Creativity
History of Psychology
Blend of diligent research and
Accidental discoveries
Researchers surprised by findings
Shift their thinking.
Historians of science call these
Paradigm shifts
Ivan Pavlov
1849-1936
Nobel prize in 1904
for studies on the
digestive system
Classical conditioning
Learned reflex
Ivan Pavlov
Research during Russian
Revolution
Inner lab insulated from
noise.
Assistant bringing in food
had to ring bell.
Dogs started to salivate
before food entered room.
Hmmm.. What’s going on?
Pavlov’s Classic Experiment
Before Conditioning
UCS (food
in mouth)
UCR
(salivation)
During Conditioning
Neutral
stimulus
(tone)
No
salivation
After Conditioning
UCS (food
in mouth)
Neutral
stimulus
(tone)
UCR
(salivation)
CS
(tone)
CR (salivation)
Behaviorism
John B. Watson
>Impressed by Pavlov’s work
>Good model for experimentation
>psychology as objective science
Birth of psychology as a science
Serendipity
Accidental fortunate discoveries
“The Three Princes of Serendip”
Persian princes who stumble into a fortune
due to their discoveries.
Find a maiden in the forest.
Take her to nearest castle where she is
greeted as missing princess.
Receive huge reward for her safe return.
Example 1: Cockleburs
The story of the discovery of
hook and loop fasteners begins
with George de Mestral taking a
walk through the countryside.
The Swiss engineer enjoyed
hunting. One morning in 1941,
while returning from the fields
with his dog, he noticed how
difficult it was to detach the
flowers of the mountain thistle
from his trousers and his dog’s
fur.
Invention?
Example 2: Pager markers
Art Fry worked for 3M in product
design of new tapes (Scotch brand) and
adhesives. He came upon this discovery
out of frustration when his scrap paper
bookmarks kept falling out of his
church choir hymnal. In a moment of
pure "Eureka," Fry realized that new
adhesive from 3M could be applied to
paper and make a wonderfully reliable
bookmark that wouldn’t damage his
hymnal.
Invention?
Example 3: “Airy” Soap
A large batch of White Soap was mixing when a
workman at the factory went to lunch and left
the machinery running. When he returned, he
found that air had been worked into the
mixture. he decided not to discard the batch of
soap because of such a small error, and he
poured the soap into the frames. The soap
hardened and it was cut, packaged, and
shipped.
Floating soap a hit!
A few weeks later, letters began arriving at Procter
& Gamble asking for more of the soap that
floated. The workman's error had turned into a
selling point! Harley Procter came up with the
name "Ivory" while listening to a bible reading at
church one morning in 1879.
New idea and hard work.
Thomas Edison
To develop light bulb, gathered
group of engineers.
Tested and retested materials.
Thousands of hours.
“Genius is 1% inspiration and
99% perspiration.”
Creativity in the arts
Product doesn’t have to have commercial
success to show signs of creativity.
Arts creative by their very nature.
Often the most creative works are not well
received by first audiences.
Controversial artwork
Music that breaks conventions.
Early 1900’s conventional music.
What the audience expected.
Camille Saint-Saens (1835-1921)
Popular and successful composer.
“The artist who does not feel
completely satisfied with elegant
lines, by harmonious colors, and by a
beautiful succession of chords does
not understand the art of music.”
Stravinsky’s
Rite of Spring
(1913)
Hardly had the performance begun when Camille SaintSaens rose in his seat, made a bitter remark about the
music and left the theater with indignation. The complex
music and violent dance steps depicting fertility rites first
drew catcalls and whistles from the crowd, and there were
loud arguments in the audience between supporters and
opponents of the work, and were soon followed by shouts
and fistfights in the aisles. The unrest in the audience
eventually degenerated into a riot. The Paris police arrived
by intermission, but they restored only limited order.
