Creativity is the ability to improve functioning and well-being by creating something useful, new or unusual. Even though it is commonly seen through prism of ‘creative thinking’, creativity is also an action. Creative performance is influenced by a variety of psychological, behavioral and cultural factors in the background. Still, what happens when we are (just not) in the mood for being creative? When we feel like staying in bed and simply being out of ideas? Is there any relation between our mood and the creative outputs we produce? With this blog post we will try to find that out!
Moods and emotions
First of all we will try to understand the difference between two affective states – moods and emotions. Emotions are a result of a specific event or cause. For example, you may feel frustrated when you are stuck in traffic or feel scared if you see a bear while walking in a forest. In addition, emotions most often lead to a reaction – when you see a bear, you will probably run or freeze. This does not apply to moods, as there is no clear and direct idea why we feel that way. Sometimes we just feel grumpy or optimistic with no special reason.
Unlike emotions, positive and negative moods last longer and have a lower intensity. Otherwise we would feel angry because of traffic jam for weeks. Understanding this distinction is important for emotional literacy (e.g. identifying what is an obstacle for achieving the performance goals) as people often use them interchangeably. In the next paragraphs we will explore how some of these concepts relate to our creativity potential.
Moods and creativity
We are not always performing at our best and that is fine. In the previous blog posts we shared some tips on monotasking and how to use procrastination to our favor. Our creativity potential may vary, e.g. depending on the project or task we are working on. Some of these fluctuations researchers tried to explain through the effects of mood on creativity.
The results suggest that induced positive mood facilitated creative performance compared to a neutral mood. People in positive mood (e.g. enthusiasm) had better results in areas such as fluency, originality and flexibility. What about the negative mood then? It is an interesting finding that negative mood can also facilitate creativity in some cases! It seems that positive moods led to more creative outputs when the task was seen as fun and enjoyable.
On the other hand, negative moods produced more creativity when the task was presented as serious and important. For example, sadness may sharpen our attention and lead to the creative outputs that are less cliché. It appears that both positive and negative moods may lead to more creative results depending on the task.
There are several perspectives to take into account when explaining why both positive and negative moods may facilitate creativity. One way (the cognitive tuning model) is seeing the mood as a response to a current situation and environment. In other words, moods are signals. The positive mood arises in the safe situation that supports risk-taking and thinking outside of the box.
In such relaxed situations we may be more ready to make unusual associations and propose alternative solutions. Negative moods on the other hand are more frequent in problematic and less familiar situations. In such cases it is more important to focus on details and avoid too risky options. Simply saying the negative moods switch our mind to an innovative, yet systematic mode. It also motivates us to invest high levels of energy to our performance and effort to deal with issues.
Practical aspects
So far researchers mostly agree that positive affects have more stable relation with creativity. The same is not so clear when it comes to negative moods – e.g. in one study anger had a positive effect on creativity, while shame had not. It definitely leaves more space for researches and conclusions, but there are some practical advices we can take from here.
Starting from this moment, try paying attention to your mood and use it as an advantage. For example, the next time you are performing in a team, play it smart by having your mood in mind. If you feel that the mood is not so bright, you may focus more on the accuracy and evaluation aspects. If the mood is brighter, you may devote more time to idea generation and seeing the bigger picture. The same applies to managers, team leaders or teachers who want to induce a certain mood among employees, youth or students – when you aim to increase creative performance of others, keep in mind the nature of task and align the mood to it.
Let us know in the comments what your current mood is and how will you use its potential!