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Would one man's debilitating suffering be worth it so you can have a pretty Starry Night or whatever hanging over your sofa?
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Nope. I agree that the correlation between various psychopathologies and creativity does in no way imply that these disorders are desirable in any way whatsoever.
However, the correlation e.g. between manic depression and creative productivity is certainly very large and significant (far larger than expected by chance alone). Acknowledging that there is not a simple cause and effect relationship between these two variables does nothing to imply that there is no causal explanation whatsoever for this correlation. Understanding the causes of this (assuredly not coincidental) relationship I think would help in a general understanding of the causes of creativity. Whether this understanding would have any practical value, however, is hard to say.
Here's a fairly recent research paper, that found a significant "humped" relationship between level of creativity and level of mental illness:
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Title: Creativity and the evolution of psychopathologies
Author(s): Ghadirian AM, Gregoire P, Kosmidis H
Source: CREATIVITY RESEARCH JOURNAL 13 (2): 145-148 2000
Abstract: The relation between creativity and mental illness has been the object of significant interest and research in psychiatry. However both psychopathology and creativity are issues of profound complexity some aspects of which are yet to be explored. This study was designed to explore changes in creativity in relation to the type and degree of psychopathology in 2 groups of patients. Forty-four patients, consisting of 20 patients with manic depressive illness (bipolar disorder) and 24 patients suffering from other psychopathologies, participated in this study. There were 23 women (M age = 43.6) and 21 men (M age = 43.7). We applied a psychological battery of tests using measures for creativity, intelligence and mood changes. All patients signed the informed consent form. The results are as follows: There was no difference in the creative abilities of patients with bipolar illness (creativity score: M = 104.4 SD = 44.9) as compared to those with other types of psychopathology (creativity score: M = 101.8, SD = 40.8). The study data were analyzed according to the degree of severity of illness, namely, mildly, moderately, or severely ill. Creativity was found to be at its highest level in patients who were moderately ill (creativity score: M = 118.3). The lowest creativity score (M = 62.1) was in the group of patients identified as severely ill. The difference was statistically significant (t = 4.35, p < .001).
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And here's a review paper that criticizes Jamison's book. Sass takes the viewpoint that the biological "causes" or "precursors" of creativity can also predispose one to mental illness. In other words, there is a third unmeasured variable that is causally related to the two observed ones, that is responsible for the correlation. This view I think seems to have become the dominant one in this field.
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Title: Schizophrenia, modernism, and the "creative imagination": On creativity and psychopathology
Author(s): Sass LA
Source: CREATIVITY RESEARCH JOURNAL 13 (1): 55-74 2000
Abstract: In this article, I consider the relation between creativity and the schizophrenia spectrum of personality and mental disorders in the light of differing notions of creativity and the creative process. Prevailing conceptions of creativity in psychology and psychiatry derive from romanticist ideas about the creative imagination; they differ considerably from notions central in modernism and postmodernism. Whereas romanticism views creative inspiration as a highly emotional, Dionysian, or primitive state, modernism and postmodernism emphasize processes involving hyper-self-consciousness and alienation (hyperreflexivity). Although manic-depressive or cyclothymic tendencies seem especially suited to creativity of the romantic sort, schizoid, schizotypal, schizophreniform, and schizophrenic tendencies have more in common with the (in many respects, antiromantic) sensibilities of modernism and postmodemism. I criticize a book by psychologist Jamison (1993), Touched With Fire: Manio-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament,for treating romantic notions of creativity as if they defined creativity in general. I also argue that Jamison's denial or neglect of the creative potential of persons in the schizophrenia spectrum relies on certain diagnostic oversimplifications: an overly broad conception of affective illness and an excessively narrow conception of schizophrenia that ignores the creative potential of the schizophrenia spectrum.
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