Sternberg_Nature-of-creativity.pdf

Creativity Research Journal

2006, Vol. 18, No. 1, 87–98

Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

The Nature of Creativity

Robert J. Sternberg

Tufts University

ABSTRACT: Like E. Paul Torrance, my colleagues

and I have tried to understand the nature of creativ-

ity, to assess it, and to improve instruction by teach-

ing for creativity as well as teaching students to think

creatively. This article reviews our investment theory

of creativity, propulsion theory of creative contribu-

tions, and some of the data we have collected with re-

gard to creativity. It also describes the propulsion

theory of creative contributions. Finally, it draws

some conclusions.

for the pretensions to which less-distinguished aca-

demics can be so susceptible.

There are a number of different approaches one can

take to understanding creativity. Torrance preferred a

psychometric approach to understanding creativity.

My colleagues and I (e.g., Sternberg, Kaufman, &

Pretz, 2002; Sternberg & Lubart, 1995, 1996) have

chosen to use a confluence approach as a basis for our

work on creativity. I will discuss two of the theories un-

derlying our work and some of the empirical work we

have done to test our ideas. These theories are part of a

more general theory—WICS—of wisdom, intelli-

gence, and creativity synthesized (Sternberg, 2003b).

The field of creativity as it exists today emerged largely

as a result of the pioneering efforts of J. P. Guilford

(1950) and E. Paul Torrance (1962, 1974). It is wholly

fitting to dedicate a special issue of the Creativity Re-

search Journal to Torrance because of his seminal con-

tributions to thinking about creativity. To this day, the

Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking (Torrance, 1974)

remain the most widely used assessments of creative

talent.

Guilford and Torrance had many more agreements

than disagreements about the nature of creativity and

the ways to measure it. Both were basically

psychometric theorists and conceived of and attempted

to measure creativity from a psychometric standpoint.

However, both were broad thinkers, and their concep-

tions were much more expansive than the

operationalizations of these conceptions through their

tests. Both concentrated on divergent thinking as the

basis of creativity and devised tests that emphasized

the assessment of divergent thinking. Both left behind

numerous students and disciples to carry on their pio-

neering work. Torrance, in particular, was a warm, car-

ing, and positive person. I met him only a few times,

but I was enormously impressed with the modesty he

displayed, given his preeminence in the field. He

showed that the best people in the field have no need

The Investment Theory of Creativity

Our investment theory of creativity (Sternberg &

Lubart, 1991, 1995) is a confluence theory according

to which creative people are those who are willing and

able to “buy low and sell high” in the realm of ideas

(see also Rubenson & Runco, 1992, for the use of con-

cepts from economic theory). Buying low means pur-

suing ideas that are unknown or out of favor but that

Preparation of this article was supported by Grant REC–9979843

from the National Science Foundation and by a grant under the Javits

Act Program (Grant No. R206R000001) as administered by the In-

stitute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education.

Grantees undertaking such projects are encouraged to express their

professional judgment freely. This article, therefore, does not neces-

sarily represent the position or policies of the National Science

Foundation, Institute of Education Sciences, or the U.S. Department

of Education, and no official endorsement should be inferred.

Correspondence and requests for reprints should be sent to Rob-

ert J. Sternberg, Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, Tufts Uni-

versity, Ballou Hall, Medford, MA 02155. E-mail: Robert.sternberg

@tufts.edu

Creativity Research Journal

R. J. Sternberg

have growth potential. Often, when these ideas are first

presented, they encounter resistance. The creative indi-

vidual persists in the face of this resistance and eventu-

ally sells high, moving on to the next new or unpopular

idea.

predict future states from past states, given incomplete

information. In another set of studies, 60 people were

given more conventional kinds of inductive reasoning

problems, such as analogies, series completions, and

classifications, but were told to solve them. However,

the problems had premises preceding them that were ei-

ther conventional (dancers wear shoes) or novel (danc-

ers eat shoes). The participants had to solve the prob-

lems as though the counterfactuals were true (Sternberg

& Gastel, 1989a, 1989b).

