RETRACTED: Steal like an artist: Connection between critical thinking and creativity of a future musician in a digital environment

Abstract

• Correlation between critical thinking and creativity in music was investigated. • The level of critical thinking was assessed using the Watson-Glaser test. • Respondents with a high level of critical thinking had a higher level of creativity. In the modern world, it is quite difficult to create authentic, unlike anything musical works, since there is a huge amount of different music. For this reason, it is extremely difficult to create a new product. The problem of creativity in this matter is of relevance. Although most studies on this topic show a positive correlation between critical and creative thinking in an online environment, there are a number of studies in which this correlation has not been traced. This fact is the rationale for this study. For this reason, this topic should be explored in more detail. As part of this work, the correlation between critical thinking and creativity in music production will be investigated (in this study, the correlation is proved by confirming the alternative hypothesis of the difference in students’ creativity depending on their critical thinking level). The sample of research participants was composed of 563 students. In the first stage, the level of critical thinking was assessed using the Watson-Glaser test. The respondents taking part in the experiment studied in music universities in the specialties of composing and arrangement. During the experiment, three groups were formed: respondents with a low level of critical thinking (first group), respondents with an average level of critical thinking (second group), and respondents with a high level of critical thinking (third group). At the second stage, the respondents were required to write a series of small pieces (30 measures with ¾ time signature (waltzes in major and minor)). The resulting compositions were evaluated by professors from various universities in China to determine the creativity in writing melodies. The obtained results, analyzed using Student's two-sample test for independent variables, showed that respondents with a high level of critical thinking had a higher level of creativity (about 80% or more) in a total digital environment, while respondents with an average and low level of critical thinking received almost equally low results (on average, not exceeding 60%, but in some cases, the results were slightly higher). In this case, the alternative hypothesis H 1 t about existence of investigated correlation was confirmed. It should be noted that the concepts of “creativity” and “authenticity” are abstract and rather subjective. Given the complexity of evaluating works from this point of view, teachers passed an oral survey in which they were required to define the word “creativity”. As the results showed, this task was difficult for most teachers, but they coped with it quite successfully. Most of the teachers gave the epithet “unlike anything” or “special”. All data sets were checked on obeying normal distribution using the Shapiro–Wilk test.