I heard that 100 years ago the average number of thuoghts of a human
was about 5000 today it is about 55000. What is this idea based on?
Any support?

Hello Qpet, 

I'll gladly repost my comment as answer and would like to thank you!
Also, thanks to researcher Sublime1 for informing me about your
comment.

----
 
According to Charlie Greer "the National Science Foundation put out
some very interesting statistics (...) the average person thinks about
twelve thousand thoughts per day. A deeper thinker (...) puts forth
fifty thousand thoughts daily."
Following are some sources, and their estimates of thoughts per day
put forth:
 
"What are you thinking?" (by Charlie Greer) - 12,000 to 50,000 
http://www.hvacprofitboosters.com/Tips/Tip_Archive/tip_archive7.html 
 
Amino Acids: Interview with Dr. Dennis Gersten, diplomate of the
American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology - 15,000
http://www.imagerynet.com/amino/audio/amino.audio.txt.html 
 
Manage ONLINE - 40,000 
http://www.nma1.org/Members/manage/Oct2002/manage_online_october02.htm
 
Working World - 50,000 
http://www.workingworld.com/?d=205_timeonside&archive=1 
 
Spiral Release Bodywork - 50,000 
http://www.spiralrelease.com/cert.htm 
 
Power of the Mind - 50,000 to 60,000 
http://www.meaningoflife.i12.com/Mind.htm 
 
KHALSA - 50,000 
http://members.pgonline.com/~mpurewal/khalsa.html 
 
WomenOf.com - 60,000 
http://www.spiralrelease.com/cert.htm 
 
"To get people to think more..." (by Anthony Robert Sabo, quoting Dr.
Deepak Chopra) - 65,000
http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=Nov16.194005.66240%40acs.ucalgary.ca&oe=UTF-8&output=gplain
 
Sublime1-ga already provided the following interesting link, which
also tells how the number of thoughts per day might be calculated:
 
Every thought - 604,800 
http://www.every-thing.net/everything_ns/thought.html 
 
 
My assumption for an eventual increase of thoughts per day over the
last century would be that life is getting more complex, daily
routines more tight, and information needs to be processed much
quicker. However during my research, I did not come across any
resources to support this, or discuss other possibilities. I could as
well imagine that only the focus shifted, and the average number of
thoughts remains constant. With all this it also needs be considered
that some people in the world live very much the same their ancestors
did a hundred years ago.
 
Hope this helps! 
 
 
Search terms: 
"thoughts per day" 
"thoughts per day" "hundred years" 
"5000 thoughts per day" 
"thoughts per day" getting more complex 
 
[1] Re: "To get people to think more..." 
Newsgroup: sci.psychology 
"Dr. Deepak Chopra once quoted a study (...) in which the researchers
concluded that the average person thinks approximately 65,000 thoughts
per day. They also went on to conclude that of these 65,000, about 95%
are exactly the same thoughts that [passed] through the minds of
people the day before."

qpet...

This might interest you:
http://www.every-thing.net/everything_ns/thought.html

Hello Qpet,

According to Charlie Greer "the National Science Foundation put out
some very interesting statistics (...) the average person thinks about
twelve thousand thoughts per day. A deeper thinker (...) puts forth
fifty thousand thoughts daily."
Following are some sources, and their estimates of thoughts per day
put forth:

"What are you thinking?" (by Charlie Greer) - 12,000 to 50,000
http://www.hvacprofitboosters.com/Tips/Tip_Archive/tip_archive7.html

Amino Acids: Interview with Dr. Dennis Gersten, diplomate of the
American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology - 15,000
http://www.imagerynet.com/amino/audio/amino.audio.txt.html

Manage ONLINE - 40,000
http://www.nma1.org/Members/manage/Oct2002/manage_online_october02.htm

Working World - 50,000
http://www.workingworld.com/?d=205_timeonside&archive=1

Spiral Release Bodywork - 50,000
http://www.spiralrelease.com/cert.htm

Power of the Mind - 50,000 to 60,000
http://www.meaningoflife.i12.com/Mind.htm

KHALSA - 50,000
http://members.pgonline.com/~mpurewal/khalsa.html

WomenOf.com - 60,000
http://www.spiralrelease.com/cert.htm

"To get people to think more..." (by Anthony Robert Sabo, quoting Dr.
Deepak Chopra) - 65,000
http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=Nov16.194005.66240%40acs.ucalgary.ca&oe=UTF-8&output=gplain

Sublime1-ga already provided the following interesting link, which
also tells how the number of thoughts per day might be calculated:

Every thought - 604,800
http://www.every-thing.net/everything_ns/thought.html


My assumption for an eventual increase of thoughts per day over the
last century would be that life is getting more complex, daily
routines more tight, and information needs to be processed much
quicker. However during my research, I did not come across any
resources to support this, or discuss other possibilities. I could as
well imagine that only the focus shifted, and the average number of
thoughts remains constant. With all this it also needs be considered
that some people in the world live very much the same their ancestors
did a hundred years ago.

Hope this helps!


Search terms:
"thoughts per day"
"thoughts per day" "hundred years"
"5000 thoughts per day"
"thoughts per day" getting more complex

[1] Re: "To get people to think more..."
Newsgroup: sci.psychology
"Dr. Deepak Chopra once quoted a study (...) in which the researchers
concluded that the average person thinks approximately 65,000 thoughts
per day. They also went on to conclude that of these 65,000, about 95%
are exactly the same thoughts that [passed] through the minds of
people the day before."

This site claims that a National Science Foundation (NSF) study came
up with the figure of 50,000 thoughts per day:
http://www.hvacprofitboosters.com/Tips/Tip_Archive/tip_archive7.html
But a search of the archives at the NSF http://www.nsf.gov turned up
no reports
with those statistics.  Perhaps another Researcher will have better
luck.

Best wishes,
--Byrd

Ooops, I should have refreshed the page - I posted my little comment
before having seen the very comprehensive comment sublime1-ga had
already given you. Sorry about that!  I still wish you good luck in
pursuing this.  It's certainly an interesting idea!
--Byrd

J_philipp-ga,
I am willing to except your comment as the answer.
qpet