In these studies, we found that correlations with

conventional kinds of tests depended on how novel or

nonentrenched the conventional tests were. The more

novel the items, the higher the correlations of our

tests with scores on successively more novel conven-

tional tests. Thus, the components isolated for rela-

tively novel items would tend to correlate more

highly with more unusual tests of fluid abilities (e.g.,

that of Cattell & Cattell, 1973) than with tests of

crystallized abilities. We also found that when re-

sponse times on the relatively novel problems were

componentially analyzed, some components better

measured the creative aspect of intelligence than did

others. For example, in the “grue–bleen” task men-

tioned earlier, the information-processing component

requiring people to switch from conventional

green–blue thinking to grue–bleen thinking and then

back to green–blue thinking again was a particularly

good measure of the ability to cope with novelty.

In another study, we looked at predictions for ev-

eryday kinds of situations, such as when milk will

spoil (Sternberg & Kalmar, 1997). In this study, we

looked at both predictions and postdictions (hypothe-

ses about the past where information about the past is

unknown) and found that postdictions took longer to

make than did predictions. Novel predictions and

postdictions are more challenging and time-consum-

ing than simpler ones.

Creativity and simply thinking in novel ways are fa-

cilitated when people are willing to put in up-front time

to think in new ways. We found that better thinkers

tend to spend relatively more time than do poorer rea-

soners in global, up-front metacomponential planning

when they solve difficult, novel-reasoning problems.

Poorer reasoners, conversely, tend to spend relatively

more time in local planning (Sternberg, 1981). Pre-

sumably, the better thinkers recognize that it is better to

invest more time up front so as to be able to process a

problem more efficiently later on.

Aspects of the Investment Theory

According to the investment theory, creativity re-

quires a confluence of six distinct but interrelated re-

sources: intellectual abilities, knowledge, styles of

thinking, personality, motivation, and environment.

Although levels of these resources are sources of indi-

vidual differences, often the decision to use a resource

is a more important source of individual differences. In

the following sections, I discuss the resources and the

role of decision making in each.

Intellectual skills. Three intellectual skills are

particularly important (Sternberg, 1985): (a) the syn-

thetic skill to see problems in new ways and to escape

the bounds of conventional thinking, (b) the analytic

skill to recognize which of one’s ideas are worth pursu-

ing and which are not, and (c) the practical–contextual

skill to know how to persuade others of—to sell other

people on—the value of one’s ideas. The confluence of

these three skills is also important. Analytic skills used

in the absence of the other two skills results in power-

ful critical, but not creative, thinking. Synthetic skill

used in the absence of the other two skills results in

new ideas that are not subjected to the scrutiny required

to improve them and make them work. Practical–con-

textual skill in the absence of the other two skills may

result in societal acceptance of ideas not because the

ideas are good, but rather, because the ideas have been

well and powerfully presented.

We tested the role of creative intelligence in creativ-

ity in several studies. In one study, we presented 80 peo-

ple with novel kinds of reasoning problems that had a

single best answer. For example, they might be told that

some objects are green and others blue; but still other ob-

jects might be grue, meaning green until the year 2000

and blue thereafter, or bleen, meaning blue until the year

2000 and green thereafter. Or they might be told of four

kinds of people on the planet Kyron—blens, who are

born young and die young; kwefs, who are born old and

die old; balts, who are born young and die old; and

prosses, who are born old and die young (Sternberg,

1982; Tetewsky & Sternberg, 1986). Their task was to

Creativity Research Journal

The Nature of Creativity

Knowledge. On the one hand, one needs to know

enough about a field to move it forward. One cannot

move beyond where a field is if one does not know

where it is. On the other hand, knowledge about a field

can result in a closed and entrenched perspective, re-

sulting in a person’s not moving beyond the way in

which he or she has seen problems in the past. Knowl-

edge thus can help, or it can hinder creativity.

