What If Einstein Had Taken Ritalin?

[Tara]

What If Einstein Had Taken Ritalin?

ADHD's Impact on Creativity

February 3, 2005; Page D1



In American schools these days, countless class clowns are sitting down and shutting up. In chemistry labs, students who used to mix chemicals haphazardly, out of an insatiable curiosity, now focus on their textbooks. In English classes, kids who once stared out the windows, concocting crazy life stories about passersby, now face the blackboard.

Ritalin and other drugs for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder have helped many children improve their focus and behavior -- to the great relief of parents and teachers. But ADHD support groups offer long lists of out-of-the-box thinkers who had classic ADHD traits such as impulsivity, a penchant for day-dreaming, and disorganized lives. Among those who are believed to have had the disorder: Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, Salvador Dali, Winston Churchill.

The question is whether the Ritalin Revolution will sap tomorrow's work force of some of its potential genius. What will be the repercussions in corporations, comedy clubs, and research labs?

Some researchers now wonder if would-be Einsteins and Edisons will choose different career paths because their creativity and drive are dulled by ADHD drugs. They also worry that the stigma of being labeled with ADHD could lead some kids to lose confidence, and dream smaller dreams.

Albert Einstein

This concern comes as more parents are being forced to weigh the sometimes dramatic benefits of ADHD drugs against the unknown that accompanies any new generation of treatment. As many as 12% of kids today have been labeled with ADHD, and the number of kids' prescriptions for ADHD drugs, including Strattera and Adderall, rose 23% between 2000 and 2003, according to the latest figures from Medco Health Solutions Inc. ADHD drug prescriptions for pre-schoolers were up 49%.

A person who focuses better taking Ritalin can be "like a horse with blinders, plodding along. He's moving forward, getting things done, but he's less open to inspiration," says Lara Honos-Webb, a psychologist at Santa Clara University. In her new book, due out next month and titled "The Gift of ADHD," she identifies "gifts" that often accompany the disorder, including creativity, exuberance and intuition. She believes ADHD drugs temper these traits.

But others who treat ADHD argue that when children are given appropriate drug regimens, they become far more capable. "God knows what Einstein would have accomplished had he been diagnosed and treated," says Wilma Fellman, a career counselor who helps clients with ADHD.

It's too early for there to be long-term career studies about today's Ritalin generation. And certainly, many who take Ritalin say it helps; some describe it as quieting the circus in the room. Still, a lot of adults who've excelled as entrepreneurs, performers, politicians and communicators trace their successes to their ADHD.

In seventh grade in the late 1970s, Erich Muller was such a class clown that his teachers actually sentenced him to more days of detention than there were days in the school year. They had a cubicle-like enclosure built atop his desk to keep his eyes from wandering. They said he should be on Ritalin. His parents refused.

"As a kid, I'd see a thousand different things in every cloud," says Mr.

Muller. "Teachers told my parents I was 'too creative.' Too creative like who?

Picasso?" He now goes by the name "Mancow," and, based in Chicago, is one of the nation's highest-paid radio personalities.

David Neeleman, CEO of JetBlue Airways, never took drugs for his ADHD, and is now an advocate for kids with the disorder. He says ADHD helps him think unconventionally, and he worries that if he took medication, he'd be like everyone else. He has found techniques to concentrate better, while hiring others to handle organizational details. He is credited with inventing the electronic airline ticket, which was in part an effort to help people with the classic ADHD trait of forgetfulness.

Too many kids, especially boys who are merely rambunctious, are being given the drugs with just cursory evaluations, says William Pollack, an assistant c linical professor at Harvard Medical School.

In his ongoing research into boyhood, Dr. Pollack has found anecdotal evidence that Ritalin renders some kids less interested in pursuing creative opportunities. One boy he studied had been active in his school's science club. After he was put on Ritalin, he felt like the spark inside him was extinguished. He lost interest in the science club and dropped out. Eventually, he stopped taking Ritalin, returned to the club, and developed a flashlight alarm system that won a major science competition.

Another subject in Dr. Pollack's research is a math whiz in his 40s who was hyperactive as a child. As an adult, the man earned several hundred million dollars developing computer technology. "His ideas come to him in a flash,"

explains Dr. Pollack. "He feels that if he had been given Ritalin as a child, he'd have just ended up as a teaching assistant in some science course."

This man did try Ritalin recently because his wife said his hyperactivity was hurting their marriage. But he found the drug stifled his thinking. He's now trying behavioral techniques to be calmer at home.

