The concept of reducing creativity to intelligence. Alice Paul Torrance - The Father of Modern Creativity Theory Analysis by Criteria

Torrance, Ellis Paul

(Torrance, Ellis Paul)

Was born: 1915, Milledgeville, Georgia, USA.

Interests: creativity, issues of education of gifted children, educational psychology, futurology, school psychology.

Education: B.A., Mercer University, 1940; MA, University of Minnesota, 1944; doctor, University of Michigan, 1951.

Professional activity: Distinguished Professor of Educational Psychology (retired) at the University of Georgia; Trustee of the Creative Education Foundation; Award "For Outstanding Contribution" of the Central Executive Committee of the Association for the Assistance to Gifted Children, 1973; "Outstanding Scientist", National Association for Gifted Children, 1974-; Founder's Medal of the Emergency Children's Fund, 1979; member of the National Academy of Physical Education, 1979; National Association for Arts Education Award for Contribution to Arts Education, 1980; Arthur Lipper Award "For Contribution to Creative Activity", 1982; Hall of Fame of the National Association for the Creation of Adults and Children, 1985; editor of the Mentors series (Burley); guest editor Journal of Research and Development in Education, 4(3), 1971, 12(3), 1979; member of the editorial boards: Journal of Creative Behavior, Gifted Child Quarterly, Creative Child and Adult Quarterly, Gifted Children Newsletter, Highlights for Children, Journal of Research and Development in Education, La Educacion Hoy, Education Digest, Journal for Humanistic Education, Journal of Group Psychotherapy, Psychodrama, Sociometry.

^ Main tests:

Torrensa test creative thinking(Torrance Test of Creative Thinking).

Main publications:

1962 Guiding Creative Talent. Prentice Hall.

1963 Education and the Creative Potential. University of Minnesota Press.

1965 constructive behavior; Stress, Personality and Mental Health. Wads-worth.

1969 Search for Safari and Creativity. Creative Education Foundation.

1972 Can we teach children to think creatively? Journal of Creative Behavior, 6, 114-143.

1972 Career patterns and peak creative achievements of creative high school students twelve years later. Gifted Child Quarterly, 16, 75-88.

1975 Sociodrama as a creative problem solving approach to studying the future. Journal of Creative Behavior, 9, 182-195.

1976 Creativity in mental health. In S. Arieti and Chrzanowski (eds), New Dimensions in Psychiatry, vol. 2. Basic Books.

1979 An instructional model for enhancing incubation. Journal of Creative Behavior, 13, 23-35.

1981 Predicting the creativity of elementary school children (1958-1980). Gifted Child Quarterly, 25, 55-62.

1984 Mentor Relationships: How they Aid Creative Achievement, Endure, Change and Die. bearly.

1984 The role of creativity in the identification of the gifted and talented. Gifted Child Quarterly, 28, 153-156.

1986 Teaching creative and gifted learners. In M. C. Wittrock (ed.), ^ Handbook of Research on Teaching (3rd edn). Macmillan.

Initially, Torrance was interested in issues related to stress and survival, but this work of his attracted relatively modest attention. His main contribution is related to creativity research. The list of his achievements can be presented as follows.

1. He developed and improved a whole series of tests for creative thinking, which are widely used.

2. He found that the characteristics of the development of most creative abilities differ from those in tests of intelligence and logical thinking.

3. He showed that creative block can be overcome with judicious use teaching materials.

4. He showed that about 70% of creative students pass intelligence tests.

5. He found that creatively gifted children who do not qualify as gifted on the IQ test (IQ130) outperform those who were gifted on the IQ test but did not meet the same criteria on creativity tests as adults;

6. He argued that the presence of a leader significantly affects the creative achievements of adults.

7. According to Torrens, the creative achievements of adults are also significantly influenced by the children's image of a future career - "falling in love with something" - as well as efforts to realize it.

8. The presence of confidence of teachers in primary school increases the chances of adult creative achievements.

9. The creativity test shows no connection with socioeconomic and racial status.

10. Children in emotionally retarded classes show great creativity compared to the norm.

11. A number of technologies for developing more creative problem solving lead to creative growth without affecting other types of educational achievement.

