Stimulating Creativity

Stimulating Creativity: Volume 1, Individual Procedures discusses the psychological and social factors affecting creativity, including techniques applicable in technological and consumer-related product areas. Creativity is a process consisting of three overlapping stages—hypothesis formation, hypothesis testing, and the communication of results. The book reviews past criteria of creativity, and then suggests techniques, based on social and psychological differentiating characteristics of creativity, that can stimulate creativity. The text also considers some procedures which the individual can use to stimulate creativity, or overcome blocks that stop creativity. The book explains in detail individual procedures, group procedures, as well the techniques appropriate in each stage of the creative process. The text notes that the creative process occurs in a social context, primarily manifested during the communication stage. The book considers the following group procedures for stimulating creativity, namely, brainstorming, creative problem-solving, synectics, and a personality-insight approach. Examples of programs employed in different companies or organization can free an individual from difficulties and problems, make him more receptive to other programs, or he can use these programs as basis to develop newer programs. The book can prove insightful for psychiatrists, psychologists, behavioral scientists, child educators, students or professors in psychology, for parents of young children or adolescents, and also for general readers interested in self-improvement.