Recent Approaches
A 1995 book by Hans Eysenck argues that a “personality trait” called Psychoticism is central to becoming a creative genius; and a more recent book by Bill Dorris (2009) looks at the influence of “everything from genetics to cultural crises”, including chance, over the course of development of those who attain greatness.
Hans Eysenck's book, Genius: The Natural History of Creativity (1995), "construct(s)... a model of genius and creativity" whose "novelty lies in (its) attempt to make personality differences central to the argument".
In particular Eysenck is interested in a personality trait called “psychoticism … chief among (whose) cognitive features is a tendency to over-inclusiveness, i.e., an inclination not to limit one's associations to relevant ideas, memories, images, etc."
He considers a massive range of experimental psychological research in order to establish the underlying genetic, neuro-chemical mechanisms which may be operating to influence levels of creativity associated with fluctuations in “the tendency towards over-inclusiveness indicative of psychoticism..."
Eysenck's assessment of his overall argument is as follows: "There is no hint that the theory is more than a suggestion of how many disparate facts and hypotheses can be pulled together into a causal chain, explaining… the apogee of human endeavour - genius. If the theory has one point in its favour it is that every step can be tested experimentally, and that many steps have already received positive support from such testing."
Read more about this topic: Greatness
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