In a study of expert and novice bridge players, for

example (Frensch & Sternberg, 1989), we found that

experts outperformed novices under regular circum-

stances. When a superficial change was made in the

surface structure of the game, the experts and novices

were both hurt slightly in their playing, but they

quickly recovered. When a profound, deep-structural

change was made in the structure of the game, the ex-

perts initially were hurt more than the novices, but the

experts later recovered. The reason, presumably, is that

experts make more and deeper use of the existing struc-

ture and hence have to reformulate their thinking more

than novices do when there is a deep-structural change

in the rules of the game. Thus, one needs to decide to

use one’s past knowledge.

1991, 1995) have supported the importance of certain

personality attributes for creative functioning. These

attributes include, but are not limited to, willingness to

overcome obstacles, willingness to take sensible risks,

willingness to tolerate ambiguity, and self-efficacy. In

particular, buying low and selling high typically means

defying the crowd, so that one has to be willing to stand

up to conventions if one wants to think and act in cre-

ative ways (Sternberg, 2003a; Sternberg & Lubart,

1995). Often creative people seek opposition; that is,

they decide to think in ways that countervail how oth-

ers think. Note that none of the attributes of creative

thinking is fixed. One can decide to overcome obsta-

cles, take sensible risks, and so forth.

In one study (Lubart & Sternberg, 1995), we found

that greater risk-taking propensity was associated with

creativity for artwork but not for essays. When we in-

vestigated why this was so, we found that some evalua-

tors tended to mark down essays that took unpopular

positions. We learned, therefore, that one of the risks

people face when they are creative, even in an experi-

ment on risk taking, is that the evaluators will not ap-

preciate the risks if they go against their own beliefs!

Thinking styles. Thinking styles are preferred

ways of using one’s skills. In essence, they are deci-

sions about how to deploy the skills available to a per-

son. With regard to thinking styles, a legislative style is

particularly important for creativity (Sternberg, 1988,

1997a), that is, a preference for thinking and a decision

to think in new ways. This preference needs to be dis-

tinguished from the ability to think creatively: Some-

one may like to think along new lines, but not think

well, or vice versa. It also helps to become a major cre-

ative thinker, if one is able to think globally as well as

locally, distinguishing the forest from the trees and

thereby recognizing which questions are important and

which ones are not.

In our research (Sternberg, 1997b; Sternberg &

Grigorenko, 1995), we found that legislative people

tend to be better students than less legislative people, if

the schools in which they study value creativity. If the

schools do not value or devalue creativity, they tend to

be worse students. Students also were found to receive

higher grades from teachers whose own styles of think-

ing matched their own.

Motivation. Intrinsic, task-focused motivation is

also essential to creativity. The research of Amabile

(1983) and others has shown the importance of such

motivation for creative work and has suggested that

people rarely do truly creative work in an area unless

they really love what they are doing and focus on the

work rather than the potential rewards. Motivation is

not something inherent in a person: One decides to be

motivated by one thing or another. Often, people who

need to work in a certain area that does not particularly

interest them will decide that, given the need to work in

that area, they had better find a way to make it interest

them. They will then look for some angle on the work

they need to do that makes this work appeal to rather

than bore them.

Environment. Finally, one needs an environ-

ment that is supportive and rewarding of creative ideas.

One could have all of the internal resources needed to

think creatively, but without some environmental sup-

port (such as a forum for proposing those ideas), the

creativity that a person has within him or her might

never be displayed.

Environments typically are not fully supportive of

the use of one’s creativity. The obstacles in a given en-

Personality. Numerous research investigations

(summarized in Lubart, 1994, and Sternberg & Lubart,

Creativity Research Journal

R. J. Sternberg

vironment may be minor, as when an individual re-

ceives negative feedback on his or her creative think-

ing, or major, as when one’s well-being or even life are

threatened if one thinks in a manner that defies conven-

tion. The individual therefore must decide howtore-

spond in the face of the nearly omnipresent environ-

mental challenges that exist. Some people let

unfavorable forces in the environment block their cre-

ative output; others do not.

