Everyday creativity and bipolar and unipolar affective disorder: preliminary study of personal and family history

The Effects of Mood on Expository Writing

Past research has shown that analytical writing and problem solving may be influenced by mood and that experiencing intense mood states may be a catalyst for creativity. This experiment sought to test the hypothesis that good and bad moods have differential effects on expository writing. Sixty-two participants were asked to write a fictional story, a non-fictional story, or story of their choosing when they were in either a good or a bad mood. They then completed a questionnaire that assessed their mood again. The results of this study showed that good moods were associated with the stories that expressed positive emotions, used a narrative style, and conveyed concrete concepts, but bad moods were associated with the stories that expressed negative emotions, used a diary style, and discussed abstract concepts.

The assessment of creativity in creativity/psychopathology research - a systematic review

INTRODUCTION

The possible link between creativity and psychopathology has been a long time focus of research up to the present day. However, this research is hampered by methodological problems, especially the definition and assessment of creativity. This makes interpretation and comparison of studies difficult and possibly accounts for the contradictory results of this research.

METHODS

In this systematic review of the literature, research articles in the field of creativity and psychopathology were searched for creativity assessment tools. The tools used in the collected articles are presented and discussed.

RESULTS

The results indicate that a multitude of creativity assessment tools were used, that many studies only used one tool to assess creativity and that most of these tools were only used in a limited number of studies. A few assessment tools stand out by a more frequent use, also outside psychopathological research, and more solid psychometric properties.

CONCLUSION

Most scales used to evaluate creativity have poor psychometric properties. The scattered methodology to assess creativity compromises the generalizability and validity of this research. The field should creatively develop new validated instruments.

Relating schizotypy and personality to the phenomenology of creativity

INTRODUCTION

Although a considerable amount of research has addressed psychopathological and personality correlates of creativity, the relationship between these characteristics and the phenomenology of creativity has been neglected. Relating these characteristics to the phenomenology of creativity may assist in clarifying the precise nature of the relationship between psychopathology and creativity. The current article reports on an empirical study of the relationship between the phenomenology of the creative process and psychopathological and personality characteristics in a sample of artists.

METHOD

A total of 100 artists (43 males, 57 females, mean age = 34.69 years) from a range of disciplines completed the Experience of Creativity Questionnaire and measures of "positive" schizotypy, affective disturbance, mental boundaries, and normal personality.

RESULTS

The sample of artists was found to be elevated on "positive" schizotypy, unipolar affective disturbance, thin boundaries, and the personality dimensions of Openness to Experience and Neuroticism, compared with norm data. Schizotypy was found to be the strongest predictor of a range of creative experience scales (Distinct Experience, Anxiety, Absorption, Power/Pleasure), suggesting a strong overlap of schizotypal and creative experience.

DISCUSSION

These findings indicate that "positive" schizotypy is associated with central features of "flow"-type experience, including distinct shift in phenomenological experience, deep absorption, focus on present experience, and sense of pleasure. The neurologically based construct of latent inhibition may be a mechanism that facilitates entry into flow-type states for schizotypal individuals. This may occur by reduced latent inhibition providing a "fresh" awareness and therefore a greater absorption in present experience, thus leading to flow-type states.

I Bask in Dreams of Suicide: Mental Illness, Poetry, and Women

A consistent research finding in creativity research has been the tendency of poets—especially female poets—to suffer from mental illness. We explore (a) Why poets? and (b) Why female poets? We posit that poetry may attract those with a predisposition toward illness, the domain of poetry may particularly reward those who exhibit illness, and unusual aspects of the domain of poetry writing may increase the likelihood of poets succumbing to illness. These domain-specific aspects of writing poetry affect men and women alike. In addition, the greater difficulty that women tend to experience in ignoring extrinsic motivational constraints may cause successful female poets to have an even higher incidence of psychological stress, and of mental illness, than male poets.

Exercise enhances creativity independently of mood

OBJECTIVES

It has been widely accepted in the literature that various forms of physical exercise, even in a single session, enhance positive mood. It has also been shown that physical exercise may sometimes enhance creative thinking, but the evidence is inconclusive. Positive moods can favour creative thinking, but the opposite has also been reported and these relations are unclear. There is a large anecdotal literature suggesting that creative people sometimes use bodily movement to help overcome "blocks". The aim of this study was to establish whether post-exercise creative thinking was attributable to improved mood.

METHODS

The responses of 63 participants to an exercise (aerobic workout or aerobic dance) and a "neutral" video watching condition were compared. Mood was measured using an adjective list, and creative thinking was tested by three measures of the Torrance test.

RESULTS

Analysis of variance showed a large and significant increase in positive mood after exercise (P < 0.001) and a significant decrease in positive mood after video watching (P < 0.001). A significant increase between the creative thinking scores of the two conditions was found on the flexibility (variety of responses) measure (P < 0.05). A multifactorial analysis of all data failed to show a significant covariance of creative thinking with the two measures of mood (P > 0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

These results suggest that mood and creativity were improved by physical exercise independently of each other.