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Researchers Say They’ve Developed a Method That Can Train Anyone to Be Creative
At least since the 1950s, psychologists have been peddling creativity training, but ask the average person on the street if creativity can be taught and they’ll probably shrug and say, not really. Sure, various techniques can marginally boost creative thinking, they might add, but a great many people still believe that you’re basically stuck with whatever level of creativity your brain is naturally wired for.
That persistent belief that creativity is basically unteachable doesn’t say great things about the past 70 or so years of creativity training. Which is why a group of researchers recently set out to reimagine the field entirely. In a new paper, they claim they’ve developed a new approach that can train just about anyone to be more creative.
Stealing the creativity secret of kids
Project Narrative, the effort out of Ohio State University, began with a simple but profound observation. Almost all past creativity training has been based on the idea of divergent thinking, offering trainees logical rules and set mental recipes to help them generate more fresh ideas. That sounds sensible, but it’s actually not how some of the most creative humans around, kids, come up with wildly novel ideas. Kids are super creative because they’re…
