Creativity

Abstract

The study of creativity is about how people generate novel ideas and products, as opposed to reproducing or mimicking things that already exist. In this chapter, the author characterizes the study of creativity as the three Ms of mechanism, modulator, and meme. The mechanisms of creativity include the modification of existing products and the blending of two or more products to create stylistic fusions. Modulators of creativity include both individual-level factors (e.g. personality) and social factors (e.g. political constraints). The notion of a ‘meme’ reflects the cultural evolutionary concept that creative products either flourish or die out as a result of the critical reception they receive. A central question for the psychology of creativity is whether creativity depends more on domain-specific or domain-general mechanisms, or some combination of the two.