A Decline in Creativity? It Depends on the Domain

Abstract

Earlier studies using psychometric tests have documented declines in creativity over the past several decades. Our study investigated whether and how this apparent trend would replicate through a qualitative investigation using an authentic nontest measure of creativity. Three-hundred and fifty-four visual artworks and 50 creative writing works produced by adolescents between 1990–1995 and 2006–2011 were assessed. Products were analyzed using a structured assessment method based on technical criteria and content elements. Criteria included in the current investigation (e.g., genre, medium, stylistic approach) are relevant both to the specific media domains and to previously established dimensions of creativity, such as originality and complexity. Results showed strong domain differences: performance in visual arts increased on a variety of indices of complexity and technical proficiency, and performance in writing decreased on indices related to originality and technical proficiency. Findings highlight the value of analysing creativity across domains. The importance of considering cultural and technological changes in characterizing and understanding apparent trends in amount and types of creativity is discussed.

Acknowledgments

We thank The James and Judith K. Dimon Foundation for their generosity and partnership, both of which made this work possible. We also thank Howard Gardner and Ellen Winner for their comments on earlier drafts of this article and Margaret Rundle, Emma Heeschen, Emily Kaplan, and Marc Aidinoff for their contributions to the research. We thank the anonymous peer reviewers and the editor of Creativity Research Journal for their valuable feedback.

Notes

¹Original article in Chinese.

²There was no indication of systematic differences between works for which originals were available and those for which there were no available originals. Therefore, this reselection was judged not to have introduced bias into the sample (i.e., with respect to quality).

*p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001.

*p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001.