Creativity { Part 2 }

Creativity

 Steps or Stages of Creative Thinking Process

Unlike many psychometrists and educators, those who theorize about the thoughts and emotions involved in creativity are generally not bound by the creativity-equals-divergent thinking assumption. Instead, they look at broader aspects of human functioning Wallas (1926) described the process as consisting of four stages, i.e., preparation, incubation. Inspiration or illumination and verification or revision.

(a) Preparation

It is the first step in which a problem is investigated in every possible way, It means the conscious work on the problem is initiated and continued till the problem solver familiar with the various features of the problem. Here the problem is analysed and the stage or plan of action is set for its solution. The facts and materials relevant to the problems are collected or gathered for solving the problem in hand. But sometime it so happens that without solving the problem the thinkers keep aside the problem for the time being and do some other activities.

(b) Incubation

In the second stage no conscious thought is given to the problem but the ideas and materials collected in the period of preparation are somehow stored below the conscious level of the psyche. This is the stage of no work or rest period. But somehow the mind continues to search or experience clue to the solution of the problem.

(c) Illumination

During this stage the 'Aha' feeling is suddenly experienced, often unexpectedly This means a sudden appearance of the solution of his problem comes to the mind.

(d) Verification

The final stage is verification. When the new idea is evaluated on the basis of its creator's own standards which may be sharply different from the public and criticism starts. Here the idea which appeared through insight may be considered as the correct answer. In case it does not work out. fresh attempts are made to solve the problem.

Dimensions of Creativity

⇒ According to Guilford there are four creative thinking abilities: fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration. The intellectual operation for these abilities is divergent, and it can apply all content areas Generally creativity test (verbal or non-verbal) measure all the above dimensions of creativity. Let us now try to illustrate the above dimensions one by one:

(i) Fluency

Researches in the field of creativity have revealed that highly creative persons are thought to be more fluent in their thinking and able to generate alternative ideas in great variety and large quantity. Examples of this competency include writing large number of acceptable plot titles for untitled literary works and imagining many consequences of a change in the environment or in the conditions of life (e.g.. suppose the world's supply of oil would dry up: list as many consequences as you can imagine). This is called ideational fluency because it denotes skills in generating quantities of ideas in a language context. But associational fluency is the ability to produce many relationship or meaningful associations with a given idea. It is evident by the quantity of synonyms a person can attach to any familiar word that has many meanings or it characterises thinking by analogy. Similarly, expressional fluency refers to skills in Juxtaposing words to meet sentence structure requirements. It is the production of alternative organised thoughts. A sequence of words in a sentence represents a thought system.

(ii) Flexibility

The skill of being to able discontinue an existing pattern of thought and shift to new patterns or shifts from one set of assumption or approach to another is called flexibility. Spontaneous flexibility deals with changes in direction of thinking when a person is not instructed to do so. For example, in listing the various uses of a brick, the flexible individual tends to produce ideas relating not only to the weight of the object but also to its size, colour, shape, texture and so on. Adaptive flexibility deals with changes in direction of thinking to solve problems. In this case content is figural, such as geometric forms which the persons use to make as many objects as possible.

(c) Originality

The process of originality is on products that are unexpected and sometimes amusing. It is found out that divergent production is the generation of logical alternatives to fit the needs of given information and that logical alternatives depend upon the original ideas of the person concerned. Thus creativity is the process of originality, uniqueness and even sometimes idiosyncratic ways of doing things or showing problems.

(d) Elaboration

Elaboration is seen in facility in giving details to round out a complex innovation, such as an organised plan or how much skilled in planning and organization. For example, a person demonstrates the ability to fill in all of the various details necessary to make a briefly outlined project depends upon the elaboration.

Identification of Creative Individuals

Creativity of an individual can be seen in the interaction of his intellect personality, motivation and the biography although its distribution is neither equal or universal. Researches in this regard have proved that creative potential are unique and divergent in nature rather than associating with welligence. The identification of creative potential depends upon the following measures :

(i) By observation of behaviour,

(ii) Through rating scale and attitude scales,

(iii) By the help of interview/asking questions informally, 

(iv) By the help of situational tests. interest inventories. aptitude test projective techniques and personality test, etc. 

(v) By studying the cummulative record, if maintained about the individual, and 

(vi) By the help of standardized tests along with creativity tests.

Factors Affecting/Hindering/Obstructing or Impediments to the Promotion of Creativity

There are different factors which obstruct or block creativity development. These are the following:

(a) Partiality or Negative Treatment of Parents

It is found out that there is a difference in treatment from the parents with regard to facilities to boys and girls at home. The boys are provided with more opportunities, encouragement and positive attitude rather than girls, hence, creative development is suppressed and not nurtured from the very beginning. 

(b) Unfavourable Home Conditions and Unfavourable Attitudes Towards Children

It is a fact that home is the child's first environment and a can help the child to do and undo everything when he/she is capable of doing the things. But broken home, discouragement. authoritarian discipline and not providing proper play equipments at the time of childhood and obstructive social anitudes and lack of rewards discourage creativity among children.

(c) Lack of Stimulation and Unfavourable Environment

Even though the foundations for creativity are made from the very beginning of the early childhood stage yet its development must be stimulated in the later stage. But it is noticed that due to lack of stimulation and congenial environment, the development of mental flexibility or divergent thinking is stopped. Thus, unfavourable environmental conditions have been found to influence the work of the creative person and offers less stimulation to foster creativity than the congenial atmosphere either at home or school.

(d) Socio-economic Status and Family Size

Socio-economic condition of the family is responsible for affecting creativity among the children. The children of lower income group experience authoritarian and lack of opportunities to express their individuality and to foster creativity. Similarly in large families it is found out that children's needs are not properly gratified due to less favourable conditions at home which hamper the development of creativity.

(e) Inability to Detect Creativity in Time

Generally there are different procedures to identify creativity But sometimes it is not noticed early and too late for stimulation for full development of these potentials. Hence, creative potential is affected and not nurtured property.

(f) Unfavourable School Conditions

Next to home the child spends at least eight hours a day in school. If the school conditions are unfavourable, the stimulation to promote creativity provided by a favourable home environment is a waste. Sometimes it is marked that authoritarian teaching-learning, too much memorisation too much dependence on text-book and curricula defective system of examination, overcrowded class, lack of co-curricular activities, lack of initiative of the teacher in the school, strict discipline and discouragement of anything that does not face within the prescribed pattern are responsible for hindering the path of creativity.

(g) Unwilling to Take Risk and Lack of Foresightedness 

It is revealed that most of the children in schools are not ready to take risk and to do new work either due to fear or not having the foresightedness. This situation might have occurred either due to family background or because of school conditions although every student has some form of creativity or the other. Thus unsatisfactory conditions at home and school obstruct the promotion of creativity among our pupils.