Abilities Within and Across Visual and Verbal Domains: How Specific Is Their Influence on Creativity?

Abstract

Does visual creativity rely predominantly on visual abilities and verbal creativity on verbal abilities, or is there a cross-over between the domains? Participants (N = 25) performed several visual tasks and verbal ability tests, as well as visual and verbal creativity tests. Both correlation and multidimensional scaling analyses were performed. Visual creativity was found to be related to visual abilities, in particular to restructuring. Verbal creativity was related to verbal ability scores, such as vocabulary and comprehension, but also by vividness scores of the visual imagery questionnaire. These findings are consistent with the notion that visual creativity is largely domain- and task-specific, whereas verbal creativity, even though mostly domain-specific, may, to some extent, be sensitive to processes in the visual domain as well.