Creativity in ADHD - neurophysiological correlates
Working memory is impaired under the influence of alcohol. However, in a certain creativity task, the remote association test (in which you have to form unusual associations), this leads to better performance. Possible reason: the executive regulation of attention otherwise impedes the formation of loose associations, one tends to think “straightforward” - which is also much more useful for the vast majority of everyday tasks.1
Students with ADHD-C showed more unusual, broader associations, presumably because of lower inhibitory control. They came up with more and more unusual ideas about what features there could be for a smartphone. The ideas of people with ADHD were just as practical as those of people without ADHD. The study situation regarding ADHD and creativity is inconsistent, which is partly due to different definitions of creativity.2
Creativity appears to be (also) dopaminergically mediated.3 In ADHD, stimulants appear to increase convergent or divergent creativity dopaminergically, not noradrenergically4
Creativity appears to correlate with striatal dopamine levels in the form of an inverted U-curve. Creativity was highest at medium dopamine levels 5 67
In healthy adults, methylphenidate affected creativity, with low novelty seeking MPH increasing creativity and high novelty seeking decreasing creativity.8
In healthy men, a dopamine reuptake inhibitor increased divergent thinking (a form of creativity) the more open the person with ADHD was to new experiences. Under placebo, there was no correlation between openness to experience and divergent thinking.9
Jarosz AF, Colflesh GJ, Wiley J (2012): Uncorking the muse: alcohol intoxication facilitates creative problem solving. Conscious Cogn. 2012 Mar;21(1):487-93. doi: 10.1016/j.concog.2012.01.002. PMID: 22285424. ↥
White H A, Shah P (2016): Scope of Semantic Activation and Innovative Thinking in College Students with ADHD. Creativity Research Journal, 28(3), 275–282. https://doi.org/10.1080/10400419.2016.1195655 ↥
Ueda Y, Tominaga A, Kajimura S, Nomura M (2016): Spontaneous eye blinks during creative task correlate with divergent processing. Psychol Res. 2016 Jul;80(4):652-9. doi: 10.1007/s00426-015-0665-x. PMID: 25863791. ↥
Appling C, Nuraini N, Hart E, Wang D, Tosh A, Beversdorf D, Ferguson B (2025): Heart Rate Variability Prediction of Stimulant-Induced Creativity Gains in Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. J Clin Med. 2025 May 20;14(10):3570. doi: 10.3390/jcm14103570. PMID: 40429570; PMCID: PMC12111806. ↥
Agnoli S, Mastria S, Zanon M, Corazza GE (2023): Dopamine supports idea originality: the role of spontaneous eye blink rate on divergent thinking. Psychol Res. 2023 Feb;87(1):17-27. doi: 10.1007/s00426-022-01658-y. PMID: 35141768; PMCID: PMC9873774. ↥
Chermahini SA, Hommel B (2010): The (b)link between creativity and dopamine: spontaneous eye blink rates predict and dissociate divergent and convergent thinking. Cognition. 2010 Jun;115(3):458-65. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2010.03.007. PMID: 20334856. ↥
Boot N, Baas M, van Gaal S, Cools R, De Dreu CKW (2017): Creative cognition and dopaminergic modulation of fronto-striatal networks: Integrative review and research agenda. Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2017 Jul;78:13-23. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2017.04.007. PMID: 28419830. REVIEW ↥
Gvirts HZ, Mayseless N, Segev A, Lewis DY, Feffer K, Barnea Y, Bloch Y, Shamay-Tsoory SG (2017): Novelty-seeking trait predicts the effect of methylphenidate on creativity. J Psychopharmacol. 2017 May;31(5):599-605. doi: 10.1177/0269881116667703. PMID: 27624151. ↥
Käckenmester W, Bott A, Wacker J (2019): Openness to experience predicts dopamine effects on divergent thinking. Personal Neurosci. 2019 Jul 26;2:e3. doi: 10.1017/pen.2019.3. PMID: 32435738; PMCID: PMC7219677. ↥