Of the four friends I've had commit suicide, 1 was a writer, 2 were choir/performance, one was a photographer. So yes, I do believe suicide coincides with the artistically inclined, by pure anecdote of course.
I think people who are inclined to suicide maybe for one reason or another be driven to write or any other forms of creativity. Those who may commit suicide because of writing rejection and criticism alone, would have eventually done so from any other forms of rejection or lack of achievement they encounter in life. I'm not at all the suicidal sort but I recently read a suicide letter and I think that maybe some people who commit suicide, do so because whatever torment or emptiness they feel, it overwhelms them to the point there is no other path for them to escape other than death. And maybe we all think there is a lot of depression among Writers because unlike other groups, they have the written form to express themselves. If there was one group who will write or complain about depression I would think it would probably be those that write! But really, writing is a lonely activity - even for people with family and a full life. So I have to imagine those that may not have that to balance them out. It's no surprise when things don't go well it can lead to more self doubt and over analysis that can take people to a dark place. The internet can be a very mean place.
I've read studies suggesting creative minds more tend to take drugs and/or develop mental health issues. In the same vein as we are also more populated with ADHD/Aspergers/Autistism/ODD that kind of stuff.
Yeah, I don't know about that. Doctor: Jim: I added 2 and 2; the result was 4. Bob: Okay, but the patient still died and now the family is suing you. Also, you can't use the math in court. Lawyer: Jim: I added 2 and 2; the result was 4. Bob: That's nice, but I have a credible witness on the stand that is sure the result was three. Tell your client not to drop the soap. Chemist: Jim: I added 2 and 2; the result was 4. Bob: You forgot the sigfigs. Redo the reaction. Mcdonalds: Jim: I added 2 and 2; the result was 4. Bob: You were supposed to be cooking a burger. Jim: You're the one named Bob. Well, it was a fun analogy while it lasted. Sorry I didn't have anything substantive to add.
Um, that quote is not derived from me. I didn't even quote the OP. Are you okay? Also, @ChickenFreak already made that point.
I quoted the first post, I went in there and deleted everything else to reduce it to that so I don't know how it quoted you. That's weird. I mean I know I had to have done it somehow, its not some mysterious forum glitch, but I really don't know. Whatever, sorry for quite literally misquoting you.
Yeah, that seems to be what happened to most of them I looked at. The suicide was the end result of their mental disorder, and was not a reaction to what people thought of their writing.
If writers are treated like artists, then your work gets appreciated after death (and worth more too). I think there is a lot of merit in modern writers committing suicide, due to the fact that they have to compete with all the garbage getting the praise. The people seem to like bad writing, and so they shall demand crap on the pages. Sucks, but what can you do? But where to start on fixing the problem? (rubs chin in deep thought.)
Interesting item of note: People are replying to this thread, but it's not showing up in my "Alerts" even though it's "my" thread. I just checked and there are no alerts for this thread since Thursday. Is there a way to turn alerts off for a thread . . . and if I have inadvertently done so, how do I turn it back on?
Up the top there a little blue word saying "watch thread" or "unwatch thread". You probably accidentally clicked unwatch.
Do you have links to any of those studies about mental illness rates? General consensus in this thread, and the main point of the Atlantic article you linked to, is that there IS a higher rate of mental illness in writers. "When the researchers looked specifically at authors, they found that they are overrepresented among people with schizophrenia, depression, bipolar disorder, anxiety syndrome, and substance abuse problems." So... rejection? No, not the cause of higher suicide rates. Mental illness? Probably the cause, yes.
Creative types are prone to dug tendencies and disorders. It's quite well documented. So yes, the career doesn't have much to do with it.
Actually, there is no consensus, which is why I started the thread. A Huffington Post article goes into detail about a number of studies that show no link between creativity and mental illness. The author is Dr. R. Keith Sawyer Professor, University of North Carolina. Here's a quote from the article: "There is no link between creativity and mental illness. Creative people are not more likely to be diagnosed with mental illness, and mentally ill people are not more likely to be creative than normal people. Multiple studies, going back over a century, have consistently found the same proportion of mental illness in creative people as we find in the general population." The article goes on to site a half-dozen studies that came to the same conclusion; no link between creativity and mental illness. The author has even written a textbook on mental illness. If you read the entire article, he evaluates the studies most often cited when claiming there is a link between creativity and mental illness, the Kyaga studies. After the evaluation he provides the following quote: "It’s interesting that the Kyaga studies have received so much media attention, when they essentially conclude (2012 p. 6) that “individuals with overall creative professions are not more likely than controls to suffer from psychiatric disorders in general. I think it’s because the very weak connections Kyaga has identified seem to affirm our widely held cultural belief that madness and creativity are related. Psychiatrist Albert Rothenberg, in his 1990 book Creativity and madness, observed “The need to believe in a connection between creativity and madness appears to be so strong that affirmations are welcomed and quoted rather uncritically” (p. 150)." Basically the author claims the link is just an urban legend that Western civilization has perpetuated, one that is not represented in other cultures, or even in the data. He ends with the following quote: "The creativity research consensus: All four textbook overviews of creativity research (mine and three others) reject any link: Weisberg (2006) says it’s a myth. Kaufman (2009) says the studies are flawed, and no link has been proven. Runco (2007) concluded that “there are indications that creativity has benefits for health” and that there are many flaws with the research claiming a link with madness, and concluded “this area receives so much study because it is newsworthy” (p. 152). Also see (Glazer, 2009; Rothenberg, 2001; Schlesinger, 2009; Waddell, 1998; Silvia & Kaufman, 2010; citations all from the bibliography of Explaining Creativity). Weisberg, R. W. (2006). Creativity: Understanding innovation in problem solving, science, invention, and the arts. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. Kaufman, J. C. (2009). Creativity 101. New York: Springer. Runco, M. A. (2007). Creativity: Theories and themes: Research, development, and practice. Burlington, MA: Elsevier Academic Press."
