Are Creative People More Susceptible to False Memory? Evidence for Age- and Task-Related Differences

Prior research suggests that people high in quantitative divergent thinking - the ability to fluently and flexibly generate original ideas - are more likely to falsely recognize novel yet related items. However, it remains unknown whether this relationship extends to later life, when memory errors are salient. We investigated this in a sample that completed multiple measures of these constructs (n = 334, 138 older adults, 196 younger adults). Although we observed a positive association between quantitative divergent thinking and false recognition on one of our four memory tasks, this relationship applied only to younger adults, and was restricted to one of our two divergent thinking cues. Evidence for this association at the latent level was mixed in that it was nonsignificant for related lure false recognition and significant but restricted to younger adults for corrected false recognition (β = 0.17 to 0.22). Additionally, we observed a negative relationship between latent originality and false recognition in younger adults, suggesting that younger adults who generate more original ideas are less susceptible to false memory. These results suggest that although divergent thinking and false memory may be positively related on some tasks, this relationship may be sensitive to task and age differences.