Science Explains What Your Desk Says About You

Fast Company:

Does every object on your desk have its proper place? Do you keep your pencils sharpened to the exact same length and dust regularly between your computer keys? Or maybe there’s so much junk on your desk that you can’t even see the surface. Maybe all that crap looks like it’s levitating. It turns out, there are benefits to both types of work spaces.

A recent study published in Psychological Science, found that subjects who worked in a clean room were more likely to make charitable donations and eat healthy foods than those who worked in a messy room. For example, when participants in the clean room were offered chocolate or fruit, they chose the fruit. Kathleen Vohs, a psychological scientist at the University of Minnesota, said the clean room “cued [subjects] to ‘do the right thing’–that which is expected of you.”

Read the whole story: Fast Company