The research, prompted by relatively high number of literary families, shows that there may be an inherited element to writing good fiction.
Researchers from Yale in the US and Moscow State University in Russia analysed the creative writing of 511 children aged eight to 17 and 489 of their mothers and 326 fathers.
All the participants wrote stories on particular themes.
For children, the subjects were "were I an elephant" and "were I invisible"; for adolescents "a time machine for an hour" and "visiting a witch"; and for adults "the world from an insect's point of view" and "imagine who lives and what happens on a planet called Priumliava".
The stories were then scored and rated for originality and novelty, plot development and quality, and sophistication and creative use of prior knowledge.
Researchers also carried out detailed intelligence tests and analysed how families functioned in the Russian households.
Taking into account intelligence and family background, the researchers then calculated the inherited and the environmental elements of creative writing.
They found what they describe as a modest but statistically significant genetic element to creative writing.
"This work is unique in its objective to investigate the familiality and heritability of the trait of creative writing," the Independent quoted researchers as saying.
The findings constitute the tip of an interesting iceberg, indicating that there may be some components of creative writing that are familial and heritable.
