This research explores how social disconnectedness uniquely impacts women's creativity. While loneliness is typically perceived as detrimental, it can also help set individuals free of societal conformist influences. Integrating research on social disconnectedness with social role theory, we hypothesize that loneliness can reduce the influences of women’s traditional gender roles that prescribe conformity and norm compliance, thus enhancing women’s creativity. In comparison, social disconnectedness is expected to have less pronounced impact on men’s creativity as their gender roles already emphasize independence and nonconformity. Using a time-lagged, multisource field study of assembly line workers (n = 188) where we collected real employees’ creative ideas relevant to the workplace, we found that social disconnectedness enhanced creativity for women, but not for men. We conducted follow-up qualitative interviews that produced insights into the underlying, gender-specific mechanism. We then conducted an experiment (n = 200) where we independently manipulated workplace social disconnectedness and participant gender. Results showed that social disconnectedness enhanced women’s (but not men’s) creativity via increased non-conformity. This research challenges the prevailing negative view of loneliness and presents a functional perspective where it can help women overcome traditional limitations and express their creativity.
