A proposito della “creatività schizofrenica”: una rilettura del nesso tra genio e follia alla luce delle scienze cognitive incarnate

This paper critically examines the enduring myth of “schizophrenic creativity”, understood as a supposed causal link between psychotic disorders and enhanced creative abilities. Drawing on a historical and epistemological critique of the romantic association between genius and madness, the article presents an integrated analysis of linguistic and artistic productions in individuals with schizophrenia spectrum disorders. Combining clinical phenomenology, cognitive science, neurolinguistics, and contemporary neuroscience of creativity, the study argues that expressive manifestations commonly labelled as “creative” in schizophrenia fail to meet the standard definition of creativity, which requires both originality and contextual appropriateness. Quantitative evidence and meta-analytic findings consistently show that, although psychotic subjects may produce unusual associations, they often exhibit impairments in executive control and pragmatic effectiveness, preventing these productions from functioning as adaptive creative outputs. On this basis, the paper advances a conceptual shift from creativity as a trait or product to creativity as an embodied process of sense-making. From this perspective, schizophrenic artistic and linguistic expressions are interpreted not as aesthetic achievements, but as situated and meaningful strategies through which individuals attempt to represent and stabilize an idiosyncratic experiential world marked by the loss of natural self-evidence.