Chaos reigned for the remainder of the performance, and
Stravinsky himself was so upset due to its reception that
he fled the theater in mid-scene.
www.keepingscore.org/flash/stravinsky/index.html
Motivation for creativity
Find new ways to explore perception: vision
and sound.
Express new ideas: Challenge convention
Find new solutions to problems
Perhaps practical but not necessarily so
Creativity is tendency to generate or
recognize ideas, alternatives or possibilities.
Good example: planning communities
Redesigning Neighborhoods
Most towns have been
modified to adapt to cars.
Wider streets laid out in
grids.
Home distant from work.
New design more
friendly to bikes and
pedestrians than to cars.
Neo-traditional
Traditional neighborhoods are more compact communities
designed to encourage bicycling and walking for short trips
by providing destinations close to home and work, and by
providing sidewalks and a pleasant environment for
walking and biking. These neighborhoods are reminiscent
of 18th and 19th century American and European towns,
along with modern considerations for the automobile.
Measures of creativity
Want to recognize and nurture creativity.
Gifted and talented programs.
Need to develop valid measures.
Creativity is a subjective quality.
General agreement among experts and
public.
Word Associations
Cue word: moon
Free responses: unique are better.
Or see associations:
Cue words: mouse, blue, cottage
Single response associated with all three?
Mosaic Designs
http://gwydir.demon.co.uk/jo/mosaic/index.htm
Unusual Uses
Give subject a common object.
Shoe lace
Get points for unusual, practical uses.
Productive thinking
Task: tie ropes together
Just for fun
INSTRUCTIONS: Each question
below contains the initials of the
words that will make it a correct
phrase. Find the missing words.
FOR EXAMPLE: 7=D in a W.
ANSWER: 7= Days in a Week.
26=L of the A
7=W of the W
1001=A N
12= S of the Z
54=C in the D[with the J]
9=P in the SS
88=P K
13=S on the A F
8=S on a S S
3= B M [S H T R]
4= Q in a G
24= H in a D
1= W on a U
5= D in a Z C
57= H V
11= P on a F T
1000= W that a P is W
29=D in F in a L Y
64= S on a C
200= D for P G in M
32= D F at which W F
18= H on a G C
Enchanted Mind - Creativity Test - Answers
Creativity hard to measure
Particularly when move into area of
expressive arts.
Music, dance and painting.
Unconventionality plays strong role.
Most people find comfort in regular things.
Brain likes convention
Brain works most easily with sameness.
Behaviors become habitual and automatic.
Semi-conscious autopilot for the routines of
everyday life (theory of Ellen Langer).
Driving to CCSU and parking your car.
Remember little of the trip.
Brain free to concentrate on other things.
Victims of convention
Easier and more comfortable
Less risky
Routine can become a rut.
Fail to see possibilities.
Land of steady habits.
Creative People
Maslow in study of self-actualizers.
Many very creative people.
Characteristics: broad interests, like
complexity, high energy, like to work, high
achievement, independent, confident.
Can tolerate conflict
Open to new experiences.
Fostering creativity
Families place high value on
intellectual development.
Allow more independence.
Open to letting children
experience new things.
Foster development of selfesteem.
Birth order may play a role
Frank Sulloway
Firstborns tend to be more
conventional, little versions of
their parents, enforce rules.
Laterborns more likely to rebel
against convention.
Find other ways to get rewards
and recognition
More adventurous
Social and Political Changes
Firstborns support the status quo.
Laterborns join the movement.
Support radical ideas.
Sulloway drew conclusions from historical
records and writings.
Laterborns 18X more likely to be burned at the
stake for rebelling against religious dogma.
However, benefits if the movement succeeds.
But Luther was oldest son of abusive father.
Csikszentmihalyi on creativity
Creativity as the result of interaction between the
individual, the domain, and the field.
Domain is set of symbolic rules and procedures.
Examples: Mathematics, music, experimental methods.
Masters the domain, know how to do the craft.
Studies all that went before him/her in domain.
Person cannot be creative in a domain to which he or she is
not exposed. Child could have great gift for mathematics
but still needs to learn the rules in order to contribute to the
domain.
