The Dynamics of Creative Ideation: Introducing a New Assessment Paradigm

Despite six decades of creative cognition research, measures of creative ideation have heavily relied on divergent thinking tasks, which still suffer from conceptual, design, and psychometric shortcomings. These shortcomings have greatly impeded the accurate study of creative ideation, its dynamics, development, and integration as part of a comprehensive psychological assessment. After a brief overview of the historical and current anchoring of creative ideation measurement, overlooked challenges in its most common operationalization (i.e., divergent thinking tasks framework) are discussed. They include (1) the reliance on a single stimulus as a starting point of the creative ideation process (stimulus-dependency), (2) the analysis of response quality based on a varying number of observations across test-takers (fluency-dependency), and (3) the production of “static” cumulative performance indicators. Inspired from an emerging line of work from the field of cognitive neuroscience of creativity, this paper introduces a new assessment framework referred to as “Multi-Trial Creative Ideation” (MTCI). This framework shifts the current measurement paradigm by (1) offering a variety of stimuli presented in a well-defined set of ideation “trials,” (2) reinterprets the concept of ideational fluency using a time-analysis of idea generation, and (3) captures individual dynamics in the ideation process (e.g., modeling the effort-time required to reach a response of maximal uncommonness) while controlling for stimulus-specific sources of variation. Advantages of the MTCI framework over the classic divergent thinking paradigm are discussed in light of current directions in the field of creativity research

Creativity assessment: Pitfalls, solutions, and standards

This is an introduction to the special issue \u27Creativity Assessment: Pitfalls, Solutions, and Standards.\u27 This special issue (SI) provides a much-needed critical review of current practice in creativity assessment and existing measures, outlining common pitfalls, while suggesting important guidelines and standards for best practice in creativity research and directions for the field. After a general overview of common assessment practice in the field (Snyder, Hammond, Grohman, & Katz-Buonincontro, 2019), several contributions in this SI address challenges and new developments regarding the measurement of divergent thinking (Acar & Runco, 2019; Reiter-Palmon, Forthmann, & Barbot, 2019), consensual assessment technique and subjective ratings (Cseh & Jeffries, 2019; Myszkowski & Storme, 2019; Primi, Silvia, Benedek, & Jauk, 2019), and self-report methodology (Kaufman, 2019). Recent developments and methodological recommendations relevant to creativity assessment on topics including neuroscience of creativity methods (Benedek, Christensen, Fink, & Beaty, 2019), experience sampling (Cotter & Silvia, 2019), developmental methods (Barbot, 2019), selfbeliefs research (Karwowski, Han, & Beghetto, 2019), and crosscultural studies of creativity (Glaveanu, 2019) are also represented. The SI concludes with a general commentary on these contributions, outlining recommendations for best practice in creativity assessment (Barbot, Hass, & Reiter-Palmon, 2019)

Structures identitaires et expression créative à l’adolescence

Le paradigme de Marcia (1966) offre un cadre pertinent pour comprendre les liens entre l’identité et la créativité : il permet d’identifier des structures identitaires (ou statuts) qui pourraient favoriser l’expression créative. Cette hypothèse est examinée dans une recherche étudiant les liens entre les statuts et des facteurs impliqués dans la créativité (la pensée divergente et la pratique d’activités créatives). 1 139 élèves scolarisés en classes de troisième à première ont complété une mesure du statut identitaire, une tâche de pensée divergente, et un questionnaire renseignant leurs pratiques créatives. Des analyses de variance indiquent un effet significatif du statut sur la pensée divergente et les pratiques créatives, et suggèrent des effets modérateurs du sexe et de l’âge quant au lien entre identité et créativité. Ces résultats sont discutés en termes de développement interactif de l’identité et de la créativité, offrant des perspectives utiles aux théories de l’identité, soucieuses de leurs applications pratiques.Marcia’s paradigm (1966) offers a relevant framework to understand the links between identity and creativity: it makes it possible to identify identity structures (or statuses) which could support creative expression. This hypothesis is examined in a research studying links between statuses and factors engaged in creative expression (divergent thinking and practice of creative activities). 1139 adolescents of middle and high schools completed a measure of identity status, a divergent thinking task, and a questionnaire informing their creative practices. Analyses of variance indicate a significant effect of identity status on divergent thinking and creative practices, and suggest a moderating effect of sex and age in the links between identity and creativity. These results are discussed in terms of interactive development of identity and creativity, offering useful prospects for identity theories concerned with practical applications

