✻ Thank you to all who participated! ✻
This study has closed.
The Creativity Study 2021
The Creativity Study 2021 investigated the relationships between creativity, flow, emotions, & well-being in the daily lives of highly creative people.
The Creativity Study 2021 was carried out as a part of a graduate research dissertation in the Department of Psychology at Goldsmiths, University of London by Kaile Smith under the advising of Professor Joydeep Bhattacharya and Professor Alan Pickering.
A subset of our findings were recently published in the Creativity Research Journal.
Smith, K., Pickering, A., & Bhattacharya, J. (2022). The creative life: A daily diary study of creativity, affect, and well-being in creative individuals. Creativity Research Journal, 34(4), 460-479. https://doi.org/10.1080/10400419.2022.2122371
✻
For a brief summary of the findings, check out the following article:
‘Tortured artist’ myth? Research links wellbeing with creativity.
✻
To read the full academic journal article, check out the link and abstract below:
The Creative Life: A Daily Diary Study of Creativity, Affect, and Well-Being in Creative Individuals.
ABSTRACT: Participating in creative activities is associated with increased positive emotions and enhanced subjective well-being in general populations. However, these relationships are less understood in the daily lives of creative individuals who regularly engage in both professional creative behaviors and everyday creative experiences. Therefore, in this study, we recruited a sample of creative adults (N= 290; creative professionals, students studying creative disciplines, and hobbyists engaged in 20+ hours of creative activities per week) who provided daily responses on their creative behaviors, emotions, and flourishing over two weeks. Creative adults were found to be the most creative on days with highly activated positive emotions and increased well-being and were significantly less creative on days with negative emotions. Individuals with higher levels of openness have stronger ties between their emotions and overall daily creativity and everyday creativity than those with lower levels of openness. Increased openness does not appear to have the same moderating effects on professional creativity and emotion relationships. Finally, high conscientiousness and low neuroticism were also found to predict increased levels of creative activity. Overall, these findings provide novel insights into the links between the specific nature of daily creative activities and the personality and subjective well-being of creative individuals.
Thank you again to all who participated in The Creativity Study 2021.