In addition, Torrens founded the Future Problem Solving Program, which has grown into a national and international program. As well as the International Network of Gifted Children and their Educators. He also owns a methodical model of increasing creativity, which has received widespread use through the 360 and 720 programs of Jinn Reading.

^ TORRENSA "PICTURE COMPLETION" TEST

(Torrance Test of Creative Thinking)

(Adapted by A.N. Voronin)

Creativity test. Full version of the methodology E. Torrensa consists of 12 subtests grouped into three batteries. The first is intended for the diagnosis of verbal creative thinking, the second - for non-verbal creative thinking (pictorial creative thinking) and the third - for verbal-sound creative thinking. The non-verbal part of this test, known as the Torrens Figural Forms, was adapted by the Institute of General and educational psychology APN in 1990 on a sample of schoolchildren.

A.N. Voronin attempted to adapt one of the subtests of the complete Torrens test - the Complete Figures subtest - on a sample of managers aged 23 to 35 years. The test was adapted in 1993-1994 in the laboratory for the diagnosis of abilities and the PHC of the Institute of Psychology Russian Academy Sciences. When adapting, special emphasis was placed on identifying non-verbal creativity as a certain ability to “generate” a new, original product in conditions of minimal verbalization. In other words, the verbalization of the material with which the subject is working and the means of "generating" a new product is not obligatory and secondary. The designation by the subject of what is drawn in some words is not essential in interpreting the results and is used only for a more complete understanding of the drawing.

The proposed version of the Torrens test is a set of pictures with a certain set of elements (lines), using which the subjects need to complete the picture to some meaningful image. In this version of the test, 6 pictures are used, selected from 10 original ones. According to A.N. Voronin, these pictures do not duplicate each other in their original elements and give the most reliable results.

The diagnostic capabilities of the adapted version of the methodology make it possible to evaluate such 2 indicators of creativity as:

1. originality,

2. uniqueness.

The indicators of "fluency" of execution, "flexibility", "complexity" of the image, which are available in the full version of Torrance's "Picture Completion" test, are not used in this modification.

In the course of adapting this methodology, norms and an atlas of typical drawings were compiled for a sample of young managers, which make it possible to assess the level of development of creativity in this category of people.

The test can be conducted both individually and in a group version.

Instruction

Features of the testing procedure:

When conducting the test, it must be taken into account that creativity is fully manifested only in favorable conditions. Unfavorable functional states, difficult conditions, insufficiently friendly testing atmosphere sharply lower the results. This requirement is common when testing any form of creativity, therefore, before testing creativity, they always try to create a favorable environment, minimize achievement motivation and orient testees to the manifestation of their hidden abilities. At the same time, it is better to avoid an open discussion of the subject orientation of the methodology, that is, it is not necessary to report that creative abilities are being tested (especially creative thinking). The test can be presented as a technique for "originality", the ability to express oneself in an unusual business, etc. The testing time is not limited if possible, approximately 1-2 minutes for each picture. At the same time, it is necessary to encourage test-takers if they think for a long time or hesitate.

Instruction:

“In front of you is a form with 6 incomplete pictures. You need to draw them. You can draw anything and any way you want. After completing the drawing, you must give it a title and sign it at the bottom of the line.

Content

Stimulus material:

^ Analysis

Interpretation.

The original Torrens test uses several measures of creativity. The most significant of them is originality, the dissimilarity of the image created by the subject to the images of other subjects. In other words, originality is understood as the statistical rarity of a response. However, it should be remembered that there are no two identical images, and, accordingly, we should talk about the statistical rarity of the type (or class) of drawings. The interpretation block contains various types of drawings and their conditional names proposed by the author of the adaptation, which reflect some essential characteristic of the image. It is important that the conditional names of the drawings, as a rule, do not coincide with the names of the drawings given by the subjects themselves. In this, according to A.N. Voronin, the differences between verbal and non-verbal creativity are quite clearly manifested. Since the test is used to diagnose non-verbal creativity, the names of the pictures given by the subjects themselves are excluded from the subsequent analysis and are used only as an aid to understanding the essence of the picture.

