Creativity and Complexity: Creative Solutions are Complex and Need Time

Abstract

Abstract To create art means to be creative, but how creativity is gained, how we can induce and train creativity and how we can validly measure creative potential is a matter of still unsolved research. In our exploratory study, 49 participants had to create figures by using a double set of Tangram puzzles — so to say: to create something with an infinite degree of freedoms but that is still based on just a few defined and simple basic elements. In total, participants created 708 different figures. Creativity and complexity of these creations were then assessed in a subsequent study by five further raters in two randomly ordered blocks. We observed a strong correlation between the ratings of creativity and complexity on basis of average as well as individual data level. Interestingly, highly productive people, sometimes misinterpreted as ‘creatives’ due to their sheer quantitative output, actually produced simpler scenes that were also evaluated as less creative. We could also reveal that the level of creativity in the produced items remained very similar over the course of the test, pointing to relatively stable creativity traits (at least during the study phase). Our approach could lead to a deeper and more differentiated understanding of the concept of creativity and creative potential, specifically by combining it with qualitative analyses of the complexity of the created figures.