Assessing creativity with divergent thinking tasks: Exploring the reliability and validity of new subjective scoring methods.

Divergent thinking is central to the study of individual differences in creativity, but the traditional scoring systems (assigning points for infrequent responses and summing the points) face well-known problems. After critically reviewing past scoring methods, this article describes a new approach to assessing divergent thinking and appraises its reliability and validity. In our new Top 2 scoring method, participants complete a divergent thinking task and then circle the 2 responses that they think are their most creative responses. Raters then evaluate the responses on a 5-point scale. Regarding reliability, a generalizability analysis showed that subjective ratings of unusual-uses tasks and instances tasks yield dependable scores with only 2 or 3 raters. Regarding validity, a latent-variable study (n=226) predicted divergent thinking from the Big Five factors and their higher-order traits (Plasticity and Stability). Over half of the variance in divergent thinking could be explained by dimensions of personality. The article presents instructions for measuring divergent thinking with the new method. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Commentary: Divergent thinking tests have problems, but this is not the solution.

Commentary on an article by P. J. Silvia et al. (see record 2008-05954-001) which discusses the topic of divergent thinking. It is certainly true, as Silvia et al. (2008) write, that "after half a century of research, the evidence for global creative ability ought to be better" (p. 68). The authors believe--incorrectly, I think--that the reason that divergent thinking tests have not done a better job can be found in the various scoring systems that have been used when assessing divergent thinking ability. I have presented evidence elsewhere that creativity is not a general ability or set of traits or dispositions that can be applied across domains (Baer, 1991, 1993, 1994a, 1994b, 1998). In those studies, I used Amabile's (1982, 1996) Consensual Assessment Technique (which is the basis for the subjective scoring technique proposed by Silvia et al. [2008]) to judge the creativity of a wide range of artifacts. What I found was that there is little correlation among the creativity ratings received by subjects across domains, and what little there is tends to disappear if an IQ test is also given and variance attributable to intelligence is first removed. The evidence presented thus far for Silvia et al.'s (2008) proposed method for scoring responses to divergent thinking tasks has far too many flaws to allow any confidence in its use. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Discernment and creativity: How well can people identify their most creative ideas?

How well can people judge the creativity of their ideas? The distinction between generating ideas and evaluating ideas appears in many theories of creativity, but the massive literature on generation has overshadowed the question of evaluation. After critically reviewing the notion of accuracy in creativity judgments, this article explores whether (1) people in general are discerning and (2) whether some people are more discerning than others. University students (n = 226) completed four divergent thinking tasks and then decided which responses were their most creative. Judges then rated the creativity of all of the responses. Multilevel latent-variable models found that people's choices strongly agreed with judges' ratings of the responses; overall, people were discerning in their decisions. But some people were more discerning than others: people high in openness to experience, in particular, had stronger agreement between their decisions and the judges' ratings. Creative people are thus doubly skilled: they are better at generating good ideas and at picking their best ideas. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

机电一体化产品创新的概念设计研究

提出机电一体化产品创新的概念设计全过程模型、创新层次与人机协同的关系、人机协同概念设计的关键技术。创新过程中可以程式化的部分由计算机来实现，而难以程式化的部分则由设计者来完成。指出在构造人机协同概念设计CAD平台时，刚愎自用模块化思想划分软件功能模块和组织开发过程，以利于系统的升级开发和高校、研究院所、企业的协调合作。     

在多媒体网络环境中培养学生的创新能力

多媒体网络作为一项新技术、新工具进入教学领域,给传统的教学带来了新的途径和方法。结合多媒体参与、学生学习以PC为主、从中获取信息并与教师和同学共同探讨的网络教学模式,论述了如何在多媒体网络环境中培养学生的创新能力。     

民间美术色彩在现代招贴设计中的应用

从具有本土文化底蕴的民间美术的色彩出发,论述其在现代招贴设计中呈现的意义与价值,并从民间美术的色彩与设计创意、图形信息传达、文字意境表述等诸关系的分析中探讨民间美术的色彩在现代招贴设计中的可行性及对提高现代招贴设计文化内涵及底蕴的作用.     

The age decrement in outstanding scientific creativity.

Criticisms of the index of citation are presented. Data are cited to bolster the thesis "that the age decrement in outstanding scientific creativity is not an artifact but a fact." Major sections are: The Index of Citation and How It Was Obtained, What Historians of Science Think of the Index of Citation, New Data, and The Findings of Some Outstanding Scholars. "Older men may be more scholarly, but they do not usually exhibit more originality than do younger ones." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Continual association as a function of level of creativity and type of verbal stimulus.

Continual word association was studied as a function of Remote Associates Test (RAT) performance, form class, associative hierarchy, and Thorndike-Lorge word frequency. Ss were selected as high creative (HC), low creative (LC), and medium creative (MC) on the basis of their RAT scores. It was found that HC Ss give the greatest number of associations and maintain a relatively higher speed of association throughout a 2-min. period. More responses were elicited by nouns than adjectives, flat hierarchy words than steep, and high frequency words than low. The S and stimulus variable did not interact. Relevance to an associative theory of creative thinking is discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Creativity and the need for novelty.

An experiment designed to demonstrate the reinforcing properties of associative novelty for creative Ss. 60 undergraduates were separated into high (HC) and low (LC) creativity groups on the basis of their scores on the Remote Associates Test. Ss were then presented with a series of pairs of words (each pair containing a noun and a nonnoun) and asked to choose the word they preferred. The choice of a noun was followed by a novel association to that noun. Nonnoun choices were followed by common associations. The HC group significantly increased and the LC group significantly decreased the frequency of their noun choices over the series of pairs. The results support the need for novelty hypothesis. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The general applicability of a scale for rating research productivity.

"The RBD III, a forced-choice rating form to provide scores indicative of a person's productive research behavior in physical science research settings, was administered in a setting other than the one in which it was developed." 50 Ss were selected at random from 168 research engineers. Supervisory judgments of a person's creativity activity indicated its validity. The "RBD III can be used to provide criterion scores for research productivity in other physical science research settings." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)