The “originality” indicator of a drawing is evaluated based on its data array and is calculated using the following formula:

Where ^ Or- originality of this type of drawing; x- the number of drawings of a different type; X max- maximum amount drawings in a type among all types of drawings for a given sample of subjects.

The Torrens originality index was calculated as the average originality for all pictures. If the originality of the drawing was equal to 1.00, then such a drawing was recognized as unique. Additionally calculated uniqueness index, defined as the number of pictures for a given subject.

Along with the “originality” indicator, the full Torrens test uses the indicator fluency, defined as the number of drawings excluding repetitive (without significant variation) and irrelevant. Irrelevant refers to drawings that do not include lines of stimulus material or are not an integral part of the drawing. When adapting the methodology, this indicator turned out to be uninformative. In the presence of irrelevant drawings, as a rule, there was a process of transition from non-original drawings to original and unique ones, that is, there was a process of transition to creative solutions consistently unfolding over time. Much less often (1-2 cases) there was a misunderstanding of the instructions. In both of these cases, the standard counting procedure test score is not applicable and retesting is required to determine the level of creativity.

An indicator such as flexibility”, works quite well in the “Parallel lines” subtest, where you need to finish drawing twelve pairs to a meaningful image parallel lines. "Flexibility" in this case means having different types of images for each pair of lines and the ease of transition from one type of image to another. In the case of various stimulus material offered for completion, such an indicator is hardly meaningful, and when it is defined as “the number of different categories of images”, it is indistinguishable from originality. Index "complexity" of the image, understood as “the thoroughness of drawing development, the number of additions to the main drawing, etc.”, characterizes some “pictorial” experience of the subject and certain personality traits (for example, epileptoidness, demonstrativeness) rather than creativity characteristics. In this version of the test, the indicators "fluency" of execution, « flexibility», "complexity" of the image, are not used.

The interpretation of test results for this test depends quite strongly on the specifics of the sample, so adequate and reliable conclusions about an individual can only be obtained within this sample or similar to it. In this case, norms and an atlas of typical drawings for a sample of young managers are presented, and, accordingly, it is possible to assess the non-verbal creativity of people of this or similar contingent quite well. If the sample is very different from the proposed one, then it is necessary to analyze the results for the entire new sample and only then draw conclusions about individual people.

To evaluate the results of testing people belonging to the contingent of managers or similar to it, it is proposed the following algorithm of actions.

It is necessary to compare the finished drawings with those available in the atlas and, if a similar type is found, assign the originality indicated in the atlas to this drawing. If there is no such type of drawings in the atlas, then the originality of this completed picture is considered to be 1.00. The originality index is calculated as the arithmetic average of the originality of all pictures.

Let the first picture be similar to picture 1.5 of the atlas. Its originality is 0.74. The second figure is similar to picture 2.1. Its originality is 0.00. The third drawing does not look like anything, but the elements originally proposed for finishing are not included in the drawing. This situation is interpreted as a departure from the task and the originality of this drawing is estimated at 0.00. The fourth picture is missing. The fifth figure is recognized as unique (not similar to anything in the atlas). Originality - 1.00. The sixth drawing turned out to be similar to the picture 6.3 and originality 0.67. Thus, the total score for this protocol is 2.41 / 5 = 0.48.

When evaluating the originality of a given drawing, one should take into account that sometimes "typical" drawings appear in response to stimuli that are not typical for them. So, for picture 1, the most typical picture, which we conventionally called "cloud". A drawing of the same type may appear in response to the stimulus material of picture 2 or 3. In the atlas, such cases of duplication are not given, and the originality of such drawings should be assessed by the images available for other pictures. In our case, the originality of the “cloud” pattern that appeared in the second picture is estimated at 0.00 points.

The index of uniqueness (the number of unique pictures) of this protocol is 1. Using a percentile scale built for these two indices, one can determine the place of a given person in relation to the proposed sample and, accordingly, draw conclusions about the degree of development of his non-verbal creativity.

