Creating All in the Family: A Case Study in Creative Thinking

Research examining the development of creative works suggests that creative products often build on previous works and that, in such cases, the new work can be seen as an extension and synthesis of works known to the creator at that time (Weisberg, 2003a). In recent years, several investigators have applied quantitative methods to the analysis of the development of creative works (e.g., Martindale, 1990; Simonton, 1998; Weisberg, 2003b). The present study extended this quantitative orientation to the analysis of the development of the innovative 1970s television show All in the Family (AITF). The family structure, character portrayals, topical emphases, and goals of AITF were compared with those of its purported "parent," the British situation comedy Till Death Us Do Part (TDUDP), as well as with those of 4 "control" U.S. situation comedies. Statistical analyses demonstrated significant relationships between AITF and TDUDP, while showing significant differences between AITF and TDUDP and the other American shows. Many of the innovations in AITF can be seen as extensions of ideas present in TDUDP. The present study provides further evidence for the feasibility and usefulness of applying quantitative methods to the analysis of the development of creative products. On a substantive level, it appears that AITF represents another in a long line of creative products that built on and extended what was already available to create something new.     

Dynamic Creative Interaction Networks and Team Creativity Evolution: A Longitudinal Study

To assess the dynamical effects of creative interaction networks on team creativity evolution, this paper elaborates a theoretical framework that links the key elements of creative interaction networks, including node, edge and network structure, to creativity in teams. The process of team creativity evolution is divided into four phases, including formation, growth, maturity and decline/restart. The importance of domain‐relevant knowledge, creativity‐relevant skill, interaction frequency, interaction length, network density and closeness centrality are emphasized in specific phases of team creativity evolution in a complex creative context. To test our assumptions, a longitudinal study of creative teams in a “Challenge Cup” Creative Business Plan Competition for university students is performed and the full networks of 17 creative entrepreneur teams are mapped. Both static comparison and dynamic analysis are conducted to analyze the relationship between creative interaction networks and team creativity evolution. For specific phases of team creativity evolution, we find confirmation of our predictions. The implications of dynamic creative interaction networks for all the phases of creative teams from formation to decline/restart are discussed.     

All in the Family:

No abstract available for this article.     

Seeing the Complexity of Standing to the Side: Instructional Dialogues

In this article, we analyze the complexity of using instructional dialogues in the teaching of mathematics. We trace a 10-lesson unit on functions and their graphs taught by Magdalene Lampert to a 5th-grade classroom. We use this trace to help analyze and systematize the complexity of the classroom discourse. Analysis shows that Lampert's instructional dialogues served 2 purposes: They developed coconstructed instructional explanations of the key mathematical concepts, and they allowed the class to navigate a meaningful path through the relevant mathematics. In creating an instructional explanation, the class as a group flagged the central questions, coordinated and differentiated between the central ideas, and anticipated and made public potential errors. Although misconceptions were often raised as part of the public knowledge space, students individually and collectively resolved these misconceptions publicly through the dialogues. The path through the mathematics was supported through the careful use of agendas, sets of conditions under which an aside was taken from the agendas, and the careful problematizing of the mathematics. Routines, metatalk, and the crafting and maintenance of the intellectual climate played important roles in supporting the instructional dialogues. In the cases of routines and metatalk, we make comparisons to other instances of expert teaching. We also show evidence of student engagement and significant student learning that transcended individual participation patterns. We explore implications for teacher education.     

Correction to: Complexity of the Universal Theory of Modal Algebras

Studia Logica - In the original publication of the article, the authors name were abbreviated as “D. Shkatov” and “C. J. Van Alten”. However it should be “Dmitry...     