Scoring divergent thinking tests: A review and systematic framework

Divergent thinking tests are often used in creativity research as measures of creative potential. However, measurement approaches across studies vary to a great extent. One facet of divergent thinking measurement that contributes strongly to differences across studies is the scoring of participants’ responses. Most commonly, responses are scored for fluency, flexibility, and originality. However, even with respect to only one dimension (e.g., originality), scoring decisions vary extensively. In the current work, a systematic framework for practical scoring decisions was developed. Scoring dimensions, instruction-scoring fit, adequacy of responses, objectivity (vs. subjectivity), level of scoring (response vs. ideational pool level), and the method of aggregation were identified as determining factors of divergent thinking test scoring. In addition, recommendations and guidelines for making these decisions and reporting the information in papers have been provided

Creativity assessment in psychological research: (Re)setting the standards

This commentary discusses common relevant themes that have been highlighted across contributions in this special issue on \u27Creativity Assessment: Pitfalls, Solutions, and Standards.\u27 We first highlight the challenges of operationalizing creativity through the use of a range of measurement approaches that are simply not tapping into the same aspect of creativity. We then discuss pitfalls and challenges of the three most popular measurement methods employed in the field, namely divergent thinking tasks, product-based assessment using the consensual assessment techniques, and self-report methodology. Finally, we point to two imperative standards that emerged across contributions in this collection of articles, namely transparency (need to accurately define, operationalize, and report on the specific aspect[s] of creativity studied) and homogenization of creativity assessment (identification and consistent use of an optimal \u27standard\u27 measure for each major aspect of creativity). We conclude by providing directions on how the creativity research community and the field can meet these standards

Postseismic deformation following the 1999 Chi-Chi earthquake, Taiwan: Implication for lower-crust rheology

On 1999 September 21, the Mw 7.6 Chi-Chi earthquake ruptured a segment of the Chelungpu Fault, a frontal thrust fault of the Western Foothills of Taiwan. The stress perturbation induced by the rupture triggered a transient deformation across the island, which was well recorded by a wide network of continuously operating GPS stations. The analysis of more than ten years of these data reveals a heterogeneous pattern of postseismic displacements, with relaxation times varying by a factor of more than ten, and large cumulative displacements at great distances, in particular along the Longitudinal Valley in eastern Taiwan, where relaxation times are also longer. We show that while afterslip is the dominant relaxation process in the epicentral area, viscoelastic relaxation is needed to explain the pattern and time evolution of displacements at the larger scale. We model the spatiotemporal behavior of the transient deformation as the result of afterslip on the décollement that extends downdip of the Chelungpu thrust, and viscoelastic flow in the lower crust and in the mid-crust below the Central Range. We construct a model of deformation driven by coseismic stress change where afterslip and viscoelastic flow are fully coupled. The model is compatible with the shorter relaxation times observed in the near field, which are due to continued fault slip, and the longer characteristic relaxation times and the reversed polarity of vertical displacements observed east of the Central Range. Our preferred model shows a viscosity of 0.5–1 X 10^(19) Pa s at lower-crustal depths and 5 X 10^(17) Pa s in the mid-crust below the Central Range, between 10 and 30 km depth. The low-viscosity zone at mid-crustal depth below the Central Range coincides with a region of low seismicity where rapid advection of heat due to surface erosion coupled with underplating maintain high temperatures, estimated to be between 300°C and 600°C from the modeling of thermo-chronology and surface heat flow data

