A large body of research has revealed that viewing example image stimuli tends to constrain creative idea generation. However, the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying such visual fixation in creative cognition are unclear. In the present experiment, we explored whether example images impacted creative imagination and patterns of neural activity…

Previous research indicates that episodic retrieval contributes to divergent creative thinking. However, this research has relied on standard laboratory tests of divergent creative thinking, such as generating creative uses for objects; it is unknown whether episodic retrieval also contributes to domain-specific forms of creativity. Here we start…

This study aims to examine the impact of affective states and affective shifts on ideation and evaluation of creativity. Affects were induced by a two-stage imagination procedure of recalling autobiographical experiences. Three periods of divergent thinking were measured to represent the participants' creative ideation at different times. Creative…

Conceptual combination is proposed as the mental activity by which imagination produces new ideas in creative processes. Two parallel forms of the imagination test were constructed based on conceptual combination theory. Each test comprises eighteen unrelated noun-noun pairs. For each pair, an original idea is required. The test-retest reliability…

This book examines research on creative thinking, both current and historical. It explores two dimensions of human thought (time and space) and two modes of thinking (conscious and unconscious) as well as both left and right brain functions and artistic and scientific creative activities. The book proposes a "Double Circulation" model of…

The Vygotsky Blocks Test assesses problem-solving styles within a theoretical framework for the development of higher mental processes devised by Vygotsky. Because both the theory and the associated test situate cognitive development within the child's social and linguistic context, they address conceptual issues around the developmental relation…

Productive daydreaming is viewed as an aspect of creative reading that can add to imagination and creativity; it combines the freedom to imagine with the contemplative state of mind. (Author)

This article examines the state of knowledge on the creative process, especially mathematical-scientific, verbal, musical, and artistic imagery. A creative imagination imagery model is proposed which has three major dimensions: the environment, the individual (with both content and process components considered in terms of the Structure of…

Thematic fantasies of highly creative adolescents were rated by clinical psychologists as exhibiting greater primary-process thinking than the thematic reports of matched controls; they also included a greater proportion of unlikely combinations, fluid transformations, visual representations, magic occurrences, and contradictions. (Author)

This paper views creativity as the combination of the conditions of interaction and transformation-imagination-fantasy. These conditions operate together, simultaneously, in order to define the complex process of creativity. (DB)

A qualitative study focused on incubation and illumination within the act of writing to determine if life-span development affects image production during these creative, cognitive acts. Sixteen subjects of both sexes from four age groups represented major developmental stages in the life cycle. The research design provided two 90-minute sessions…

Describes research on creative processes, in which subjects were tested in a hypnotic experiment. (DR)

This article discusses techniques for reaching the metaphorical side of the brain. (PD)

Discusses the use and stimulation of lateral, or divergent, thinking to promote creativity. (SL)

Author states that modern education has provided students with an adequate ability to solve given problems and implement solutions, but has overlooked the importance of problem-finding, a skill which involves defining purpose, setting personal objectives, and exploring interests. (RW)