Deterministic Chaos and Computational Complexity: the Case of Methodological Complexity Reductions

Some problems rarely discussed in traditional philosophy of science are mentioned: The empirical sciences using mathematico-quantitative theoretical models are frequently confronted with several types of computational problems posing primarily methodological limitations on explanatory and prognostic matters. Such limitations may arise from the appearances of deterministic chaos and (too) high computational complexity in general. In many cases, however, scientists circumvent such limitations by utilizing reductional approximations or complexity reductions for intractable problem formulations, thus constructing new models which are computationally tractable. Such activities are compared with reduction types (more) established in philosophy of science. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

阅读障碍学生创造力特征的研究

本研究采用问卷测量的方法,对76名阅读障碍学生的创造力特征以及教师对其创造力评价的客观性进行了研究,结果表明:(1)阅读障碍学生的创造力总分与正常学生并无显著差异,但阅读障碍学生创造力的独特性和抽象性成绩显著优于正常学生。(2)对阅读障碍学生而言,流畅性、精细性和创造力总分存在性别差异;创造力总分亦存在年级差异;独特性与创造力总分在年级与性别因素上均存在交互作用。(3)不同学科教师对正常学生的创造力评价显著高于阅读障碍学生,他们对正常学生的创造力评价基本客观,对阅读障碍学生创造力的评价则与测验成绩呈显著负相关。     

Creative ways to well-being: Reappraisal inventiveness in the context of anger-evoking situations

Neuroscientific studies in the field of creativity mainly focused on tasks drawing on basic verbal divergent thinking demands. This study took a step further by investigating brain mechanisms in response to other types of creative behavior, involving more “real-life” creativity demands in the context of emotion regulation and well-being. Specifically, functional patterns of EEG alpha activity were investigated while participants were required to generate as many and as different ways as possible to reappraise presented anger-eliciting situations in a manner that reduces their anger. Cognitive reappraisal involves some of the same cognitive processes as in conventional verbal creativity tasks, inasmuch as it requires an individual to inhibit or disengage from an emotional event, to shift attention between different perspectives, and to flexibly adopt new solutions. To examine whether alpha oscillations during cognitive reappraisal are different from those during conventional creative ideation, the EEG was also assessed during performance of the Alternative Uses task, requiring individuals to generate as many and as original uses of an object as possible. While cognitive reappraisal was associated with a similar pattern of alpha power as observed in conventional verbal creative ideation, the former yielded significantly stronger alpha power increases at prefrontal sites, along with lower alpha increases at more posterior cortical sites, indicating higher cognitive control and less spontaneous imaginative thought processes in the generation of effective strategies to regulate an ongoing negative emotional state.     

It Is Time to Observe the Creative Process: How to Use a Creative Process Report Diary (CRD)

Although the first research on the creative process was based on interviews with the aim of identifying the main stages (macro‐process), in the last 50 years researchers have focused more on the analysis of micro‐processes, i.e., the mechanisms underlying the generation of ideas. This interest in the micro‐processes is partly a result of the tools available to researchers to carry out rigorous studies on the creative process. In this article, we present a useful and relevant analytical tool for macro‐processes to assess the creative process in a natural context and when it occurs. Here, the reader will find advice on establishing a research protocol for the creative process by using diaries. Examples of diaries and results are presented. The advantage of this tool is that it enables a direct, rich, and inexpensive assessment of the creative process. Thus, the ecological validity of the diary method is particularly high.     

The Creative Process in Visual Art: A Longitudinal Multivariate Study

The purpose of this research was to study the creative process in real-life settings and in a multicomponential perspective of creativity. Relations between the creative process and other important variables (mood, personality, and the creative product) were investigated. The data analyzed were collected in four applied art schools (n = 41) in Switzerland, during mandatory workshops. The creative process was operationalized through 2 subprocesses: generation (idea production) and selection (idea evaluation), both repeatedly measured across the workshops. The trajectories of theses subprocesses were modeled with a commonly used statistical model for longitudinal data (Latent Growth Models). Results showed that generation had an overall decreasing pattern through time, whereas selection had an inverted U-shaped pattern. Important individual differences in both subprocesses and related variables were also found, many of which had strong predictive validity. Indeed, process and personality variables explained 70% of the variance of the evaluation of the final product.     

对明清小说中神仙形象复杂性问题的研究

明清时期通俗小说中的许多神仙形象都具有复杂性和多元性。从道教发展史的角度来看,这样的神仙形象也正是道教世俗化的产物,是“神仙”由单纯的宗教象征进入到世俗领域和普通人生活时的一种变化。本文在这一宗教背景下,探讨了明清小说中神仙形象复杂性和多元性这一文学现象与道教世俗化过程中道教神仙体系对民间神灵的吸收及改造间的联系。     

Prediction Study of Adult Creative Achievement: Torrance's Longitudinal Study of Creativity Revisited

The purpose of this study is to reanalyze Torrance's longitudinal study (1981) by employing a multiple regression analysis to find the best predictors for adult creative achievement. A total of 211 cases were available for this study. The results of the regression analysis led to the predictive rule that comprised the following predictors: creativity test score, childhood future career image, intelligence test score, and the existence of a mentor. These four predictors explained 49% of the total variance in adult creative achievement.     

