Who Takes the Clue? Relationships Between Internal and External Factors in Creative Problem Solving1

Abstract

This study examined the relationship between implicit environmental clues in a creativity task and individual differences in state change and personality traits. In two experiments, participants completed a Remote Associates Test. Some solution words were implicitly primed as clues. In Experiment 1, the clue priming effect turned from negative to positive depending on task progress, which is related to arousal state. Clue priming can hinder people's generating ideas depending on arousal. In Experiment 2, considering participants' personality traits as a moderator, we further examined the relationship between sensitivity to environmental clues and arousal measured by heart rate. The results confirmed Experiment 1's outcomes and revealed that the relationship is moderated by extraversion. For extraverted participants, an implicit clue had a negative effect in a high‐arousal state but a positive effect in a low‐arousal state. The facilitative or obstructive influences of external factors can be determined by the interaction of internal factors (i.e., solvers' traits and states). Thus, extraverts and introverts differ in how they receive and utilize external information.