Cognitive and Affective Empathy in Relation to Creativity: Investigating Moderating Effects of Overinclusive Thinking

Details

Supervisors

Barbot, Baptiste

Faculty

Faculté de psychologie, logopédie, sexologie et des sciences de la famille

Degree label

Master [120] en sciences psychologiques, à finalité spécialisée

Abstract

Empathy is an understudied topic in the creativity research. It is a key social cognition skill involving affective and cognitive mechanisms. Although the positive contribution of cognitive empathy has been established in several studies, the relation between affective empathy and creativity is less clear. The present study examines how cognitive and affective empathy are related to creative ideation, ideational behavior and creative writing. Furthermore, the moderating effect of overinclusive thinking is investigated. It was hypothesized that both empathy constructs are positively related to creativity. Participants (N = 123) were presented with performance-based measures and questionnaires. Affective empathy was positively associated with creative ideation and ideational behavior. Furthermore, it significantly predicted the level of these variables. Cognitive empathy was positively associated with ideational behavior. However, no significant relations were observed between creative writing and empathy. Overinclusive thinking significantly moderated the relation between cognitive empathy and ideational behavior. These results imply that affective and cognitive empathy components may relate to creativity in different ways. Overall, empathy might be a potential creativityrelevant skill.