Creativity and schizophrenia: An equivalence of cognitive processing.

Abstract

Two tests of creativity were given to 10 paranoid and 10 nonparanoid schizophrenics, 10 nonpsychotic psychiatric controls, and 10 normal subjects. Scores on vocabulary and similarities tests, as well as education, medication, marital status, socioeconomic background, and age, were examined. Results indicated that nonparanoid schizophrenics were significantly more creative than paranoids and psychiatric controls on one creativity measure, a graded level measure of the Alternate Uses Test. Also, nonparanoid schizophrenics produced a significantly higher percentage of "highly creative" responses than did the normals. Nonparanoid schizophrenics also scored higher than the other groups on the Barren-Welsh Figure Preference Test, but this finding was found to be related to age rather than to schizophrenia. The superior performance of the nonparanoid schizophrenic is discussed in terms of the encouragement that a supportive, nonjudgmental testing environment provides. Also, the possible equivalence of creativity and schizophrenia is discussed, and the hypothesis that the two may reflect similar cognitive processes is offered.

A Module for Metaphor? The Site of Imagination in the Architecture of the Mind

“…As the banal uses are soon exhausted, much of the variation on this task arises from the person's ability to draw possible uses from completely different domains than that for which the object is designed. Schizophrenia patients show a large advantage on this task compared with controls, and indeed, when a group of 'highly creative' normals were tested, their performance was essentially indistinguishable from that of the patients (Keefe and Magaro 1980). A similar pattern is found on a task where non-standard, novel criteria for sorting objects must be devised by the subject (Dykes and McGhie 1976).…”

Verbal creativity and schizotypal personality in relation to prefrontal hemispheric laterality: A behavioral and near-infrared optical imaging study

“…Eysenck and Furnham, 1993;Gianotti et al, 2001;Kline and Cooper, 1986;Merten and Fischer, 1999;O'Reilly et al, 2001;Poreh et al, 1994;Rawlings and Toogood, 1997;Rushton, 1990;Rust et al, 1989;Graves, 2001, 2002;Woody and Claridge, 1977;Zanes et al, 1998) but currently, there is little support for enhanced creative ability in schizophrenics (Andreasen and Powers, 1975;Cropley and Sikand, 1973;Keefe and Magaro, 1980;Shimkunas and Murray, 1974). Yet, several studies using retrospective analyses of birth records, found support for increased creativity in the relatives of schizophrenic individuals, rather than in the probands themselves (Karlsson, 1970(Karlsson, , 1984.…”

Creativity and Perception

“…An individual for whom the involuntary processes operate somewhat less deterministically (but perhaps less efficiently) is more likely to represent environmental data mentally (as well as data recalled from memory) in novel ways. The potential relationship between schizophrenia and creativity (Keefe & Magaro, 1980;Prentky, 1979) would seem to illustrate this factor.…”