Curiosity has long been closely associated with creativity. It makes sense: curiosity leads to exploration, trying new things, gathering new knowledge, and being more comfortable with ambiguity. Some of the most creative people were intensely curious about the world around them. Consider the insatiable curiosity of Walt Disney, Steve Jobs, and Larry Page.
Research into the link between curiosity and creativity has been lacking, however. Until now.
Curiosity is a dimension of openness, one of the personality measures in the Five Factor Model. Openness is known to be directly related to creativity. An open mind explores, questions assumptions, revels in new information, and is open to new experiences. Curiosity leads us to be less wary of ambiguous, uncertain situations, which in turn means that it makes us more willing to stay with a complex problem until we have solved it.
Curiosity is also a trait that drives survival. It helps us adapt to changes in our surroundings.
On an individual level, curiosity and its concomitant exposure to new information provoke interest and excitement, which motivates one to solve a complex problem.
In a recent study, researchers discriminated between two types of curiosity: the first is something called specific curiosity, associated with anxiety in uncertain situations and a desire to reduce that uncertainty by filling in gaps in knowledge. Diversive curiosity, on the other hand, is associated with a general interest in exploring unfamiliar topics and learning something new. Unlike specific curiosity, it does not look for depth, but breadth of understanding, and gathers information without a particular goal.
In the study, the researchers found that diversive curiosity is strongly associated with creativity, particularly in the information gathering and idea generation stages, but specific curiosity is not. It seems someone who is curious in general is more creative than someone who is focused on a specific problem.
An implication is that, if you spend time with a complex problem and not jump to the first answer that comes to you, you will have a greater chance of solving the problem. Creativity is a skill that can be learned, after all.
Interestingly, thus far, research has focused on specific, goal-directed curiosity, not diversive curiosity, which has been seen as directionless, hedonistic, and unproductive.
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Source: Hardy, J. H. I., Ness, A. M., & Mecca, J. (2017). Outside the box: Epistemic curiosity as a predictor of creative problem solving and creative performance. Personality and Individual Differences, 104, 230–237. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2016.08.004
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