Capturing Age-group Differences and Developmental Change with the BASC Parent Rating Scales

Estimation of age-group differences and intra-individual change across distinct developmental periods is often challenged by the use of age-appropriate (but non-parallel) measures. We present a short version of the Behavior Assessment System (Reynolds & Kamphaus, 1998), Parent Rating Scales for Children (PRS-C) and Adolescents (PRS-A), which uses only their common-items to derive estimates of the initial constructs optimized for developmental studies. Measurement invariance of a three-factor model (Externalizing, Internalizing, Adaptive Skills) was tested across age-groups (161 mothers using PRS-C; 200 mothers using PRS-A) and over time (115 mothers using PRS-C at baseline and PRS-A five years later) with the original versus short PRS. Results indicated that the short PRS holds a sufficient level of invariance for a robust estimation of age-group differences and intra-individual change, as compared to the original PRS, which held only weak invariance leading to flawed developmental inferences. Importance of test-content parallelism for developmental studies is discussed

Differences in Judgments of Creativity: How Do Academic Domain, Personality, and Self-Reported Creativity Influence Novice Judges’ Evaluations of Creative Productions?

Intelligence assessment is often viewed as a narrow and ever-narrowing field, defined (as per IQ) by the measurement of finely distinguished cognitive processes. It is instructive, however, to remember that other, broader conceptions of intelligence exist and might usefully be considered for a comprehensive assessment of intellectual functioning. This article invokes a more holistic, systems theory of intelligence—the theory of successful intelligence—and examines the possibility of including in intelligence assessment a similarly holistic measure of creativity. The time and costs of production-based assessments of creativity are generally considered prohibitive. Such barriers may be mitigated by applying the consensual assessment technique using novice raters. To investigate further this possibility, we explored the question: how much do demographic factors such as age and gender and psychological factors such as domain-specific expertise, personality or self-perceived creativity affect novices’ unidimensional ratings of creativity? Fifty-one novice judges from three undergraduate programs, majoring in three disparate expertise domains (i.e., visual art, psychology and computer science) rated 40 child-generated Lego creatures for creativity. Results showed no differences in creativity ratings based on the expertise domains of the judges. However, judges’ personality and self-perception of their own everyday creativity appeared to influence the way they scored the creatures for creativity

Identifying Learning Patterns of Children at Risk for Specific Reading Disability

Differences in learning patterns of vocabulary acquisition in children at risk (+SRD) and not at risk (SRD) for Specific Reading Disability (SRD) were examined using a microdevelopmental paradigm applied to the multi-trial Foreign Language Learning Task (FLLT; Baddeley et al., 1995). The FLLT was administered to 905 children from rural Chitonga-speaking Zambia. A multi-group Latent Growth Curve Model (LGCM) was implemented to study interindividual differences in intraindividual change across trials. Results showed that the +SRD group recalled fewer words correctly in the first trial, learned at a slower rate during the subsequent trials, and demonstrated a more linear learning pattern compared to the SRD group. This study illustrates the promise of LGCM applied to multi-trial learning tasks, by isolating three components of the learning process (initial recall, rate of learning, and functional pattern of learning). Implications of this microdevelopmental approach to SRD research in low-to-middle income countries are discussed

Advancing Creativity Theory and Research: A Socio-cultural Manifesto

This manifesto, discussed by 20 scholars, representing diverse lines of creativity research, marks a conceptual shift within the field. Socio-cultural approaches have made substantial contributions to the concept of creativity over recent decades and today can provide a set of propositions to guide our understanding of past research and to generate new directions of inquiry and practice. These propositions are urgently needed in response to the transition from the Information Society to the Post-Information Society. Through the propositions outlined here, we aim to build common ground and invite the community of creativity researchers and practitioners to reflect up, study, and cultivate creativity as a socio-cultural phenomenon