Mood and personality predict improvement in creativity due to meditation training

Abstract

Studies have shown a mean improvement of creative performance following meditation, however, differences among individuals have been neglected. We examine whether short-term integrative body–mind training (IBMT), can improve creative performance and seek to determine which people are most likely to benefit. In a randomized study using short-term IBMT or a control given same amount of relaxation training (30 min/day for 7 days), mood, personality and creative performances were assessed before and after training. The results indicated that the IBMT group had significantly greater creative performance than the relaxation control. A linear regression showed that five predictors in pre-tests including depression, anger, fatigue, introversion × vigor, and emotional stability × vigor accounted for 57% of the variance in the change in creativity before vs. after IBMT. Mood and personality may be useful tools to predict individual variation in the improvement of creative performance following meditation training.

Introduction

Creativity is commonly defined as work that is both novel (i.e., original and unexpected) and appropriate (i.e., valuable and adaptive concerning task constraints) (Sternberg & Lubart, 1999). Creativity is essential to the development of human civilization and plays a crucial role in cultural life (Hennessey & Amabile, 2010). Hence, various fields of research are interested in the potential for fostering creative performance through technology and training. It has been the contribution of cognitive psychology to understand mental processes in terms of component operations (Posner, 1978). Our choice of tests to measure creative performance including the Torrance Test of Creative Thinking (TTCT) is based on that theoretical perspective. Of special important is the ability to measure aspects of creative performance particularly as it relates to divergent thinking as measured by the TTCT (Torrance, 1972). Divergent thinking pertains primarily to information retrieval and the call for a number of varied responses to a certain item (Guilford & Paul, 1967). Prior study demonstrated that divergent thinking as a key aspect of creative performance has the validity to predict creative ability (Kim, 2008).

For the past four decades, the popularity of meditation in the Western world has led to extensive research into both its physiological and behavioral effects, including creative performance (Murphy, Donovan, & Taylor, 2004). For example, transcendental meditation training enhances creative performance as assessed by TTCT (Ball, 1980). Moreover, maintaining a mindful and alert state during meditation results in better creative thinking (solving insightful problem) (Ren et al., 2011). In addition, Zen practitioners who meditated in the laboratory performed better on the creative thinking (as measured by Remote Associate Test) than those who did not meditate (Strick, Van Noorden, Ritskes, De Ruiter, & Dijksterhuis, 2012). The open-monitoring meditation, in which an individual is open to perceive and observe any sensation, promotes creative thinking (Colzato, Ozturk, & Hommel, 2012). Our recent work also suggested that short-term IBMT can enhance the creative thinking including divergent thinking (Ding et al., 2011, Ding, Tang, Tang and Posner, 2014) and insightful problem solving (Ding et al., 2014a).

It should be noted that research into a connection between creative performance and meditation has shown a mean improvement of creative performance following meditation training (Ball, 1980, Colzato et al., 2012, Ding et al., 2011, Ding, Tang, Cao, et al., 2014, Ding, Tang, Tang and Posner, 2014, Ren et al., 2011, Strick et al., 2012), but there were individuals who showed the opposite effects (O'Haire and Marcia, 1980, Otis, 1974). One study revealed no improvement in creative performance proceeding three months meditation training, though many individuals reported an increase in their creative ability (Otis, 1974). Another study tested creative thinking skills with the TTCT—Form B and found an unsupportable relationship between three years meditation experience and creative performance, although some meditators scored highest on figural originality (O'Haire & Marcia, 1980). These differences could be due to error of measurement in the TTCT or other factors such as the aspects of the individuals' personality and mood.

Mental state and personality have been associated with creative performance. For example, people with more positive emotion had more flexible and original responses (Brand and Opwis, 2007, Davis, 2009, De Dreu et al., 2008). Moreover, creative people in general are more autonomous, introverted, mood stable, and energized (Barron and Harrington, 1981, Feist and Barron, 2003, Furnham and Bachtiar, 2008). Similarly, both mental state and temperament are related to individual differences in meditation. For example, anxiety and neuroticism are negatively related to the ability to achieve an appropriate meditative state (Lykins and Baer, 2009, Murata et al., 2004). These findings suggest that mood states and temperament may be indicative of an individual's capacity to benefit in creative ability from meditation training.

The current study focuses on individual differences of meditation training on divergent thinking as an aspect of creativity using TTCT. In previous work (Ball, 1980, Colzato et al., 2012, Ding et al., 2011, Ding, Tang, Cao, et al., 2014, Ding, Tang, Tang and Posner, 2014, Ren et al., 2011, Strick et al., 2012), it has been established that creative performance increases following meditation, but not all persons improve in creative performance, we hypothesize that those with specific personality and/or mood will improve more than those without these characteristics.

Many studies of meditation compare long term meditators with a control group. However, integrative body–mind training (IBMT), one form of meditation, has been shown in just five days to improve many aspects of cognition including attention (Tang et al., 2007). IBMT originates from ancient eastern contemplative traditions (e.g., traditional Chinese medicine and Zen) and incorporates key components of meditation training including body relaxation, mental imagery and mindfulness (Tang and Posner, 2009, Tang et al., 2007). IBMT is designed to facilitate the achievement of a meditative state with a balance and optimization between mind and body (Tang et al., 2007). On the other hand, relaxation training (RT) involves the relaxing of different muscle groups over the head to the abdomen and forces one to concentrate on the feelings of warmth and heaviness (Bernstein & Borkovec, 1973). This progressive muscle training helps a participant achieve physical (body) and mental (mind) relaxation and calmness (Tang et al., 2009, Tang et al., 2007). Since both RT and IBMT effort to achieve their desired states through regulating the body and the mind, RT matches IBMT in the training and thus we chose RT as an active control condition. Recent studies have shown IBMT to be effective with a U.S. population (Tang et al., 2009, Tang et al., 2007, Tang et al., 2013). We have found that a few hours IBMT significantly improved creative performance including divergent thinking (Ding et al., 2011, Ding, Tang, Tang and Posner, 2014) and insightful problem solving (Ding, Tang, Cao, et al., 2014a). Hence, IBMT is being used as a meditation intervention to test our hypothesis.

Taken together, we hypothesize that compared to RT (i) IBMT will produce greater creative performance (as measured by TTCT) (ii) There will be a relation between pre-test score (Profile of Mood States (POMS) or Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ)) and improvement (post-test TTCT score minus pre-test TTCT score) following IBMT.