Active or Inert? An Experimental Comparison of Creative Ideation across Incubation Periods

The primary objective of this study was to contribute to the growing research discipline investigating the effects of physical exercise on divergent thinking creativity performance. Thirty‐two students participated in this two‐visit, within‐subject intervention. Individuals consented to participate in two randomized, and counterbalanced, experimental conditions, consisting of 15 min of active treadmill walking and an inert, seated control incubation period. Creativity was assessed at baseline and post‐exercise (and control) via the Instances Creativity Task (ICT). Creativity scores for changes in fluency (F(1, 31) = 2.90, p = .10) were not statistically significant across the experimental conditions. Originality scores were higher at baseline and follow‐up when compared to the exercise condition (F(1, 31) = 6.82, p = .01). However, there was no statistically significant condition × time interaction effect (F(1, 31) = 1.78, p = .19). Further analyses demonstrated that there was no statistically significant difference between the experimental conditions on recall score (F(1, 31) = 1.04, p = .32). All models indicated statistically significant main effects for time: fluency (F(1, 31) = 131.17, p < .001); originality (F(1, 31) = 36.54, p < .001); and recall (F(1, 31) = 51.75, p < .001). These findings suggest that both active and inert creative incubation periods may similarly enhance subsequent divergent thinking performance.     

Teachers’ Perceptions of Students’ Creativity in China’s Classrooms: The Role of Students’ Academic Achievement and Misbehaviors

Teachers can be biased, especially toward low achievers and students with behavioral issues. However, creative students often appear to be disruptive in the classroom, and many of them struggle academically. The purpose of the present study was to examine the extent to which teachers’ perceptions of students’ creativity is associated with students’ academic achievement and classroom (mis)behaviors, as well as to examine the interaction between these two factors. Three hundred and fifty‐four eighth‐grade students selected from five middle schools in China participated in this study. Using achievement scores, peer nominations, a divergent thinking test, a self‐rated ideational behavior scale, and teacher ratings, the present study found that, whereas creativity has no significant relationship with teachers’ perceptions, academic achievements and misbehavior are significantly associated within structors’ perceptions. The achievement bias resulted in the underestimation of low achievers’ creativity, even when the low achievers were highly creative. More nuances emerged when student misbehaviors were considered. Specifically, misbehaving low achievers’ originality was further underestimated even when they were highly original. In contrast, teachers overestimated well‐behaved high achievers’ creativity, even when the students comprised the lowest creativity group. The results are further discussed from a socio‐cultural perspective.     

Visual perspective as a two-dimensional construct in episodic future thought

Visual perspective (first-person vs. third-person) is a salient characteristic of memory and mental imagery with important cognitive and behavioural consequences. Most work on visual perspective treats it as a unidimensional construct. However, third-person perspective can have opposite effects on emotion and motivation, sometimes intensifying these and other times acting as a distancing mechanism, as in PTSD. For this reason among others, we propose that visual perspective in memory and mental imagery is best understood as varying along two dimensions: first, the degree to which first-person perspective predominates in the episodic imagery, and second, the degree to which the self is visually salient from a third-person perspective. We show that, in episodic future thinking, these are anticorrelated but non-redundant. These results further our basic understanding of the potent but divergent effects visual perspective has on emotion and motivation, both in everyday life and in psychiatric conditions.     

即刻消退缺损的原因分析及其神经生物学机制

即刻消退缺损(immediate extinction deficit, IED)是指在条件性恐惧习得后, 立即进行的消退训练不能长期抑制恐惧记忆的现象。IED可能与消退起始时的应激水平和事件分割等因素有关。在高应激水平下, 消退记忆的巩固受损导致IED; 而在中等或较低的应激水平条件下, 即刻消退有效但效果可能容易受事件分割的影响。IED的神经生物学机制涉及应激激活蓝斑去甲肾上腺素能系统, 去甲肾上腺素引起杏仁核基底外侧核(basolateral amygdala, BLA)过度兴奋, 然后BLA通过投射突触抑制在恐惧消退中起核心作用的内侧前额叶神经元的活动。未来研究应注意即刻消退缺损引起的长期后果, 并深入探讨如何优化即刻消退在临床上的应用。     

Creation and humanity: Veli-Matti Kärkäinen's answer to the ultimate question

This article focuses on the third volume of Vel-Matti Kärkkäinen's systematic theology, titled Creation and Humanity. After a brief overview of the volume the article offers some clarification on the tenth chapter, especially on its interaction with paleontology. After that, two constructive observations follow. The first is related to Kärkkäinen's notion of the embeddedness of human nature, and the second is to further employ systems thinking in his constructive work on creation and human evolution.     

