The Relationship Between Subthreshold Autistic Traits, Ambiguous Figure Perception and Divergent Thinking

Citation

Best C, Arora S, Porter F & Doherty M (2015) The Relationship Between Subthreshold Autistic Traits, Ambiguous Figure Perception and Divergent Thinking. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 45 (12), pp. 4064-4073. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-015-2518-2

Abstract
This research investigates the paradox of creativity in autism. That is, whether people with subclinical autistic traits have cognitive styles conducive to creativity or whether they are disadvantaged by the implied cognitive and behavioural rigidity of the autism phenotype. The relationship between divergent thinking (a cognitive component of creativity), perception of ambiguous figures, and self-reported autistic traits was evaluated in 312 individuals in a non-clinical sample. High levels of autistic traits were significantly associated with lower fluency scores on the divergent thinking tasks. However autistic traits were associated with high numbers of unusual responses on the divergent thinking tasks. Generation of novel ideas is a prerequisite for creative problem solving and may be an adaptive advantage associated with autistic traits.

Keywords
Autism; Ambiguous figures; Creativity; Autistic traits; Divergent thinking

Journal
Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders: Volume 45, Issue 12

People

Dr Catherine Best

Lecturer Statistician, Institute for Social Marketing