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A Comparative Study of Attentional Strategies of Schizophrenic and Highly Creative Normal Subjects

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Margaret Dykes
Affiliation:
Kingston Psychiatric Hospital, Ontario
Andrew McGhie
Affiliation:
Psychology Department, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario

Summary

Frequent references have been made to the similarities between highly creative and psychotic thinking. This study attempts to test the hypothesis that one explanation for such a correspondence lies in the fact that individuals in both these populations habitually employ common attentional strategies which cause them to sample an unusually wide range of available environmental stimuli.

A group of highly creative adults and a group of equally intelligent but low creative adults were compared with a group of acute non-paranoid schizophrenic adults on three tests designed to assess attentional and other cognitive styles.

The results offer support to the view that both highly creative and schizophrenic individuals habitually sample a wider range of available environmental input than do less creative individuals. In the case of the schizophrenic this involuntary widening of attention tends to have a deleterious effect on performance, while, in contrast, the highly creative individual is more able to successfully process the greater input without this incurring a performance deficit.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1976 

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