Creativity: Depth and Breadth

Abstract

Creativity is an elusive concept. Indeed there are those who believe it cannot be studied as if the heat of the microscope would destroy the specimen. Nevertheless, it is accepted by many that at a minimum creativity entails the generation of ideas that are both original and appropriate. Creativity, then, entails both divergent and convergent thinking. Here we investigated divergent and convergent thinking in a task in which participants are asked to provide many interpretations of ambiguous suggestive sketches. Switching attention among the sketches encouraged divergent thinking whereas focused repeated attention to interpreting a single sketch encouraged convergent thinking.