The (Dis)Pleasures of Creativity: Spontaneous Eye Blink Rate during Divergent and Convergent Thinking Depends on Individual Differences in Positive and Negative Affect

Previous research has demonstrated that individual differences in affect and motivation predict divergent and convergent thinking performance, two thinking processes involved in creative idea generation. Individual differences in affect and motivation also predict spontaneous eye blink rate (sEBR) during divergent and convergent thinking; and sEBR predicts divergent and convergent thinking performance. This study investigates experimentally whether the relationship between sEBR and divergent and convergent thinking depends on individual differences in affect and motivation. Eighty-two participants completed the Emotion/motivation-related Divergent and Convergent thinking styles Scale (EDICOS; G. Soroa et al., 2015), performed the alternative uses task (AUT; divergent thinking) or the remote associates task (RAT; convergent thinking), while their sEBR was captured with an eye-tracker. The results showed that individual differences in positive affect positively correlated with sEBR for the AUT, whereas individual differences in negative affect positively correlated with sEBR for the RAT. Furthermore, the interaction between individual differences in positive and negative affect and sEBR predicted divergent and convergent thinking performance. The contribution of our study is therefore that individual differences in positive and negative affect can both positively correlate with sEBR during divergent and convergent thinking; and that this predicts divergent and convergent thinking performance.     

Instructions Moderate the Relationship between Creative Performance in Figural Divergent Thinking and Reasoning Capacity

In this study with within-subject design, the “be-creative effect” was investigated using three instructions in figural divergent-thinking tasks: Besides a be-fluent instruction, a be-creative instruction, and a be-creative instruction combined with strategies were applied. In addition, reasoning ability as part of fluid intelligence, self-reported creative ideation, current motivation after reading the instructions, and task-related interest were assessed. Multilevel analysis applying random-intercept-constant-slope models found significant main effects of the instructions on creative performance and fluency. Both be-creative instructions yielded a rise in creative performance in divergent thinking tasks with additional improvement due to supporting strategies. The be-fluent instruction enhanced the quantity of ideas but decreased creative performance. Task-related interest turned out to be a better predictor of creative performance than the self-estimated expected interest prior to working on the task. Moreover, the relationship of creative performance and reasoning ability was moderated by instruction, with no relationship with a be-fluent instruction and small to moderate positive effects with both instructions emphasizing creative ideas.     

Toward the bigger picture: Concrete and abstract thinking about a transgression,and the role of time in interpersonal forgiveness

Rumination is commonly considered detrimental to forgiveness. In contrast, we propose that different forms of post-transgression thinking are differentially effective for forgiveness, depending on their timing. Concrete thinking focuses on event details, whereas abstract thinking abstracts from details and views the event in a broader context. Following construal level theory, we propose that concrete thinking is increasingly ill-matched, and abstract thinking better matched, to the construal abilities and motivation afforded by psychological distance. Hence, over time, concrete thinking would be negatively, and abstract thinking positively, associated with forgiveness. Two correlational recall studies, with time since transgression measured (Study 1) or manipulated (Study 2), demonstrated that with greater temporal distance concrete thinking was more negatively, and abstract thinking more positively, related to forgiveness. Study 3 employed a prospective-longitudinal methodology over five time-points; intra-individual decrease in concrete thinking and increase in abstract thinking over time were related to higher levels of forgiveness.     

高校教师教学水平评价概化理论预算限制下最佳样本量估计

使用“高校教师教学水平评价问卷”,要求566名学生对19名教师进行评价,对收集到的数据作不同的概化设计,包括t×i、（s：t）×i、（s：t）×（i：v）和（s：t）×（i：v）×o四种设计。基于概化理论,结合预算限制,统一LaGrange乘法公式,自行推导不同设计的最佳样本量公式,联合估计的方差分量,计算出不同设计的最佳样本量。结果表明：（1）LaGrange乘法统一公式表现出较强的通用性,能够适用于预算限制下各种概化设计;（2）评价场合是影响高校教师教学水平评价一个相当重要的因素;（3）（s：t）×（i：v）×o是高校教师教学水平评价概化理论预算限制下最优概化设计;（4）高校教师教学水平评价概化理论预算限制下,每位教师最佳评价学生人数为20人,每个维度最佳评价题目数为3题。     

Emotion matters: The influence of valence on episodic future thinking in young and older adults

In young adults, valence not only alters the degree to which future events are imagined in rich episodic detail, but also how memorable these events are later on. For older adults, how valence influences episodic detail generation while imagining future events, or recalling these details at another time, remains unclear. We investigated the effect of valence on the specificity and memorability of episodic future thinking (EFT) in young and older adults. Among young and older adults, negative EFT was accompanied by less episodic detail generation relative to positive and neutral EFT. A similar reduction in episodic specificity for negative EFT was found two days later when participants recalled their previously imagined events. Notably, while older adults generated less episodically specific future thoughts relative to young adults, age did not influence the effect of valence on episodic detail generation at imagination or recollection.