Do You Have The Funny Kind Of Crazy?

“’The creative elements needed to produce humor are strikingly similar to those characterizing the cognitive style of people with psychosis — both schizophrenia and bipolar disorder,’ said Gordon Claridge of the University of Oxford’s department of experimental psychology, who led the study. “Although schizophrenic psychosis itself can be detrimental to humor, in its lesser form it can increase people’s ability to associate odd or unusual things or to think ‘outside the box. Equally, manic thinking — which is common in people with bipolar disorder — may help people combine ideas to form new, original and humorous connections.”