Effects of Creative and Non-Creative Work on the Tendency To Drink Alcohol During the Restitution Phase of the Creative Process

An experimental study explored how type of task (hard or light creative task or hard non-creative task) would affect the propensity to drink either alcoholic or nonalcoholic beverages. Subjects worked for forty minutes and a following taste test indicated that subjects working on the hard creative task drank more totally and more of both the alcohol and the placebo drinks than subjects working on the hard non-creative task. Also subjects with light creative work drank more alcohol than did the control subjects. The results were discussed in terms of a need to calm down during a phase of restitution after creative work. The results are in keeping with how creative artists seem to use alcohol.