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34 - Imagination Is the Seed of Creativity
- from Manifestations of Creativity
- Edited by James C. Kaufman, University of Connecticut, Robert J. Sternberg, Cornell University, New York
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- Book:
- The Cambridge Handbook of Creativity
- Published online:
- 12 April 2019
- Print publication:
- 25 April 2019, pp 709-731
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Summary
Imagination – the ability to mentally simulate situations and ideas not perceived by the physical senses – lays the foundation for creativity. Yet imagination alone is insufficient to produce creativity. We define two types of imagination important for creativity: social-emotional and temporal. Social-emotional imagination is the ability to conceive of and reflect on multiple social perspectives and scenarios and the implications of these for one’s own and others’ lives. It promotes creativity by helping individuals understand multiplicities of identity and experience within themselves and others, reason ethically, and appreciate human diversity and potential. Temporal imagination is the ability to engage in mental time travel, counterfactual thinking, and mind-wandering. It can lead to creativity by allowing individuals to engage in the kind of nonliteral, divergent, and future-oriented thought creativity necessitates. For creativity to happen, imaginative thought is infused into mental simulations that are regulated, evaluated, and integrated to conjure new ideas and concepts. As such, in the brain, creativity relies heavily on the default mode network, which is known to be involved in mental simulations across time and especially about social content. Creativity also relies on organized interactions between the default mode network and the executive attention and salience networks, in order for imaginings to be strategically organized into coherent, meaningful plans and actionable ideas. To harness the potential of imagination, individuals need conducive personal qualities, including openness to experience and intrinsic motivation, as well as a supportive context. To better support individuals in developing their creative potential, for example in schools and in the workplace, we must continue to explore the mechanisms by which imagination leads to creativity and the biological, mental, and cultural constraints and affordances.
17 - How Social-Emotional Imagination Facilitates Deep Learning and Creativity in the Classroom
- from PART II - VOICES FROM THE RESEARCH
- Edited by Ronald A. Beghetto, University of Connecticut, James C. Kaufman, University of Connecticut
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- Book:
- Nurturing Creativity in the Classroom
- Published online:
- 24 November 2016
- Print publication:
- 07 November 2016, pp 308-336
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Summary
Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathise with humans whose experiences we have never shared.
J. K. Rowling, 2008Developing creativity in students is not a luxury. Technology experts project that about 47% of current jobs in the United States will become obsolete because of computers within the next decade or two, and the jobs that will remain are those that require creative intelligence (Frey & Osborne, 2013). In this chapter we propose that supporting youths’ capacities for social-emotional imagination – their abilities to creatively conjure alternative perspectives, emotional feelings, courses of action, and outcomes for oneself and others in the short- and long-term future – is a critical missing piece in many classrooms. This mental act of imagining precedes and translates into creative behaviors – behaviors that demonstrate divergent thinking or a novel approach to a problem and result in the formation of a useful idea or work.
Students’ school success and lifelong creativity are facilitated not only by the cognitive skills measured by IQ tests but by other cognitive and social-emotional attributes. Critically, a capacity for imagination enables many of these cognitive and social-emotional skills, such as intellectual curiosity, openness to experience, passion, inspiration, love of work, envisioning future goals, persistence, sense of mission, courage, delight in deep thinking, tolerance of mistakes, and feeling comfortable as a “minority of one” (e.g., Cox, 1926; Duckworth & Seligman, 2005; Fredricks, Blumfeld & Paris, 2004; Furnham & Bachtair 2008; Kaufman, 2013a, 2013b; Kaufman et al., 2015; Nusbaum & Silvia, 2011; Oyserman & Destin, 2010; Runco, Millar, Acar, & Cramond, 2010; Torrance, 1993, 2003, 2004; von Stumm, Hell, & Chamorro- Premuzic, 2011). Imagination is central because it allows students to reflect holistically about what they learn such that school-related tasks are more meaningful, personally relevant and rewarding, and more connected to the adulthood they hope to achieve one day. Imagination facilitates creative, critical dispositions toward new content and skills by helping students conjure new connections between ideas and invent new ways to represent and apply information.