When we enhance cognition with Adderall, do we sacrifice creativity?
Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Pennsylvania, 3720 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA. mfarah@psych.upenn.edu RATIONALE: Adderall (mixed amphetamine salts) is used by healthy normal individuals to enhance attention. Research with healthy normal participants and those with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder indicate a possible inverse relationship between attentional function and creativity. This raises the possibility that Adderall could decrease creativity in people using it for cognitive enhancement. OBJECTIVE: This study was designed to find out whether Adderall impairs creativity in healthy young adults. MATERIAL AND METHODS: In a double-blind placebo-controlled study, the effects of Adderall on the performance of 16 healthy young adults were measured on four tests of creativity from the psychological literature: two tasks requiring divergent thought and two requiring convergent thought. RESULTS: Adderall affected performance on the convergent tasks o
