Studies Link Creativity to Psychological Distress
Parents are excited to see a spark of genius in their child but are also apprehensive on concerns that it might be accompanied by mental disorder. This is because men of science who discovered breakthroughs and artistic individuals who created masterpieces have been known to harbor unstable behaviors.
This notion has been perpetuated by movies on the lives of pianist David Helfgott ("Shine," 1996) and mathematician John Nash ("A Beautiful Mind," 2001). The eccentricity of other famous brilliant minds has also surfaced like French poet Gerard de Nerval who walked his lobster in the streets of Paris.
Shelley Carson in a 2011 article cited examples of the quirkiness of highly creative people. He wrote: "Albert Einstein picked up cigarette butts off the street to get tobacco for his pipe; Howard Hughes spent entire days on a chair in the middle of the supposedly germ-free zone of his Beverly Hills Hotel suite; the composer Robert Schumann believed that his musical compositions were dictated to him by Beethoven and other deceased luminaries from their tombs; and Charles Dickens is said to have fended off imaginary urchins with his umbrella as he walked the streets of London."
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So, is there a connection between brilliance and insanity? Is there such a thing as a mad genius? A 2011 study found that people with bipolar disorder were more likely to work in scientific or artistic occupations than people without the disorder. And those with schizophrenia were similarly found to be more likely to work in an artistic occupation.
While further research and experiments are needed for a more definitive answer, psychologists tend to agree with one study suggesting that "a small dose" of psychological distress can lead to creativity than extreme levels of distress. Psychologists refer to this as an inverted-U relationship between creativity and psychopathology.
The hypothesis was arrived at by psychologists Felix Post and Arnold Ludwig who both studied the lives of world-famous men (all deceased) in different creative professional categories. Both observed higher rates of mood disorders among persons in creative arts (artists, musical composers and performers, and writers) compared to other professions.
The separate studies made in the 1990s concluded that mild depression or irritable mood may enhance creativity, but a full-blown manic depression may interfere with creative activity. This means that mental distress in small doses could be good.
