Sunday, December 7, 2014

The Artist: Never a Quiet Mind

            
What is there to be said about an artist who can design and create a beautiful masterpiece in a matter of days, but cannot seem to perform on a remedial level when it involves other tasks?  On 12/2, Dr. Zabelina of Northwestern University spoke about her research involving the different creative abilities in humans, and what is cognitively occurring in someone who is creative vs. someone who is non-creative.  What research is beginning to point towards, as well as Dr. Zabelina’s work, is that attention may play a large role in an individual’s creative abilities.  In Dr. Zabelina’s lecture on her research involving creative thinking, she hypothesizes that creative individuals are stronger in a type of attention, known as divergent attention, as well as attentional perseverance.    Individuals classified as creative individuals after receiving testing, underwent a series of trials testing attentional abilities and types of attentional strengths or weaknesses, and it was found that creative individuals had a large amount of attentional perseverance, but did not score well with convergent attention.  This suggests that there are cognitive factors involving attention that operate differently than non-creative individuals. 
            People diagnosed with Attention Deficit-Hyperactivity Disorder are often described as highly creative and innovative, although academic performance for individuals with this disorder is usually less than stellar.  An article by Casey Schwartz outlining new research performed by psychologists at the University of Memphis suggests that the way individuals with ADHD use their attentional skills may differ than those without ADHD.   Generally, there are two types of attention worth mentioning for this topic: divergent and convergent attention.  Convergent attention is essentially an individual’s ability to completely focus, while divergent attention refers to one’s ability to generate spontaneous and original thoughts and ideas.  From the research of Dr. Holly White at the University of Memphis involving ADHD individuals and attention, she concluded that ADHD individuals had a greater sense of divergent attention, but lacked on the convergent attentional tasks.  The key to these types of abilities in ADHD individuals, according to Dr. White, is inhibition control.  A non-creative individual may inhibit all other possible solutions or thoughts about a particular scenario and thus does not generate as many spontaneous ideas, while an ADHD individual is able to generate multiple spontaneous ideas due to a lack of inhibition.  On a more global scale, this may prove to be a positive outlook and “upside” for adults and children who are diagnosed with ADHD.  Although they struggle with the SATs, they may have a better chance of writing the next great American novel. 

            In conclusion, there is a increasingly significance between one’s attentional level and one’s level of creativity.  More specifically, the type of attention one excels at may pre-determine their general creativity and spontaneity level.  Due to the significant findings of the research being conducted within the last few years, this is definitely a research topic worth taking a look at. 

References: 
Schwartz, Casey.  “ADHD’s upside is creativity, says new study.” The Daily Beast.  The Daily Beast, 8 Feb. 2011.  Web. 3 Dec. 2014

Beeman, M., Zabelina, D.L. Short-term attentional perseveration associated with real-life creative achievement. (2013) Frontiers in Psychology.  Northwestern University. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00191

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