Part of the environment is determined by who is do-

ing the evaluating. In our studies (Lubart & Sternberg,

1995), we had creative products of people of different

ages rated for their creativity by raters of different age

cohorts. We found informal evidence of cohort match-

ing—that is, raters tended to rate as more creative

products of creators of roughly their own age cohort.

For example, people will often tend to prefer the popu-

lar music of the generation in which they grew up as

early adolescents more than the popular music of the

generation in which their parents or children grew up.

Thus, part of what may determine growth patterns of

creativity (Simonton, 1994) is in changing criteria for

evaluations of creativity on the part of raters.

major works of literature and art are often negative.

Toni Morrison’s Tar Baby received negative reviews

when it was first published, as did Sylvia Plath’s The

Bell Jar . The first exhibition in Munich of the work of

Norwegian painter Edvard Munch opened and closed

the same day because of the strong negative response

from the critics. Some of the greatest scientific articles

have been rejected not just by one but by several jour-

nals before being published. For example, John Garcia,

a distinguished biopsychologist, was immediately de-

nounced when he first proposed that a form of learning

called classical conditioning could be produced in a

single trial of learning (Garcia & Koelling, 1966).

From the investment view, then, the creative person

buys low by presenting an idea that initially is not val-

ued and then attempting to convince other people of its

value. After convincing others that the idea is valuable,

which increases the perceived value of the investment,

the creative person sells high by leaving the idea to oth-

ers and moving on to another idea. People typically

want others to love their ideas, but immediate universal

applause for an idea often indicates that it is not partic-

ularly creative.

Confluence. Concerning the confluence of these

six components, creativity is hypothesized to involve

more than a simple sum of a person’s level on each

component. First, there may be thresholds for some

components (e.g., knowledge) below which creativity

is not possible regardless of the levels on other compo-

nents. Second, partial compensation may occur in

which a strength on one component (e.g., motivation)

counteracts a weakness on another component (e.g.,

environment). Third, interactions may occur between

components, such as intelligence and motivation, in

which

The Role of Decision Making

Creativity, according to the investment theory, is in

large part a decision. The view of creativity as a deci-

sion suggests that creativity can be developed. Simply

requesting that students be more creative can render

them more creative if they believe that the decision to

be creative will be rewarded rather than punished

(O’Hara & Sternberg, 2000–2001).

To be creative one must first decide to generate new

ideas, analyze these ideas, and sell the ideas to others.

In other words, a person may have synthetic, analyti-

cal, or practical skills but not apply them to problems

that potentially involve creativity. For example, one

may decide (a) to follow other people’s ideas rather

than synthesize one’s own, (b) not to subject one’s

ideas to a careful evaluation, or (c) to expect other peo-

ple to listen to one’s ideas and therefore decide not to

try to persuade other people of the value of these ideas.

The skill is not enough: One first needs to make the de-

cision to use the skill.

For example, ability to switch between conven-

tional and unconventional modes of thinking is impor-

tant to creativity. One aspect of switching between con-

ventional and unconventional thinking is the decision

high

levels

both

components

could

multiplicatively enhance creativity.

Creative ideas are both novel and valuable. How-

ever, they are often rejected when the creative innova-

tor stands up to vested interests and defies the crowd

(cf. Csikszentmihalyi, 1988). The crowd does not ma-

liciously or willfully reject creative notions. Rather, it

does not realize, and often does not want to realize, that

the proposed idea represents a valid and advanced way

of thinking. Society often perceives opposition to the

status quo as annoying, offensive, and reason enough

to ignore innovative ideas.

