Standing out from the crowd: the role of theory of mind on childhood creativity

The present study investigated the role of theory of mind (ToM) on childhood creativity and in the formulation of a complex creative ToM, namely the ability to take into consideration the mental states of others to produce original and appropriate ideas beyond the ordinary. For this purpose, a sample of 176 young schoolaged children completed a set of ToM and creativity tasks. Results demonstrated ToM skills were not significantly correlated with participants' attainment of creativity and creative ToM tasks. However, scores on the Unexpected Content ToM task significantly predicted creative fluency. Also, children who had acquired ToM as assessed by the Unexpected Content task were found to achieve higher scores both on creative fluency and originality. That said, despite their growing sociocognitive skills, young children may formulate their creative ideas based on what is intrapersonally unique rather than taking into account the potential ideas of their peers.