by lea satalaDoes being an artist mean you are “dysfunctional”? David Bowie thought so. In a video with over 1 million views, he explained that expressing oneself in an artistic way is a sign of certain social dysfunctionality, as it goes beyond the basic purpose of life – survival. Many artists could be great examples of the tormented creative genius. David Lynch, the director of Mulholland Drive, seems to be one of them. He blatantly rejected psychotherapy, stating his fear that it would affect his creativity. Both Bowie and Lynch were extremely creative and successful artists. They also agreed that there is a certain abnormality or pain in being an artist, adding a more practical insight to the “tortured artist” argument. The belief that creativity and genius go in pair with psychopathology has deep roots in Western Culture. Dating back to ancient philosophy, Aristotle (who lived in the 4th Century BC) attributed extraordinary talent to melancholic temperament (Becker, 2014). This concept is widely present in our everyday culture across various media. Schlesinger (2009) proposes that this concept demystifies geniuses and makes them more accessible. If talent comes at the price of abnormality or dysfunctionality, we are less likely to be envious of it. How valid is the “tortured artist” argument from today’s perspective? Is it a myth or truth? Firstly, it must be acknowledged that the term “creativity” is a hard one to define. This imposes a huge methodological problem on any research on this matter. Creativity has been defined as “novel approaches requiring cognitive processes that are different from prevailing modes of thought or expression” (Power et al, 2015, p.953). Thus, thinking differently causes creativity. It is important to note that creative occupations are not only visual and non-visual artists but also scientists. Another problem is the definition of abnormality or madness. Abnormality is usually examined in psychopathology, which is the scientific study of mental disorders. Mental disorders are characterised by cognitive and emotional disturbances, abnormal behaviour, impaired functioning, or a combination of these (American Psychological Association, n.d.). Throughout history, supporting research in this discipline was based mostly on autobiographical data or small cohorts of participants. Indeed, there are many examples of artists who suffered from mental illnesses, for example, bipolar disorder. From speculated diagnoses of Van Gogh, Mark Rothko, and Virginia Woolf to the contemporary example of Britney Spears, on an intuitional level, this connection does seem valid. However, psychology is based on science, not anecdotes, intuitions, or biographical data. For this reason, a Swedish large-scale population study conducted by the Karolinska Institutet has become hugely influential in creativity psychology. Kyaga et al. (2011) showed that both people suffering from bipolar disorder and schizophrenia and their healthy siblings, are overrepresented in creative professions. This effect was not found for unipolar depression. In a larger-scale follow-up study, Kyaga et al. (2013) obtained results suggesting that individuals in creative professions were overall not more likely to suffer from psychiatric disorders than others, with two exceptions. Firstly, again there was a significant overlap between bipolar disorder and creative professions. Secondly, being a writer was specifically associated with an increased likelihood of schizophrenia, unipolar depression, anxiety disorders, substance abuse and suicide. Thus, this large-scale study of the Swedish total population suggests that creativity is not associated with all mental illnesses even though some seem to overlap with creativity. The link between creativity and the likelihood of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia was further explored in a study conducted on a sample of Icelandic people. Power et al. (2015) obtained results suggesting that creativity and psychosis share genetic roots. Another way of looking at the link between creativity and psychopathology was proposed by Perkins et al. (2015), who suggest that creativity may come from looking at our personality, more specifically neuroticism. Neuroticism belongs to the five-factor model of personality, where it is one of five traits that some have argued form the human personality along with openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion and agreeableness. High neuroticism is the opposite of emotional stability, meaning it is the tendency to experience negative thoughts and feelings. Neuroticism is known to predict certain forms of psychopathology, especially anxiety disorders and substance use disorders (Ormel et al., 2013). Perkins et al. (2015) suggest that this tendency for negative thoughts is a catalyst of creativity, as the longer we dwell on unpleasant thoughts, the more creative our solutions may be. Nevertheless, this theory was heavily criticized by Pickering et al. (2016), who presented a large synthesis of research showing a lack of significant associations between neuroticism and multiple types of creativity. Therefore, there is a lack of solid evidence favouring the link between neuroticism and creativity. Even though there is some supporting evidence of the association between creativity and psychopathology, it is quite inconsistent, and criticism persists. An important figure in creativity research, Albert Rothenberg may be among the most significant critics. He suggests that there is no correlation between being mentally ill and creativity. This is supported by his research presented in “Flight of Wonder: an investigation of scientific creativity”. He conducted 45 interviews with Nobel prize winners on their creative strategies. However, he identified three common cognitive processes leading to creativity and no evidence of mental illness. An often-ignored aspect of this debate is the romanticisation of mental illnesses. Do creative individuals feel that their mental illnesses give them a creative advantage? Van Gogh wrote in a letter to this brother Theo in 1890, “Oh, if I could have worked without this accursed disease - what things I might have done”. This sheds new light on the tortured artists. David Lynch, who was mentioned before and may seem like a perfect example of the “tortured artist” stated himself that he does not believe in suffering for your art. He sees making art as the exact opposite, comparing it to being high on happiness (Neilson, 2019). As such, Lynch’s approach can be seen as using art as a form of therapy. Rothenberg (1994, pp. 8-9) further claims that there is no specific personality type associated with outstanding creativity. According to his research, the only characteristic present in all creatives is motivation to create and be creative, not successful, effective, or competent. Maybe the “mad genius” or “tortured artist” is just a stereotype that lives in our heads and tells us that we cannot be creative as we were not born with this elusive “creativity particle” while, in reality, creativity depends just on how strongly we believe in our creativity. There could be other possible explanations for the “mad genius” archetype. What third factor can “bind” creativity and mental illness together? Maybe it is a matter of pay. Artists are often self-employed and may experience anxiety due to unstable income. Another factor could be fame. Most of the biographical or anecdotal knowledge comes from famous creatives. Fame comes at a price, so maybe the mental illnesses result from fame rather than creativity. Finally, it could be that creatives are just better at expressing their feelings and showing their internal struggles, which overexposes their “inner demons”. The “tortured artist” argument receives mixed evidence from a psychological perspective. On the one hand, some evidence suggests that people working in creative industries (and their relatives) are more likely to have bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, suggesting a genetic component to creativity. However, there is a high possibility of a third factor causing this effect. It might be that the association between creativity and mental illness survived only because of anecdotes of great artists who struggled with fame, or maybe they just happen to be creative as well as mentally ill. It may also be possible that people want to believe in the “tortured artist”. I think that the “tortured artist” archetype reflects, to some extent, the fascination people have with the new and extraordinary while at the same time serving as some barrier to entering the world of creatives. On the bright side, this association might reduce the stigma around mental disorders like bipolar disorder or schizophrenia, which are still condemned in contemporary society. Thus, from a psychological point of view it is hard to tell if the “tortured artist” is real or not. Maybe the secret of creativity is not supposed to be known. References
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