was actually quite fun! I feel that I learned a lot about myself as a writer, and the study wasn’t too long, or writing intensive.
Sadly, English is my second language.
it s actually fine
This was an interesting survey! I learned a bit more about myself as a writer. Give it a try!
I really enjoyed participating in this study. I was intrigued by the writer profile provided in the end. I believe I found some very positive things I might not have noticed about myself and my writing skills and style.
This was just plain old fun! Thanks for the opportunity!
It is like doing one of those Q and A things in a magazine where you answer all of the questions and the give you a detailed account of what your answers mean.
I thought after I had finished that it was a waste of time because it really didn’t sum up anything of why I write like it says it will. like a phsycic they got a couple of things right and a lot of things wrong maybe I will win an Amazon Voucher to make up for time wasted.
Be aware that this is geared towards fiction writers. I just threw a wrench in their works, because I only really write how-to instructions and non-fiction.
Gave it a shot. Liked the photo prompt. Now on to bigger and better things.
That was challenging. I have been thinking of writing mysteries but was unsure, I guess that I got a bit of a push from that.
I wrote a funny horror/sci-fi story about it, just under a hundred words.
I write science fiction and horror as a passion, technical articles to pay the bills.
I understand the opinion that it doesn’t quite catch the motivations people may have. For some, writing is an emotional outlet, a way to vent or say what your circle won’t listen to. For others, it is “please learn from my experience”.
Nowhere did it ask, “Do you ever write for the money?”
I am doing both studies 🙂
Christy, thanks so much for sharing this opportunity with us! I participated the other day and and enjoyed the challenge of writing my first flash fiction piece. As someone who writes non-fiction articles and hubs typically running to thousands of words in length, writing a 150-word fictional story was definitely out of my comfort zone! The experience was fun and educational and I enjoyed the insights provided on the type of writer I am, which seemed pretty accurate.
The best part for me was looking at the picture and writing a flash story about it. It stretched my imagination. Most of the rest of it either didn’t apply to me, or told me something I already knew.
I don’t participate in raffles. There needs to be an alternative way to compensate people if that’s what they want to do.
I would enjoy similar exercises in the future. I don’t think it was a waste of time, in spite of the fact much of it seemed invalid to me. And incidentally, one’s emotions aren’t always the same. I noticed that the exercise had a negative impact on my mood because I imagined a very dark response to the picture.
Hmmm. That’s all I can say. Hmmm.
That was a fun and interesting survey! I only write non-fiction on HubPages but am working on a fiction novel on my own. It was fun to see where I rank as a writer.
This was interesting. I’m pleased with the assessment I received.
I enjoyed taking this survey- might have already known some reasons why I write, but learned some others. What was more fun, was doing the writing exercise itself.
I thoroughly enjoyed that! I appreciate the assessment for why I write. Interesting and thought provoking!
I agree with Tamara – nowhere did it ask about writing for money. I love writing, but I do it for the lovely piles of cold, hard cash it generates. That whole element of the profession was ignored here.
I tried it and it was fun and informative. I knew I wrote mostly to learn and teach, but pushed away the fact that it’s great to escape in a fantasy world once in a while!
I enjoyed doing the survey and the picture flash fiction was great fun. I have written a fiction novel and am in the process of trying to get it published so I was happy with the result. I’d be happy to participate in similar studies.
This was fun and I like to see what the survey score meant. I like to write about things that I love.
This was a fun exercise. I really felt good after finishing it. Great confidence booster for me anyway. 🙂
I thought the survey was great. The profile results were spot on for me
Gave it a shot. Liked the photo prompt. Now on to bigger and better things. thanks