A Longitudinal Study of Creative Personality in Women

The Mills Longitudinal Study, covering 30 years in the lives of approximately 100 women from the senior year of college to their early 50s, was begun as an investigation of creativity in women. After a presentation of the design of the study and its measures of creative potential and productivity, findings in several areas are reviewed. A central finding is that varied measures of creative potential assessed openness and unconventionality, manifested in both positive and negative ways, whereas creative productivity was associated with these traits along with strong creative motivation and resilience. Creative potential was actualized in some women in self-discovery through relationships rather than in careers. Creative traits showed impressive consistency over time, but the creative vitality of individuals fluctuated considerably with major changes in life situation. Creative productivity showed more relation to psychosocial development than did measures of creative potential.     

Exploring the Effects of Creativity Training on Creative Performance and Creative Self‐Efficacy: Evidence from a Longitudinal Study

In organizations and educational institutions, creativity trainings are the preferred approach to enhancing individual creative abilities. However, three issues regarding these trainings still remain largely unsolved. First, the question of how long‐lasting creativity training effects are has not been sufficiently answered so far. Second, the question arises whether all participants benefit from such trainings equally in terms of their creative performance (CP). Third, an increasing number of studies have shown that creativity trainings may also be able to increase participants' creative self‐efficacy (CSE), that is, the confidence in one's own creativity. Other studies, however, did not find evidence for this effect. Therefore, this article aims to address these issues by analyzing data from three measurement waves. Results reveal that participants' CP increased during the training and decreased only slightly 4 weeks after the training. Additionally, we found an effect of diminishing training returns in that the higher a participant's CP before the training the lower the training effect was. In contrast to most prior literature, we found no support for an effect of creativity training on participants' CSE. We discuss these findings and offer implications for both theory and practice. Finally, we state this study's limitations and derive avenues for further research.     

创造性思维之类比法在医学研究中的应用--论红细胞免疫系统假说的提出

文章阐述了创造性思维之类比法在红细胞免疫系统假说提出及完善中发挥的作用,表明培养学生的创造性思维,在医学实践观察、理论研究及临床思维中是极为重要的.使我们认识到,医学认识目的的实现,需要创造和使用某种适当的认识手段.     

Creative restorations: Holding a mirror to the self in brief dynamic therapy

The author outlines the conceptual framework that underpins psychoanalytic self-psychology, describing the function of the selfobject in meeting the need of the child and later the adult for mirroring, idealisation and essential alikeness, and thereby sustaining the coherence of the self within a structure that takes the form of a tension arc. Drawing from more recent elaborations of the need for optimal responsiveness by the selfobject in mirroring the expansiveness of the self, the author proceeds to compare this conceptual framework with that of Winnicott and Wright, who posited the role of mirroring in the development and realisation of the self. The contribution of mirroring to the facilitation of creativity as well as the relationship between the arts and the realisation of the self are explored in the particular context of the counselling of students in the field of the performing arts. The implications of these concepts are further explored in relation to short-term counselling and this is illustrated with a case example.     

Integrating the Differentiated: A Review of the Personal Construct Approach to Cognitive Complexity

This article reviews personal construct psychology (PCP) research on cognitive complexity. It examines conceptual foundations, measures of cognitive complexity, and a large body of empirical findings. It identifies several ambiguities in the conceptualization of the two components of cognitive complexity: differentiation and integration. These ambiguities lead to inconsistent interpretations of indexes proposed for their measurement and consequently to an inconsistent interpretation of empirical findings. The review of empirical studies identifies many valuable findings that are, however, quite fragmented. After reviewing the relevant cognitive complexity literature, suggestions for future research are discussed. In accordance with PCP's organization corollary, two different types of integration that have different relationships to the component of differentiation are identified that enable researchers to consistently distinguish various types of construing in terms of cognitive complexity and to formulate hypotheses that are open to empirical testing.