The results of the protocol discussed above show that this person is on the border of 80%. This means that about 80% of the people in this sample had higher non-verbal creativity (according to the originality index) than he did. However, its uniqueness index is higher and only 20% have a higher index. To assess creativity as such, the uniqueness index is more important, showing how truly new a person can create, but the differentiating power of the proposed index is small and therefore the originality index is used as an auxiliary one.

Percentile scale

1 - percentage of people whose results exceed the specified level

2 - originality index value

3 - uniqueness index value

1	0%	20%	40%	60%	80%	100%
2	0,95	0,76	0,67	0,58	0,48	0,00
3	4,00	2,00	1,00	1,00	0,00	0,00

Torrance (Torrance) Ellis Paul (b. 1915) - American psychologist, specialist in the problems of the psychology of education, the psychology of creativity and the education of gifted children.

Biography. Educated at the University of Mercer (bachelor, 1940) and the University of Minnesota (master, 1944). In 1951 he defended his doctoral dissertation at the University of Michigan. Distinguished Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Georgia.

Research. He began his professional activity with the study of the problem stress and survival. But in the future, he completely switched to the study of creativity. He proved the irreducibility of indicators of creative abilities to indicators of intellectual achievements and logical thinking. So, in particular, he demonstrated that with the help of intelligence tests it is impossible to identify about 70% of creatively gifted students. Creatively gifted children who do not qualify as gifted on an intelligence test (i.e., do not have an IQ greater than 130) often outperform those who, according to an intelligence test, showed giftedness, but performed poorly on tests of creativity ( Career patterns and peak creative achievements of creative high school students twelve years later // Gifted Child Quarterly. 1972.16.75-88). In addition, the creativity test demonstrates a lack of association with socioeconomic and racial status. I came to the conclusion that the adequate use of methodological materials plays an important role in creative activity. Among other things, the presence of a leader significantly affects the creative achievements of adults. He showed the role of emotional and motivational processes in the dynamics of the development of creative abilities. Thus, it was shown that the creative achievements of adults are significantly influenced by the image of the future profession that they developed in childhood (“falling in love with something”), as well as the efforts aimed at its implementation. This is also influenced by the confidence of their elementary school teachers. Numerous empirical studies have shown that creative children are often recognized as having some kind of emotional deviation from the norm.

Methods. He substantiated and developed methods for supporting creative activity, the use of which does not affect other types of educational achievements. He also developed and improved a number of tests for creative thinking, primarily the Torrens test (Test of Creative Thinking. Bensenvill, 1966).

Kondakov I.M. Psychology. Illustrated dictionary. // THEM. Kondakov. - 2nd ed. add. and reworked. - St. Petersburg, 2007, p. 606-607.

Read further:

Philosophers, lovers of wisdom (biographical index).

US Historical Persons (Index of Names).

Compositions:

Guiding Creative Talent. N. Y.: Prentice Hall, 1962; Education and the Creative Potential. University of Minnesota Press, 1963; Constructive Behavior: Stress, Personality and Mental Health. Wadsworth, 1965; Search for Satori and Creativity. Creative Education Foundation, 1969; Can we teach children to think creatively? // Journal of Creative Behavior. 1972,6,114-143; Sociodrama as a creative problem solving approach to studying the future // Journal of Creative Behavior. 1975, 9, 182-195; Creativity in mental health// S. Arieti and Chrzanowski (eds), New Dimensions in Psychiatry, vol. 2. N. Y.: Basic Books, 1976; An instructional model for enhancing incubation //Journal of Creative Behavior. 1979, 13, 23-35; Predicting the creativity of elementary school children (1958-1980) // Gifted Child Quarterly. 1981, 25, 55-62; Mentor Relationships: How they Aid Creative Achievement, Endure, Change and Die. Bearley 1984; The role of creativity in the identification of the gifted and talented // Gifted Child Quarterly. 1984,28,153-156; Teaching creative and gifted learners // M. C. Wittrock (ed.), Handbook of Research on Teaching (3rd edn). N.Y.: Macmillan, 1986.

Literature:

E. P. Torrens // Psychology: Biographical Bibliographic Dictionary / Ed. N. Sheehy, E. J. Chapman, W. A. Conroy. St. Petersburg: Eurasia, 1999.

