Investigating the negative link between perfectionism and emotional divergent thinking.

Abstract

Previous research has shown that perfectionism was negatively associated with the generation of original ideas in Divergent Thinking (DT) tasks, while striving for excellence was positively associated with it. However, the explanatory variables for these effects remain unclear. This study investigated the mediating roles of doubts about actions, concerns over mistakes, openness to experience, empathy, and emotions during DT tasks. Additionally, it examined an emotional DT task (i.e., naming frustrating things and things that affect one's self-esteem). From a sample of n = 282 university students, we replicated the negative association between perfectionism and DT abilities, though the effect size was smaller than in prior studies. Perfectionism correlated with lower empathy and greater primary negative emotions (e.g., fear) but similar openness to experience compared to excellencism. Mediation analyses revealed that doubts and concerns were unrelated to DT abilities. Openness to experience and empathy were positively correlated with DT abilities. Primary negative emotions during the tasks were negatively associated with the originality of answers. In contrast, positive emotions and secondary negative emotions (e.g., embarrassment) predicted more original ideas. These findings emphasize the importance of promoting excellencism over perfectionism to foster original ideas. This study has implications for overcoming barriers and supporting the creative process of individuals high on perfectionism. It also has implications for creativity researchers investigating the role of empathy and emotions in DT abilities.

Supplementary information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s44202-025-00330-x.