Dimensions of the Creative Episode: Old Categories, New Perspectives

Abstract

In the domain of creativity, many different phenomena have been labeled creative. One strategy for bringing order to the variety has been to distinguish different categories of creativity. This article proposes that multiple dimensions, rather than categories, provide a more heuristic approach for capturing the variety. By dimensionalizing the criteria that define discrete categories (Big C vs. little c, for example), assembling various dimensions suggested by others scattered in the literature (degree of organization within a domain, for example), and identifying new dimensions (structure in initial project representation, for example), we achieve a more solid foundation for describing, analyzing, comparing, and theorizing about the varieties of the creative process. There is no claim that the dimensions are independent; rather, their relationships to one another pose interesting empirical and conceptual questions. The dimensional approach suggests new perspectives on laboratory measures of creativity, new ways of looking at the development of creativity in children, and a middle path in the tension between those who hold that the making of each creative work is unique and those whose work rests on the assumption of universals in the creative process.