I don't see that textbook on mental illness - can you link? And the author DOES say that authors are more likely to have mental illnesses, so... I'm still not sure how this article supports your original post?
Maybe not mental illness, but I do know that drug tendencies and personality disorders(ADHD, Aspergers, ODD) are more common. Or do you have a meta-study about those??
@Oscar Leigh I just think that it's really interesting that on the one hand you have the Kyaga studies, and probably others, saying their is a possible link between creativity and mental illness, even observing a suicide rate double that of the general population, then you have a whole bunch of others stating no link exists. Some studies (quoted above) even claim “there are indications that creativity has benefits for health.” The Kyaga study admits, “individuals with overall creative professions are not more likely than controls to suffer from psychiatric disorders in general." (2012 p. 6). Yet, the media latched on to the "possible latent gene for mental illness and creativity," based not on an analysis of mental illness rates among people in creative pursuits, but in people whose parents were engaged in creative pursuits. The Kyaga study evaluated the family members of people with mental illness. (I have no idea if other studies did this as well.) What Kyaga found, was that people who were diagnosed with a mental disorder had parents and family members who were engaged in creative occupations, teacher, artist, professor, etc. This is where the latent gene theory arises from. Essentially, the Kyaga study is saying that because I am a professor and a writer, I posses a non-expressed gene for mental illness (there being no difference in rates of mental illness diagnosis by occupation), however, that gene may be expressed later in my non-creative offspring. This is a very large and very interesting leap of logic that could have far reaching consequences. Imagine health insurance and life insurance companies refusing to offer policies to children based on the occupations of their parents. Since the Kyaga study is highly controversial, and has yet to be replicated, it's even more interesting to see it quoted, not in scholarly articles, but all over the popular media. It's just like all the other on again/off again studies out there; coffee is good for you/bad for you (depending on study), two glasses of wine a day is good for you/bad for you (depending on study.) But what really caught my interest was this: “The need to believe in a connection between creativity and madness appears to be so strong that affirmations are welcomed and quoted rather uncritically,” (Rothenberg, Creativity and Madness, p. 150). Why does Western culture need to believe and perpetuate what might well be a myth? Why do we eagerly accept any position we agree with, rather than looking critically at the data and fact checking? And what benefit could there be from asserting a link between creativity and madness? That's why I posted articles both for and against; there are two sides (or n sides, depending on how many dimensions you want to get into to), to every debate.
Very interesting discussion! Obviously studies disagree on the link between creativity, mental illness, suicide, etc. but I could think of some hypothetical reasons why, if indeed there is a link, why it may be so. First I can understand the link between creativity and bipolar. I could see how manic episodes could induce creativity, definitely. (People do crazy things they wouldn't normally do during manic episodes, which is one form of creativity!) Personally, if I were to guess why creative people would commit suicide more, it would be because creativity = higher intelligence, intelligence = more thinking/ruminating, which can lead to depression. Sort of an "ignorance is bliss" theory. I also understand people associating mental illness with creativity. After all, what we consider mental illness is 100% socially constructed. We decide what mental illness is based on our cultural norms and what we consider socially appropriate. Creative people, by definition, think and behave differently, uniquely from other people. People deemed mentally ill are also different from other people in society. In a way, creativity is our label for positive differences, and mental illness is our label for negative differences. But who draws the lines?
I once saw a study somewhere that said there was a correlation between depression and IQ. I have no idea where I found that now though, sorry. Another study (I think I heard about it on NPR) said depressed people were more likely than non-depressed people to remember situations accurately. In that study, actors either treated the participants well or poorly (in a waiting room, I think). The interactions were video taped. Then the participant went to do whatever they thought the study was. Afterwards they were asked to recall the incident in the waiting room. Non-depressed people often misremembered both the insults and the compliments. Depressed people remembered both. Sort of supports the ignorance is bliss argument. I think this is true in some respects too. If I were to strike up a conversation with Elmer the 6 foot tall, 3 toed sloth, who lives in my back yard, wears a Cheshire cat grin, and has a shaggy purple coat I'm crazy. Talking to Jesus . . . totally OK. It seems some imaginary friends are more acceptable than others. I have a friend working in the field of psychology and creativity right now. The study he's working on is trying to discover the "line" between creativity and mental illness. When a schizophrenic hears voices in their head and creates an imaginary world, it becomes counter productive to functioning in society. Yet, when a an illustrator, author, or artist creates an imaginary world, there is no ill affects, it's how they earn their money. So at what point to you cross the line and become unable to distinguish fact from fantasy? Do writers flirt with danger by rubbing up against their fantasies on a daily basis? It's an interesting question. And could that be a contributing factor to higher rates of suicide?
Yeah, I would believe it certainly contributes to it. If you are not tough and able to cope with a lot of chaff it can go under your skin (and btw I just LOVED the interaction bit at the start with the writers critiquing the equation ) I know that in my early years when I was not so "fuck-off-if-you-don't-want-me-around" (pardon my language) frame of mind, being constantly told that I could do something better if I only changed, it would have amounted to a whole lot of pressure. Early on I always looked for approval from society, from parents, from myself. And I was not happy, not by any kind of definition. I even remember back then (I think I was around 9 years old) contemplating how best to commit suicide. Now I can take this kind of pressure, but it took me only about 30 years to come to this pass. Oh well, I like crashing walls down with my head
