The assessment of creativity in creativity/psychopathology research – a systematic review

Abstract

Introduction

The possible link between creativity and psychopathology has been a long time focus of research up to the present day. However, this research is hampered by methodological problems, especially the definition and assessment of creativity. This makes interpretation and comparison of studies difficult and possibly accounts for the contradictory results of this research.

Methods

In this systematic review of the literature, research articles in the field of creativity and psychopathology were searched for creativity assessment tools. The tools used in the collected articles are presented and discussed.

Results

The results indicate that a multitude of creativity assessment tools were used, that many studies only used one tool to assess creativity and that most of these tools were only used in a limited number of studies. A few assessment tools stand out by a more frequent use, also outside psychopathological research, and more solid psychometric properties.

Conclusion

Most scales used to evaluate creativity have poor psychometric properties. The scattered methodology to assess creativity compromises the generalizability and validity of this research. The field should creatively develop new validated instruments.

Keywords:

• creativity
• art
• rating scales
• psychiatric illness
• psychotic disorders

Notes

1. We added “meaningful” to Mednick's definition (Mednick & Mednick, 1962), as it characterises artistic creativity better than “useful”. Although music can be very useful (the “Belgian revolution” in 1830 started after an opera performance), it is essentially meaningful. Also, note the circularity of any definition of “creativity”.

2. Some interesting research was published before 1950, like Terman's large prospective study of gifted children and Havelock Ellis' large study of eminent British people (Ellis, 1904). It is interesting to note that most of these studies refuted a link between giftedness and psychopathology.

3. Authors and introduction year of tests are italicized to differentiate them from bibliographical references.