Creativity from Start to Finish: A “Straight-A” Model of Creative Process and Its Relation to Intelligence

This article describes a “straight-A” model of the creative process. It characterizes the creative process in five overlapping phases, with the variables most affecting those phases characterized as: (1) activators, (2) abilities, (3) amplifiers, (4) appeal to audience, and (5) assessment by audience. The creative process does not complete itself often, in part because all five phases rarely work in the right direction. For example, at Phase 1, there are deactivators as well as activators and at Phase 3, there are attenuators of creativity as well as amplifiers. I further discuss in the article the implications of the model for the relation between creativity and intelligence. In particular, whereas aspects of intelligence (according to the triarchic theory of successful intelligence) involve some degree overlap among creative, analytical, and practical skills, true creativity involves a true conjunction of these skills and is therefore much rarer.     

What's Wrong with Creativity Testing?

Creativity testing as it is now done is often based on a defective assumption that different kinds of creativity can be compressed into a single unidimensional scale. There is no reason to believe that the different kinds of creativity represent, simply, different amounts of a single unidimensional construct. The article shows how three different ways of viewing creativity lead to different ways of measuring creativity, all at variance with current unidimensional models. The point of view presented here does not suggest that current creativity tests are invalid, but rather, that care must be taken in the nature of claims made for them. Moreover, many of the same arguments could be applied to the measurement of intelligence and even wisdom as well.     

“Playing by the Book”: Determinants of Children's Preference for Replicating and Originating Play

Play is children's most important daily behavior and when children play, they do so in multiple ways. With two studies, this paper explores how children perceive a continuum of two play types, namely replicating play (in which models, guidelines, and examples are used to reach an intended result) and originating play (in which children create something from the mind, think freely about how they will play, are less restricted by given models, etc.). Study 1 (N = 56, M_age = 9) quantitatively shows that both play types occur and tests if children also describe the play types as we define them. Results show that children who play originating (vs. replicating) believe they follow less (vs. more) rules and do their own thing more (vs. less), which verifies the definitions of both types of play. Study 2 includes 16 in-depth semi-structured interviews (M_age = 10) and shows which determinants children identify as triggers for engaging in play that has more replicating or more originating elements.