Wednesday, September 21, 2005

 

"Fine Line Revealed Between Creativity and Insanity" By Ker Than

Have you sometimes wondered whether a friend is brilliant or batty? Well they may be both.

For some time, there has been a commonly held belief that there is only a fine line between creativity and insanity. A small group of people known as "schizotypes" may essentially live on that line. It is amazing how much of the forward progress made in history has been by people who weren't conventional, but rather thought in odd, new ways.

A recent article by "Live Science" reports on a study that indicates the line between creativity and insanity are closer than you may have thought.

The Line Between Genius and Madness

Schizotypes fall in the midpoint between sanity and insanity. They do not suffer most of the symptoms of schizophrenia, such as paranoia and hallucinations, but they often exhibit both eccentricities and enhanced creativity. A new study confirms that both may come from their using more of the right side of the brain than the rest of us.
Scanning Your Brain

The link between creativity and aberrant behavior has generally been based on anecdotal evidence. The new study used brain-imaging techniques to investigate the creative process in an experimental manner, with "creativity" being defined as the ability to generate something new and useful from pre-existing materials or ideas.

The researchers compared the creative thinking processes of schizotypes, schizophrenics, and normal control subjects.

Schizotypes Used Their Right Brain More

Scans showed that both sides of the brain in all three types were active when making novel associations. But in schizotypes, the activity in the right hemisphere was much higher when compared to the control subjects, and they also came up with a wider variety of creative ideas.

It was theorized that schizotypes may have more access to the right hemisphere of the brain, or that they may exhibit more efficient communication between the two hemispheres than the rest of us.

Digging Deeper

To read more about the actual study and access related resources click here for this “Live Science” article.

Now It's Your Turn!: What activities or practises do you use to enhance your creativity? (My 'Comment Section', in which you can share anonymously, will open to you when you click on "comments" immediately below this post.)

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