Creative Flourishing: Unpacking the Creativity-Well-Being Connection in Creative Practitioners and Comparison Participants

This study compared how creativity relates to multi-dimensional well-being in creative practitioners and comparison participants using a daily diary approach. A sample of 355 adults: 202 creative practitioners and 153 comparison participants with lower creative engagement completed baseline measures and 13 daily surveys assessing creativity and well-being . Creative practitioners reported higher baseline well-being, particularly in engagement, relationships, and meaning. Daily analyses revealed enhanced well-being on days with greater creativity with creative practitioners showing stronger relationships in overall well-being, engagement, and accomplishment. Cross-day analyses revealed comparison participants experienced positive carry-over effects of creativity on next-day positive emotions and relationships, while creative practitioners experienced increased next-day negative emotions following creative engagement. Decreased well-being predicted next-day creativity only for comparison participants. These findings suggest that while immediate benefits of creativity may be somewhat universal, temporal dynamics between creativity and well-being differ based on level of creative engagement, highlighting the importance of tailoring interventions.