Reanalyses of Student Responses to Creativity Checklists: Evidence of Content Generality

The question of whether creativity is content general (i.e., applied similarly across content areas) or content specific (i.e., applied differently across content areas) is one of the most controversial issues in contemporary creativity research, with recent studies providing support for both positions. Reanalyses of data from three previously published studies suggest that, contrary to the results of recent research, a content general factor may explain 40 — 50% of the variance in creativity checklist scores. The results are analyzed in light of other studies, and a hypothesis regarding the content generality-specificity of creativity is provided to guide future research efforts.