ADHD drugs are good for patching up weaknesses, not enhancing strengths, says Dr. Honos-Webb. "If your parents want you to be a lawyer, maybe these drugs can help you do that." But she believes a child on Ritalin is less likely to be the next great dot-com pioneer or even a Robin Williams-like comic.

She wishes more parents would see their kids' futures in less-rigid terms.

"Spaciness," she insists, "is a path to inspiration."

• E-mail: Jeffrey.Zaslow at wsj.com





Copyright 2005 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved

URL for this article:

http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB110738397416844127,00.html

[Gregster]

Or maybe Einstein would have figured out the grand unification theory problem!
I don't feel stimulants stifle my thinking, but to each his own, I guess.

[Tara]

I have mostly heard people being afraid that stimulants will stifle their creativity. I don't know any people have taken Ritalin and have had it stifle their creativity. If creativity is somebody's biggest worry then maybe they don't need the ADD meds in the 1st place.

[Ian]

I've had more thoughts worth having while on stimulants that ever before.

Although there is a niggling thought regarding a conversation I had with a Union president for corrections officers.

We had a great gab on a flight to Vancouver that's left me wondering about the meds I'm taking and the success I've been attributing to them. When I asked him if prison offered any real chance at rehabilitation he said yes.. if the man is in his forties. Before that point it's not realistic to believe the reforms are authentic. If they are in their mid forties then the chances are quite real that the reforms would stick and the guy would go straight and stay that way.

I've never been able to confirm this anywhere but it's stuck in my mind that this observation may have merit.

Anyway I'm not sure now whether my new insight and changes are as a result of the Dexedrine or my age. At the very least it was fun to think about.
Ian.

[RhapsodyInBlue]

Interesting article, but I have no idea about Ritalin and can only relate it to a study I have seen which was done in a documentary regarding Prozac, the anti-depressant.

It was trialed on highly creative persons across the spectrum. ALL of these creative types reported a "block" of some type or another.

As a creative, I can relate to this. I need the slight depression to be expressive in art forms of any medium.

If I remember correctly, stimulants were once used to treat depression, so creatives "may" have a point worth noting.

[free2bme]

If Einstein had been on stimulant medication I would bet he'd have accomplished even MORE more then he did, not less. I'm both a musician and a writer and I haven't found my creativity stifled in the least. On the contrary, I now find myself able to get things done in a more efficient manner, allowing more time to BE creative in the first place. The notion that creative people thrive best under some sort of psychological strain just seems a bit too much like major stereotyping for me to buy into it. Hasn't been my experience anyway.

[Garry]

I also don't find my creativity to be stunted in any way and I find the meds allow me to carry through more thoroughly when I decide on a coarse of action.

What I feel that needs to be discussed more is the inflexability of society to see that some people just plain aren't interested in learning some things like how to spell or do a certain type of math, yet it is forced on them anyway as that is what is mandated in the school system.

Let kids learn what really interests them (after they have learned the basics or how to read and add subtract multiply and divide.)

Why force French, or spelling,and so on

my opinion for what its worth

[abre los ojos]

My creativity has increased substantially since starting medication. My creativity comes in the form of taking seemingly unrelated ideas and combining them into a single, simple hypothesis. My inspiration has inceased, rather than decreased. Medication has made me more of who I already am.

[RhapsodyInBlue]

Originally Posted by free2bme

If Einstein had been on stimulant medication I would bet he'd have accomplished even MORE more then he did, not less. I'm both a musician and a writer and I haven't found my creativity stifled in the least. On the contrary, I now find myself able to get things done in a more efficient manner, allowing more time to BE creative in the first place. The notion that creative people thrive best under some sort of psychological strain just seems a bit too much like major stereotyping for me to buy into it. Hasn't been my experience anyway.

Your post intrigues me, Free. As a musician, is it not possible that it would depend on the type of music you are making? I can relate to you saying it seems a bit too much like stereotyping, but I spoke from personal experience of "performance" more than the actual creative process which leads up to it.

In "performance" do you feel that extremely sad music, such as death scenes, could be aided by a slight depressive feeling, and closer relationship to the music to be "perfomed"?

I really need that slight "down" feeling to get into the depths, and even caffeine is something I will refrain from injesting for up to 6 hrs prior to performance. That's not just me; I know many classical singers who do the same thing. Caffeine is not our friend.

But as for the preliminary creative process of working out how I will deliver a performance, yes, caffeine is my best friend

Basically, I think I am speaking of the actual delivery of the performance; not the process beforehand.

As for writing, yes, I agree totally with you.

[budwzr]

This first post is typical of how non-ADHD people judge us, by our outward behaviors. The most important thing to the masses is that we calm down and assume their "Borg" mentality.