ALICE PAUL TLRRENS - THE NATURE OF CREATIVITY

Biography

Career

In 1936 he began his teaching career at Midway Vocational School and in 1937 at the Georgia War College. In 1945, he was drafted into the US Army where he worked as a consultant to disabled veterans at the Counseling Center at the University of Minnesota. In 1951, he became director of the US Air Force Rehabilitation Science Center in Colorado, and in 1958 he returned to the University of Minnesota, where he served as director of the Center for Educational Research until 1966.

From 1966 to 1978, Torrance served as chair and from 1978 to 1984 as professor in the Department of Educational Psychology at the University of Georgia (UGA). In 1984, he retired and, in the same year, the Torrens Center for the Development of Creativity and Talent was established at the University of Georgia. Personality: Torrens had a good-natured, delicate, and generous personality. He was an outstanding mentor and teacher, always showing respect and support to his colleagues and students.

Creation

There has been active debate in the psychological literature about whether intelligence and creativity are parts of the same process (adjacent hypotheses) or represent different mental processes (disjoint hypotheses). Evidence from attempts to link intelligence and creativity since the 1950s by authors such as Baron Guildford or Wolack and Kogan has consistently demonstrated that the relationship between the two is small enough to allow them to be seen as completely different. concepts. Some researchers believed that creativity is a consequence of the same cognitive process as intelligence, and is defined as creativity only on the basis of its consequences, that is, when something new is born as a result of a cognitive process. Perkins conditionally called this approach the “nothing special” hypothesis.

A very popular model, later known as the Threshold Hypothesis,

The Threshold Hypothesis, proposed by Alice Paul Torrens, states that in the general sample there will be a positive relationship between creativity and intelligence at a low level of their development, but the relationship will not be found at higher levels. The development of the "threshold" hypothesis, however, has met with mixed reactions ranging from enthusiastic support to rebuttal and denial. In 1974, Torrens created an orderly grading system. As part of the conceptual framework of creativity, he identified five measurable norms and 13 measurable criteria. The five norms measured are: fluency, originality, abstractness of titles, elaboration, and resistance to premature termination. Measured criteria include: emotional expression, clarity of wording when telling a story, movement, or action, expressiveness of titles, juxtaposition of incomplete data, juxtaposition of lines, circles, extraordinary visualization, expansion or destruction of boundaries, humor, imaginative richness, vividness of imagination, and fantasy. According to Arasteh and Arasteh (1976), the most systematic definition of the creative abilities of children of primary school age was developed by Torrens and his colleagues (1960a,1960b, 1960c, 1961,1962,1962a,1963a,1964), who developed Minnesota Tests of Creative Thinking (MTCT) and conducted them among several thousand students. And while they used many of Guilford's concepts in the design of the tests themselves, the Minnesota group, unlike Guilford, developed tasks that could be assessed on multiple dimensions, including both verbal and non-verbal aspects and based on feelings other than sight.

Torrance in 1962 grouped the various tasks of the Minnesota Creative Thinking Tests into three categories: Verbal tasks using verbal stimuli (stimuli); Verbal tasks using non-verbal stimuli (stimuli); nonverbal tasks. A summary of the tasks used by Torrens is given below:

Unusual application. Unusual application tasks using verbal stimuli are a modified version of Guildford's brick application test. After preliminary attempts, Torrens (1962) decides to replace the brick with cans and books, believing that it will be easier for children to operate with cans and books, since both are more accessible to children than bricks.

The task of "impossibility". Originally used by Guilford et al. (1951) as a measure of fluency that included a combination of limitations and great potential. In the process of personality development and mental health, Torrens experimented with the number of changes in the basic task, making the restrictions more specific. In this task, test subjects are asked to list as many impossibilities as they can.

Consequence task. The consequences problem has also been previously applied by Guilford et al. (1951). Torrance adapted it with a few changes. He chose three improbable situations and the children were required to list their consequences. "Just Guess" Task This is an adapted version of the "Consequences" test that aims to detect a higher degree of spontaneity and is intended to be more effective in children. As in the consequences task, the test-taker is faced with improbable situations and must predict the possible consequences caused by the introduction of a new or unknown variable.

