The effects of emotions on creative performance: a review

This chapter summarizes studies and meta-analyses that investigate the relationships between affect, mood and discrete emotions, and in turn, their effect on creativity. First, a brief introduction is given, highlighting core meanings of critical constructs. Differences and similarities between mood, affect and emotions are explained, along with main theoretical hypotheses regarding their relationships with creativity. Then, virtuous effects of positive emotions are briefly reviewed in order to introduce an analytical summary of research results regarding the effects of positive emotions on creative performance, in which we specifically focus on direction, intensity, and moderators. A selection of the most important studies are commented to give the reader a taste of the most commonly used research designs, measures and manipulations. Results of our review point out that creative performance, at the individual, group and organization levels, is facilitated by positive affective states when the creative process essentially involves the generation of ideas, when people are fully aware of the origins of their own emotional state, when the emotional states are not too intense, and when emotional states are characterized by high levels of activation. Future challenges and research directions are then commented.