They snide like pigs.

[Archon]

Originally Posted by budwzr

This first post is typical of how non-ADHD people judge us, by our outward behaviors.

What... are they supposed to judge us by our inward behaviours?

The most important thing to the masses is that we calm down and assume their "Borg" mentality.

They snide like pigs.

Oh please.

The link between ADHD and creativity has no merit. If you personally are creative, that's because you're a creative person. No correlation has been found suggesting ADHD might impart any benefits in and of itself.

Second of all, turn that paradigm on its head and say "How many Einsteins have we missed because we didn't develop appropriate treatments?"

Stimulants (in this case cocaine) have a long history of being used by artists and academics because it was thought to INCREASE productivity. This whole premise is based on an urban myth.

[psychokitty]

I did have an interesting experience, not long after I started taking ritalin.

I am an ESL teacher, and some of my most interesting and fun lessons have stemmed from me following the subjects and tangents that came up in the free conversation time in the first fifteen minutes of the class. I could take anything, and run with it....and make up a lesson on the spot.

After I started taking ritalin I was doing a class.....and was suprised when no flashes of brilliance came.....I had to look back at my lesson plan (which unusually I had completed) and actually follow the lesson plan
I`d lost my ability to creatively go off on a tangent

[doiadhd]

He was probably on opium,or some other form of legal drug,back then.

[johnny s.]

if he had maybe he could have figured out how to apply his theory of time travel!

[Prusilusken]

Einstein...on Ritalin...?
Well, we'll never know, will we?
So...well, while I'd probably find it interesting to do a bit of 4am, drunken philosophy on this subject once in a while, like I do the subject of time travelling and "what if I had a tail, what would it look like, and how ******* awesome would that be!" ...I do think it's "play thought" and impossible to answer (well, the specific 'What if Einstein (or insert any other deceased person's name) Had Been on Rit' one) so therefore futile and a pretty much a waste of time (Nope, didn't take my meds today, so that's not why I'm being a bore, hehe! )

That being said, I really hope that the subject in it's essence (creativity, thinking out of the box, people's ability to innovate and run with it, 'allowing' accidents to happen (take penicillin, e.g.) for whatever reason and thereby stumbling upon amazing possibilities and the effects our environment, including whatever meds we take) will continue to get a great ammount of attention now and in the future.

I do believe it's a serious issue, and that monitoring ALL effects from our meds and take the results seriously is imperative. And I take the possible risk of loosing my (alleged) creativity as seriously as a possible cancer risk, if not more.

That being said, I feel as creative on meds as I do off meds. The quality of the creativity sometimes changes a bit - not for the worse, just for the different - and I do find that all in all I am gaining from the meds and will be even more in the future, when I've learned to work this difference to my advantage, e.g. by finding out how and when - and when not - taking my meds is the most beneficial for my wellbeing.

Psychokitty: I do recognise the scenario you describe, and I know how weird it felt first time I 'didn't just do it' - scary! But my thinking on this subject is, that what we experience in situations like that has more to do with the meds working wonders(?) on our impulse control than it has to do with actually stifling our creative abilities as such. Seeding-creativethoughtimpulserun-with-it becomes bubbling creative thought...hmmm (subconsciously)...and the moment is gone or has lost it's innocence before it even reaches 'you'...and you stand there, ready to catch the surprise screwball that you're used to just 'almost-thinking-about' before you can trust it to arrive...but it's not really a surprise anymore, because the meds has given your brain the opportunity to begin processing the thought before the action, where earlier, you were in surprise action and your (conscious) brain had to process the creative impulse you had on the go. Probably sometimes with risky-to-dire results - but sometimes also giving you and your class 'LIKE! The coolest, bestest, funniest, potentially life changing, lightbulb moment, like! E-VAR!!'

Instead...just the blank space. Pause. And we're not used to it. We have NO idea how to handle it, because we've never had to fight for it to come before, improvising being a very welltrained part of our personality, whether owing it to natural talent or a well trained coping mechanism or a combination.
Probably (maybe certainly) thanks to our ADD, at least in part.

My way around this is working to pick up a few new skills to use as a safety net in similar situations, and also - finding out when and when not to take my meds, maybe try out a smaller dose for certain situations. I have not gotten this down to anywhere near perfection (yet) and we can never plan for every eventuality, but I do believe that there are ways to work around this issue, I've had some luck already, experimenting in this way, so I am hopeful. I hope you are too!

I'm sorry if I strayed too much OT...?
If I did, I'll be happy to edit. I feel I am on topic, but I have known to be wrong before, so...