Situation problem. This task was modeled after Guilford's (1951) test, which was designed to measure the ability to see what needs to be done. Three general problems are presented to the test subjects, so that they come up with as many possible solutions to the problems as they can. For example: suppose all schools were cancelled, what would you do to try to become educated? General Problems Task This task is an adaptation of Guilford's (1951) test, which was designed to measure the ability to see shortcomings, needs, and deficits, as well as a determining factor called “problem sensitivity”. Test subjects are instructed to be presented with general situations in which to see as many possible problems stemming from those situations as possible. For example: if you do your homework on the way to school in the morning.

improvement task. This test is an adaptation of Guilford's (1952) instrumental test, designed to assess the ability to see faults and all aspects of sensitivity to problems. To solve this problem, test-takers are offered a list of common objects in order to suggest as many ways to improve each of them as possible. At the same time, they are asked not to worry about how these improvements are applicable to reality.

"Mom's Problem - Hubbard". This problem was conceived as an adaptation of the situations problem for oral application in elementary grades, but is also applicable to older groups. This test activates a whole range of ideas about factors that inhibit the development of thinking. Fictional Story Task For this task, the child is asked to write the most interesting and exciting story they can imagine. The titles of the stories are offered ready-made, for example: “The dog that did not bark”, or the child can use his own ideas.

Problems of a jumping cow. The jumping cow problem is a companion problem to the Mum-Hubbard problem, and was proposed to be solved in the same groups under the same conditions, and evaluated according to the same principle. The task is to think about all the possible consequences that could happen if the cow jumped to the moon. Verbal tasks using non-verbal stimuli[edit | edit wiki text]

Task "Ask and Guess". In this task, the individual is to be asked a question about a painting, a question that cannot be answered by looking at the painting alone. Then he is asked to guess or formulate a hypothesis about the possible causes of the depicted event. And then about its consequences - both immediate and remote.

Product improvement challenge. In this task, familiar toys are used. The child is asked to suggest improvements for each of the toys in order to make them more interesting (more fun) to play with. The test-taker is then asked to think of other unusual uses for these toys besides playing with them.

The task of unusual application. In this problem, along with the problem of improving the product, another one (unusual application) is used. The child is asked to think of the smartest, most interesting and most unusual use of the proposed toy, in addition to playing with it. This use must be offered for the toy as it is, or modified in some way.

nonverbal tasks.

Problem of incomplete figures. This is an adaptation of the "drawing completion" test, which was developed by Kate Franck and used by Barron in 1958. A sheet of ordinary white paper measuring 54 square inches is divided into six squares, each of which depicts some kind of stimulus figure. The subject is asked to outline some new drawings or images by adding as many lines as needed to the existing six shapes. Design an image or shape task In this task, the child is given the shape of a triangle or jelly and a piece of white paper. The child is asked to come up with an image, a picture in which this form would become an integral part. He must place it in any place of the white sheet chosen by him and draw with a pencil so that a new picture is obtained. Then the picture must be named and signed at the bottom of the sheet.

Problem "Circles and squares". It was originally conceived as a task to identify the flexibility and fluency of thinking, and then redesigned in such a way as to emphasize originality and elaboration (detail). This test uses two printed templates. On one test subject sees an image of forty-two circles, he is asked to sketch objects or pictures in which the circles would form the basis of the image. The second pattern uses squares instead of circles.

The task of the creative project. Designed by Henrikson, it looks promising, but the scoring system is far from perfect. For testing, circles and strips of various sizes and colors, a four-page booklet, scissors and glue are used. The test subject's task is to construct an image, a "project", using all the colored circles and stripes. Time is limited to thirty minutes. You can use one, two, three, or all four pages. After using these circles and stripes, you can refine the image using a colored or black and white pencil.

(Torrance, Ellis Paul)

Was born: 1915, Milledgeville, Georgia, USA.

Interests: creativity, issues of education of gifted children, educational psychology, futurology, school psychology.

Education: B.A., Mercer University, 1940; MA, University of Minnesota, 1944; doctor, University of Michigan, 1951.

Main tests:

Torrens test of creative thinking(Torrance Test of Creative Thinking).