Psychedelics and creativity have been linked in anecdotal evidence from artists, scientists, actors, entertainers and musicians. Many credit the benefits of psychedelic substances for influencing their work.
In the last seven years, there has been an increasing trend to use macro- and microdosing to increase cognition and creativity, particularly in Silicon Valley.
However, the scientific evidence is lacking to demonstrate a quantitative enhancement of creative thinking with psychedelic drugs.
In an interview with Natasha Mason, Ph.D., a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Maastricht, she dives into an experiment she conducted to directly assess the effects of psychedelics on creativity.
How do you define creativity?
Scientists view creativity as a dynamic process that requires a shifting between different modes of thought in order to reach an end result. These modes include divergent thinking (DT) which consists of generating novel and original ideas, and convergent thinking (CT), the evaluation of those ideas and choosing which one is best.
Creativity is an essential process for everyday functioning, and the inability to think “outside the box” has been associated with psychological disorders, such as depression and anxiety.
How is creativity measured?
Creativity is difficult to measure, especially when psychedelics produce other effects that may be mistaken for creativity.
In her study, Dr Mason used the “alternate uses task,” which is the gold standard for assessing divergent thinking. Here they asked people to come up with uses for an everyday object like a brick or a pen, and they have to write down how many different uses they can come up with.
Secondly, they used the “picture concept task,” which assesses both divergent and convergent thinking. Here they showed people three rows of three pictures, and they had to make associations between them. There is always one correct answer, with the number of correctly identified associations across the task serving as a benchmark for more convergent creativity.
Finally, they had a questionnaire asking how creative the study participants felt, not specifically during the tasks but throughout the whole testing day. It consisted of statements like “I had insights into problems,” “I had insights into connections that had previously puzzled me,” or “I had very original thoughts,” which participants rated after the testing day.
The study had 60 participants, 30 of which were given 15mg of psilocybin, which is a moderate dose where participants were still able to perform the requested tasks. The other group received placebo.
The study found that participants performed worse under the influence of psilocybin than under placebo in all tasks. Both divergent and convergent creativity were reduced, yet at the same time participants reported feeling more creative.
However, seven days later, participants returned to the lab for a second assessment, and the researchers found a significant increase in the number of new ideas people came up with on the alternate uses task for the psilocybin group. Interestingly, we also found that the more subjective creativity they reported on the acute testing day, the more new ideas they had on the seventh day.
The observed “delay” of creativity is super interesting. A theory I have is inspired by Dr Matthew Walker’s research and his book, ‘Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams’. In which he explains how essential sleep is to the integration of learning and forming new connections in the brain. Perhaps sleep can help explain the ‘‘after glow’ effect after a psychedelic experience and the importance of integration sessions after psychedelic assisted therapy.
What are some discoveries credited to psychedelics?
Many celebrities and futurists such as Cary Grant, Susan Sarandon, Joe Rogan, Yoko Ono and Elon Musk credit the benefits of psychedelic substances for influencing their work.
Steve Jobs, said “Taking LSD was a profound experience, one of the most important things in my life… LSD shows you that there’s another side to the coin, and you can’t remember it when it wears off, but you know it. It reinforced my sense of what was important.”
Two breakthrough biology-related discoveries have links to psychedelics. The DNA double-helix structure was discovered by Nobel Prize winner Francis Crick who admitted to fellow scientists that he enjoyed dabbling in LSD to strengthen his mind and used it during his discovery of DNA.
Nobel Prize-winning chemist Kary Mullis claims his invention of polymerase chain reactions (PCR), one of the most fundamental tools of molecular biology, might never have happened without LSD. As he put it, “I could sit on a DNA molecule and watch the polymers go by. I learnt that partly on psychedelic drugs.”
This may be a stretch, but some even believe the gospel of the Ten Commandments was delivered by Moses while under the influence of psilocybin. According to Jerusalem Hebrew University professor Benny Shanon, magic mushrooms were readily accessible at Mount Sinai and widely used by Israelites during Biblical times.
