How to Cite

Lubart, Todd and Thornhill-Miller, Branden: Creativity: An Overview of the 7C’s of Creative Thought, in Sternberg, Robert J. and Funke, Joachim (Eds.): The Psychology of Human Thought: An Introduction, Heidelberg: Heidelberg University Publishing, 2019, p. 277–305. https://doi.org/10.17885/heiup.470.c6678

License (Chapter)

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Identifiers (Book)

ISBN 978-3-947732-33-3 (PDF)
ISBN 978-3-947732-34-0 (Softcover)
ISBN 978-3-947732-35-7 (Hardcover)

Published

07/31/2019

Authors

Todd Lubart, Branden Thornhill-Miller

Creativity: An Overview of the 7C’s of Creative Thought

  1. Creativity is a multifaceted phenomenon that can be understood by examining 7 aspects, called the 7 C’s: Creators (person-centered characteristics), Creating (the creative process), Collaborations (co-creating), Contexts (environmental conditions), Creations (the nature of creative work), Consumption (the adoption of creative products) and Curricula (developing creativity).
  2. Creative people have a set of cognitive capacities, personality traits, affective and motivational characteristics that favor their engagement in original thinking.
  3. Person-centered factors, environmental conditions and task-centered factors need to be jointly considered to describe creative potential and achievement.
  4. The creative process involves multiple sub-processes, which can be described as divergent-exploratory and convergent-integrative phases.
  5. Creative potential and achievement can be measured with production tasks, and other assessment tools in diverse domains of expression.
  6. Creativity can be collaborative and collective as expressed in team, group and societal forms of creativity.
  7. Creativity is influenced by the physical and sociocultural context, which may boost or inhibit it, and direct creativity to certain expressive outlets.
  8. Creativity is a topic that concerns both the production and the public who consume the creations, pointing to a co-constructive link between creators, consumers, and cultures.
  9. Creativity can be developed through education. The school curriculum, or specific training activities and creativity techniques have been shown to boost original thinking in children and adults.