Evidence abounds that creative ideas are often re-

jected (Sternberg & Lubart, 1995). Initial reviews of

Creativity Research Journal

The Nature of Creativity

that one is willing and able to think in unconventional

ways—that one is willing to accept thinking in terms

different from those to which one is accustomed and

with which one feels comfortable. People show reli-

able individual differences in willingness to do so

(Dweck, 1999). Some people (what Dweck calls “en-

tity theorists”) prefer to operate primarily or even ex-

clusively in domains that are relatively familiar to

them. Other people (what Dweck calls “incremental

theorists”) seek out new challenges and new concep-

tual domains within which to work. I have proposed a

number of different decisions by which one can de-

velop one’s own creativity as a decision (Sternberg,

2001): (a) redefine problems, (b) question and analyze

assumptions, (c) do not assume that creative ideas sell

themselves: sell them, (d) encourage the generation of

ideas, (e) recognize that knowledge can both help and

hinder creativity, (f) identify and surmount obstacles,

(g) take sensible risks, (h) tolerate ambiguity, (i) be-

lieve in oneself (self-efficacy), (j) find what one loves

to do, (k) delay gratification, (l) role-model creativity,

(m) cross-fertilize ideas, (n) reward creativity, (o) al-

low mistakes, (p) encourage collaboration, (q) see

things from others’ points of view, (r) take responsibil-

ity for successes and failures, (s) maximize person–en-

vironment fit, (t) continue to allow intellectual growth.

American and Chinese evaluators rated two distinct

artistic products (collages and science fiction charac-

ters) of American college students to be more cre-

ative than products of Chinese college students

roughly matched for conventional intelligence (Niu &

Sternberg, 2001). This finding held up regardless of

whether the raters were American or Chinese.

One concern we have is whether creative skills can

be measured in a way that is distinct from the way

g -based analytical skills are measured, as well as the

practical skills that, together with the analytical and

creative ones, combine into my theory of successful in-

telligence.

In one study (Sternberg, Grigorenko, Ferrari, &

Clinkenbeard, 1999), we used the so-called Sternberg

Triarchic Abilities Test (STAT; Sternberg, 1993) to in-

vestigate the relations among the three abilities. Three

hundred twenty-six high school students, primarily

from diverse parts of the United States, took the test,

which consisted of 12 subtests in all. There were four

subtests, each measuring analytical, creative, and prac-

tical abilities. For each type of ability, there were three

multiple-choice tests and one essay test. The multi-

ple-choice tests, in turn, involved, respectively, verbal,

quantitative, and figural content. Consider the content

of each test:

1. Analytical–Verbal: Figuring out meanings of ne-

ologisms (artificial words) from natural contexts. Stu-

dents see a novel word embedded in a paragraph and

have to infer its meaning from the context.

2. Analytical–Quantitative: Number series. Stu-

dents have to say what number should come next in a

series of numbers.

3. Analytical–Figural: Matrices. Students see a

figural matrix with the lower right entry missing. They

have to say which of the options fits into the missing

space.

4. Practical–Verbal: Everyday reasoning. Students

are presented with a set of everyday problems in the

life of an adolescent and have to select the option that

best solves each problem.

5. Practical–Quantitative: Everyday math. Stu-

dents are presented with scenarios requiring the use of

math in everyday life (e.g., buying tickets for a

ballgame) and have to solve math problems based on

the scenarios.

6. Practical–Figural: Route planning. Students are

presented with a map of an area (e.g., an entertainment

Evidence Regarding the Investment Theory

Assessment. Research within the investment

framework has yielded support for this model (Lubart

& Sternberg, 1995). This research has used tasks such

as (a) writing short stories using unusual titles (e.g.,

the octopus’ sneakers), (b) drawing pictures with un-

usual themes (e.g., the earth from an insect’s point of

view), (c) devising creative advertisements for boring

products (e.g., cufflinks), and (d) solving unusual sci-

entific problems (e.g., how could we tell if someone

had been on the moon within the past month?). Our

measures have the same goal as Torrance’s do, but we

attempt to use tasks that are more oriented toward

what people do in school and in the real world when

they think creatively. This research showed creative

performance to be moderately domain specific and to

be predicted by a combination of certain resources, as

described as follows. The exact blend of resources

and the success with which these resources are

blended may vary from one culture to another. For

example, Niu and Sternberg (2001) found that both

Creativity Research Journal

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