Creativity and Neurodiversity: Towards an Inclusive Creativity Measure for Autism and ADHD

Abstract

Exploring creativity within the autistic and ADHD community is important as their strengths are often unrecognised in society. The neurodiversity perspective considers autism and ADHD as variations in brain structure and function, leading to experiencing the world differently. It should then, follow that neurodivergent individuals may express creativity differently from standard expectations. However, commonly used creativity measures do not accommodate the different ways in which neurodivergent individuals process and combine external information, thus failing to capture the different and unique presentations of creativity. In light of this, we aimed to develop a novel measure to explore creativity within autistic and ADHD individuals. The sample (N=26) included 3 autistic, 5 autistic+ADHD, 8 ADHD and 10 neurotypical adults. Various methods were used, including: two storytelling tasks, the Kaufman Domains of Creativity Questionnaire and semi-structured interviews. Reflexive thematic analysis demonstrated different presentations of creativity across groups. Two themes were identified regarding factors which affect creativity in neurodivergent individuals: attention and thinking differently or seeing the world differently. Further, three themes suggested improvements for future creativity tests: time, anxiety and instructions. Findings have implications not only for developing an inclusive creativity measure, but also for designing strengths-based interventions to facilitate creativity in neurodivergent individuals.