Field
Creativity is not a private enterprise but occurs
only when an individual, who has mastered his
subject matter is acknowledged by the gatekeepers
of his domain.
These gatekeepers (people) are called the field.
Their job is to decide whether a new idea should
enter into the domain.
In music, the field might be the critics.
In psychology, other psychologist who conduct
peer review as part of the publication process.
Internet age changed field
No longer control access to the
domain through print media.
In past only way to enter the domain
was through acceptance to a printed
article.
Now online journals, postings,
internet searches.
Who are the gatekeepers?
What info deserves to enter domain?
Creativity over time
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Greatest musician of all time.
Forgotten by the music world after his death.
His music was considered old-fashioned.
Manuscripts used as scrap paper by butchers.
Rediscovered when Felix Mendelssohn resurrected
Bach’s St. Matthew’s Passion (in 1829).
Creativity reassessed by the field over time.
Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890)
Recognized today as a genius in his domain.
Rejected by his field during his lifetime.
A disturbed man who painted strange canvases.
According to Csikszentmihalyi, van Gogh’s
creativity came into being when a sufficient
number of art experts (the field) started to
recognize his contribution to the domain.
In this view, you’re only creative when so
recognized by your peers.
Will it play in Peoria?
The saying, "Will it play in Peoria?" is
traditionally used to ask whether a given product,
person, or event will appeal to mainstream America.
The phrase initially came into fashion during the
Vaudeville era, believed to have been first asked by
Groucho Marx when putting together a new act. The
belief was that if a new show was successful in
Peoria, it would work anywhere in America.
Just because the critics like it, doesn’t mean the
general public will as well.
Public needs to be considered.
Field may be the gatekeepers but letting something
through the gate doesn’t assure acceptance.
Field may find a new piece of art or music is
daring and creative.
Public might find it boring and offensive.
Critics rave about a new musician but the CD’s
don’t sell.
New movie looking for a distributor in order to
reach a larger audience.
Doug Block
Independent film maker.
Film school at Cornell. Learned domain.
Several previous films. Practiced craft.
51 Birch Street is story of his parents
reflecting back after his mother’s death and
father’s remarriage.
Great story, wonderfully edited.
Critical acclaim (gatekeepers for the field).
Featured at several film festivals.
Birch Street (website for film)
Process of creativity
1. Delineating the problem.
2. Developing knowledge base.
3. Synthesis (putting the elements together).
4. Withholding judgment during process.
Delineating the problem
Not going to search for a
solution unless you see a
problem or an opportunity.
Concern over global
warming.
Need creative solutions and
very soon.
Need to consider all the
possible areas of study and
impacts.
Developing knowledge base.
Need well-developed information.
Gathered by intelligent folks.
“Global average surface temperatures
pushed 2005 into a virtual tie with 1998 as
the hottest year on record. For people living
in the Northern Hemisphere—most of the
world's population—2005 was the hottest
year on record since 1880, the earliest year
for which reliable instrumental records were
available worldwide.”
Synthesis
Putting elements together.
Many different impacts all around the world.
May seem unconnected but creative people can pull
together the elements and see the relationships.
Alpine and polar glaciers
have retreated since 1961,
and the amount of ice
melting in Greenland has
increased since 1979.
Withholding judgment
Making judgments will stop the creative process.
Suspend judgment for a time.
People with strong opinions have tendency to
make premature decisions.
People need to set aside their preconceptions.
A mind is like a parachute.
It works best when it is open.
Global warming solutions
“We
have the technology and ingenuity to
reduce the threat of global warming today.
Solutions are already available that will
stimulate the American economy by creating
jobs, saving consumers money, and protecting
our national security. By investing in renewable
energy and energy efficiency, and increasing the
efficiency of the cars we drive, we can take
essential steps toward reducing our dependence
on oil and other fossil fuels that cause global
warming.”
Global Warming Solutions