The costs of curiosity and creativity: Minimizing the downsides while maximizing the upsides

Abstract

The unbridled positivity toward curiosity and creativity may be excessive. Both aid species survival through exploration and advancement. These beneficial effects are well documented. What remains is to understand their optimal levels and contexts for maximal achievement, health, and well-being. Every beneficial element to individuals and groups carries the potential for harm – curiosity and creativity included.

Curiosity and creativity are (rightfully) defined as psychological strengths or positive goods (e.g., Peterson & Seligman, 2004). From an evolutionary perspective, both aid species survival. Curiosity ensures that an agent explores anything that is new, uncertain, complex, or ambiguous in the environment. By doing so, there is opportunity to capitalize on rewards such as the medicinal value of plants or attaining status. An agent is also attuned to perturbations in the self (inward directed) or environment (outward directed) that could suggest potential insult, injury, or premature death. As for creativity, agents that design new and useful contributions are more likely to be valuable and thus, accepted and protected. At a societal level, creativity drives economies, underlies paradigm-shifting inventions, and offers solutions to global crises (Florida, 2014).

From a psychological angle, there is evidence that people exhibiting greater curiosity and creativity benefit in terms of greater achievement, health, and well-being (in particular, vitality, meaning and purpose in life, psychological healing, and satisfying needs for autonomy and competence) (e.g., Acar, Tadik, Myers, Van der Sman, & Uysal, 2021; Kaufman, 2023; Silvia & Kashdan, 2009). Curious and creative people are more likely to be successful entrepreneurs with larger social and professional networks. Conditioning on the beneficial consequences fits with a larger theme that there is a “shared novelty-seeking basis for creativity and curiosity” (Ivancovsky, Baror, & Bar, this issue) that buffers against threats to a better life (cf. hedonic adaptation; Sheldon & Lyubomirsky, 2007).

As with many psychological strengths, there are predictable, replicable situations with unintended costs (Biswas-Diener, Kashdan, & Minhas, 2011; Grant & Schwartz, 2011). Unintended costs are inevitable with competing demands for our time and attention. There are metabolic costs, as the brain consumes energy to process new information. There are social costs, as those constantly seeking novelty may be seen as eccentric or disruptive. And there are psychological costs, as the constant pursuit of novelty can be mentally exhausting.

Is too much of a good thing, a good thing?

Curiosity is characterized as the enjoyable pursuit of new knowledge. However, curiosity comes in more than one flavor. Unlike the Joyous Exploration dimension of curiosity (i.e., Kashdan, Disabato, Goodman, & McKnight, 2020), there is Deprivation Sensitivity or the uncomfortable urge to fill an information gap (Litman, 2005). Both have metabolic costs that arise from orienting attention to the new, detecting information gaps, and making sense of the target of curiosity (Gruber & Ranganath, 2019). Deprivation Sensitivity has additional burdens. There is a restless need to know and a sense of frustration, triggered by a lack of information (Schweitzer, Gerpott, Rivkin, & Stollberger, 2023). To the outsider, an agent experiencing deprivation sensitivity appears to be anxious and neurotic – definitely not in the throes of well-being.

Strangers, close friends, and family possess mixed reactions to highly curious individuals. Highly curious people are perceived as having a high intellectual capacity and being imaginative, humorous, and non-judgmental; on the flip side, they are viewed as somewhat critical, rebellious, and distant (going into interviewer mode) (Kashdan, Sherman, Yarbro, & Funder, 2013).

Similarly, creativity is explicitly praised, but bosses may show implicit bias against creative workers (Mueller, Goncalo, & Kamdar, 2011), possibly because it can be associated with lower company loyalty (Madjar, Greenberg, & Chen, 2011) and quality (Miron, Erez, & Naveh, 2004). Teachers, too, show a comparable split between explicit and implicit views (Westby & Dawson, 1995). Creativity is often assumed to result in benevolent outcomes. However, creativity is not bound to any morality. Creativity can be used for negative ends which benefit the creator at the expense of others (such as stealing from work) or downright malevolent acts, with the goal being to cause harm (Kapoor & Kaufman, 2022).

Creativity is often linked to mental illness, although these connections are often exaggerated or overly generalized. However, Carson (2014) suggests that neurocognitive factors can be “shared vulnerabilities.” Neural hyperconnectivity (i.e., uncommon areas of the brain being connected, as in synesthesia), lower latent cognitive disinhibition, and a need for novelty can help someone be more creative – or more likely to develop psychopathology. Further, the creative process can trigger specific anxiety that is distinct from general anxiety (Daker, Cortes, Lyons, & Green, 2020).

Creative people have been likened to investors, choosing to put their time and resources toward a particular project (Sternberg & Lubart, 1995). Successful creators will buy low (unpopular) ideas, convince others of their value, and then sell high and move on to their next idea. A creator's decision to pursue any particular idea means they have less time to follow a different idea.

Optimal levels

Insufficient consideration is given to an inconvenient truth: there are always psychological trade-offs when investing in a behavior. In this case, we consider predictable ways that being curious and creative are costly. Think of finite resources – attention, time, money, and energy – that can be spent on other, more beneficial life pursuits that create a more well-rounded person. Some of the most powerful interventions for a good life such as exercise, diet, being in the company of pets, or spending time outside on a sunny day are often mundane habits.

Opportunity costs aside, there are social consequences that may lead to negative evaluations and/or social isolation (e.g., Mueller & Yin, 2021). The highly curious and creative often hold different ideas and perspectives than others. These differences lead to discriminatory actions by others and significant financial (e.g., rejection of novel ideas), personal (e.g., low self-worth), and interpersonal costs (social group rejection). Furthermore, at times, curiosity and creativity at their maximum produce overstimulation due to the vigilance demands and as a result, emotional well-being declines.

Despite a voluminous literature on curiosity and creativity, we know little about optimal levels of curiosity and/or creativity. We need to uncover when there is too much, when they are wrongly applied, and when costs outweigh benefits to the point of dysfunction. Determining optimal levels is the province of wisdom, metacognition, morality, and work–life balance, among other factors. We hope a conversation on trade-offs catalyzes research on what works best for whom in particular situations.