Creativity and bipolar disorder

"Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve."

-Dr. Napoleon Hill

Mental illness and creativity are popularly considered to be related, particularly in the case of disorders commonly called manic depression.

Contents

1 Symptoms of Bipolar Disorder 2 Statistics Regarding Bipolar Disorder 3 What is Creativity? 4 How Creativity Relates to Bipolar Disorder 5 Works Cited

Symptoms of Bipolar Disorder

Once known as manic depression, bipolar disorder is a mental illness recognized by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. It is seen by psychiatrists and other mental health workers as a real and treatable disease. Individuals suffering from bipolar disorder alternate between manic (or hypomanic) and depressive states. This change of states is qualitatively different than what an average person would call a mood swing.

Some of the signs of bipolar disorder (Mayo Clinic, 2004) are:

1. A feeling of extreme optimism and an exaggerated self esteem, i.e. euphoria, during manic states.
2. Hasty speech, racing thoughts, anxiety, and increased physical activity.
3. Poor judgment and increased risky behaviors.
4. Trouble sleeping.
5. Being easily distracted and having trouble concentrating.
6. Severe irritability.

Bipolar disorder is a serious and complex illness. Many treatments are available. One common treatment is the medication lithium carbonate. It is one of the oldest effective medication for this illness. It is being replaced by newer medications with less profound side effects. In April 2002, the American Psychiatric Association suggested using lithium or lamotrigine (Lamictal) as the first-line treatment for people in the acute depressive phase of bipolar disorder who were not already taking mood stabilizer medication.

Statistics Regarding Bipolar Disorder

1. It is estimated that of the 36 20th century poets represented in the New Oxford Book of American Poetry, 20% were manic depressive. (Jamison, 1990)
2. "2.3 million adults in the U.S. are diagnosed with manic depression." (Princeton University, 2004)
3. "The mortality rate for persons with untreated bipolar illness is higher than those for most types of heart disease and many types of cancer." (Carroll Consulting, 2002)
4. "Twenty to thirty percent of adult bipolar patients report having their first episode prior to age 20. In a survey by the National Depressive and Manic-depressive Association, 59% of respondents reported the onset during childhood or adolescence." (Carroll Consulting, 2004)
5. "Bipolar children are at higher risk for suicide, substance abuse, violence, and academic failure." (Carroll Consulting, 2004)

What is Creativity?

One way to conceptualize creativity is to break it into the following three aspects:

1. The product of creative activity.
2. The person behind the creative activity.
3. The process by which a person creates the end product.

Does this actually answer what creativity is? No. According to Encyclopedia Britannica Online, creativity is the ability to produce something new through imaginative skill, whether it is a new solution to a problem, a new method or device, or a new artistic object or form. Many of the major aspects of creativity are considered controversial. These include:

1. Are there creative people and non-creative people, or are some people simply more creative than others?
2. Are differences in creativity innate and unchangeable, or can people be taught to be creative? If there is such a thing as "corporate creativity", or creativity in the business world, is this a different type of creativity? Do these two types of creativity share common properties?
3. Does the creative process produce an "Aha!" moment, like a light bulb going on, or does it happen more gradually, in a series of smaller steps? The "Aha" model can involve a large amount of subconscious activity, but the conscious activity is sudden and happens all at once. This is often called a Gestalt view of creativity, after the Gestalt psychologists, who held that visual details cannot be perceived until the overall visual layout is perceived (Wayne State University, 1999).

Creativity is a puzzle, a paradox, a mystery ~ Margaret Boden

How Creativity Relates to Bipolar Disorder

Studies show that creativity is linked with personality traits sometimes associated with mental illnesses. Bipolar disorder can be linked with “sharpened and unusually creative thinking.” According to Ludwig’s study, it does suggest that the state of general unease contributes to an artist’s accomplishments.

“Studies have been consistently discussed in popular as well as professional publication as having proven connection between affective illness - depression, mania, or both together - and creativity, despite the fact that the first had not been published or reviewed in a scientific journal until quite recently, and the other has a flawed research methodology. The need to believe in a connection between creativity and madness appears to be so strong that the affirmations are welcomed and quoted rather uncritically.”(Albert Rothenberg, M.D., 1990)

Strong added that it was important to note that bipolar disorder patients showed high creativity despite the fact that they were being treated for their condition. Many patients are afraid to take medication for their disorder out of fear that it will impair their creativity, but these findings seem to suggest otherwise (Reuters, 2002). Some studies have shown that people with bipolar disorders and very creative people tend to share some of the same traits.

Below is a graph showing the studies that link bipolar disorder with creativity.

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(Princeton University, 2000)

There may be a link between manic depression and creativity but even if there was, it would only be relevant for a very small percentage of people. “An estimated 2 million Americans suffer from bipolar disorders, with roughly 1/3 of those individuals going untreated. This is a particularly grave statistic, considering that the suicide rate among untreated individuals is up to 20%"(Redfield, 1995).

"Sometimes I think God gave me the gift of creativity as a consolation prize, but I’m still suffering. I don’t know where this disease came from, but I sure wish it would go away."

-Gutin

Works Cited

• Princeton University student Web Project (2000) Retrieved July 19, 2004 from (http://www.molbio.princeton.edu/courses/mb427/2000/projects/002/artists.html)

• Wayne State University College of Lifelong Learning Interdisciplinary Studies Program (winter, 1999) Retrieved July 22, 2004 from (http://www.molbio.princeton.edu/courses/mb427/2000/projects/0002/index3.html)

• Knowledge Projects, book review site, Retrieved July 23, 2004 from (http://www.knowledgeproducts.net/whatiscreat.html)

• Alison McCook Reuters (2002) retrieved July 19, 2004 from (http://www.namiscc.org/Research/2002/Creativity.htm)

• Jamison, Kay Redfield, "Manic-Depressive Illness and Creativity," Mysteries of the Mind, February 1995

• Albert Rothenberg, M.D.(1990), Creativity and Madness, London, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press

• Gutin, "That Fine Madness."

• Chart adapted from chart in Jamison, Kay Redfield, "Manic-Depressive Illness and Creativity," Mysteries of the Mind, February 1995.- also from Princeton University Course site above