Mood regulation as a shared basis for creativity and curiosity

Abstract

We extend the work of Ivancovsky et al. by proposing that in addition to novelty seeking, mood regulation goals – including enhancing positive mood and repairing negative mood – motivate both creativity and curiosity. Additionally, we discuss how the effects of mood on state of mind are context-dependent (not fixed), and how such flexibility may impact creativity and curiosity.

Ivancovsky et al. proposed that both creativity and curiosity are motivated by the desire to experience novelty (novelty seeking). We propose that, in addition to novelty seeking, the desire to regulate one's mood (i.e., enhance positive mood and/or reduce negative mood) is another mechanism that motivates both creativity and curiosity. Thus, we review empirical evidence to describe how creativity and curiosity are both driven (in part) by mood regulation goals. Further, we highlight how mood flexibly alters state of mind (SoM) to shape creativity and curiosity.

Curiosity typically involves feelings of interest (diversive curiosity) or feelings of deprivation (specific curiosity) – both motivate information seeking (that is expected to be rewarding) as a means of potentially regulating mood (Litman, 2005). Diversive curiosity is driven by interest (a positive emotion; Silvia, 2006) and thus often involves positive mood (Litman, 2008; Sung, Yih, & Wilson, 2020). People experiencing these positive states are motivated to maintain/enhance them, and thus engage in broad information seeking in anticipation of finding rewarding (e.g., novel) information (Litman, 2005). Specific curiosity stems from the desire to reduce unpleasant mood evoked by a perceived knowledge gap (Litman, 2008; Litman & Jimerson, 2004) – people in such negative states engage in narrow information seeking in anticipation of finding the information needed to close the knowledge gap and repair their negative mood (Litman, 2005; Lydon-Staley, Zhou, Blevins, Zurn, & Bassett, 2021). We therefore agree with the assertion of Ivancovsky et al. that diversive curiosity typically involves an exploratory SoM and positive mood, whereas specific curiosity involves an exploitatory SoM and reduction of negative mood. However, despite the underlying assumption that curiosity is driven by interest (to increase positive mood) or deprivation (to decrease negative mood), few studies have examined curiosity in the context of mood regulation or real-world emotional experience, making this a fruitful area for future research.

Crucially, much like curiosity, creativity also is commonly driven by the desire to enhance positive moods and/or reduce negative moods, and it is effective at doing so (Conner, DeYoung, & Silvia, 2018; Zhai et al., 2021). For example, people often report feeling joy and satisfaction after generating creative products (Forgeard & Eichner, 2014). Additionally, creativity in daily life is frequently intrinsically motivated and involves flow (Zeitlen, Silvia, Kane, & Beaty, 2022), an inherently rewarding state. Notably, flow states typically produce strong positive moods, and people pursue various (e.g., creative) activities to experience such rewarding states (Engeser & Schiepe-Tiska, 2012). Taken together, these findings suggest that creativity is often a rewarding experience that people pursue to effectively increase their positive mood.

In addition to enhancing positive mood, creativity might be pursued to repair negative moods. For example, the ability to generate creative responses to a worrisome future problem reduces anxiety and negative mood (Jing, Madore, & Schacter, 2016). Furthermore, research on art therapy reveals that creating art can help people cope with and repair their negative moods (Bell & Robbins, 2007; Futterman Collier & Wayment, 2021). Indeed, creativity is a critical resource for resilience and coping with adversity (Orkibi, 2023). For example, the ability to generate new and adaptive responses to changed and/or stressful situations (“creative adaptability”) positively predicts resilient coping, which in turn predicts decreased negative mood and greater well-being during periods of adversity (e.g., COVID-19 pandemic; Orkibi et al., 2021). Altogether, these findings indicate that people frequently engage in creative acts to help them effectively cope with and repair negative moods.

In addition to mood regulation goals, mood influences the processes involved in shaping both creativity and curiosity, but in a flexible way that depends on the information that mood provides within the context. For example, mood can promote information seeking by increasing the perceived value of information, such that negative mood increases goal-directed information seeking when task performance is perceived as strong, whereas positive mood increases such behavior when task performance is perceived as weak (Gasper & Zawadzki, 2013). Additionally, whether positive or negative mood promotes broad thinking and exploration depends on which processing styles are currently most accessible (dominant) in one's SoM. Positive moods signal that the dominant processing (e.g., perceptual/attentional) style is more appropriate to use (reinforcing its use) than do negative moods (which inhibit its use; Huntsinger, Isbell, & Clore, 2014). Thus, when a global processing style is dominant, positive moods promote the use of a global style and broad thinking, which typically leads to greater creativity; but when a local style is dominant, they promote the use of a local style and narrow thinking, which often results in less creativity (Huntsinger & Ray, 2016). Therefore, positive mood typically promotes an exploratory SoM (as there is a bias toward global processing; Navon, 1977), fostering creativity and diversive curiosity; but when a local style is dominant in one's SoM, then negative mood promotes an exploratory SoM and positive mood might promote an exploitatory SoM, fostering specific curiosity. Ivancovsky et al. did not address this nuance, in that they assumed the effects of mood on SoM were fixed, not flexible. Their novelty-seeking model linking curiosity and creativity might have greater predictive utility if it took into account the flexible nature of mood effects on SoM.

In sum, creativity and curiosity are both influenced by mood regulation goals and context-dependent effects of mood on SoM. Both novelty seeking (as proposed by Ivancovsky et al.) and mood regulation are shared bases for creativity and curiosity. This expanded framework could help to further elucidate the link between curiosity and creativity. Indeed, the anticipated reward of discovering novel ideas is one reason why people pursue their curiosity or creativity to regulate their mood. The emotional motivations underlying creativity and curiosity also extend beyond such novelty seeking (e.g., coping with negative mood by engaging with meaningful information). Future studies, which account for context-dependent effects of mood on SoM, are needed to directly assess shared (cognitive and emotional) motivations underlying curiosity and creativity. Such work would inform how novelty seeking and mood regulation, among other processes and influences (e.g., SoM), promote both creativity and curiosity.