Student’s Creativity in Relation to Locus of Control: a Study of Mysore University, India

Prof Anu Singh Lather Prof Anu Singh Lather,Ms Anju Dwivedi Shukla Ms Anju Dwivedi Shukla,Dr Shilpa Jain Dr Shilpa Jain

doi:10.25215/0201.058

Prof Anu Singh Lather Prof Anu Singh Lather, Ms Anju Dwivedi Shukla Ms Anju Dwivedi Shukla + Show 1 more

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https://doi.org/10.25215/0201.058

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Abstract

The study explored the relationship of creativity and locus of control of students coming from various academic disciplines (Biotechnology, Environmental Sciences, Civil Engineering, Electronics & Communication, Centre for Women Studies, Mathematics, Food and Nutrition and Geography).The data was collected from a sample of 450 students of Mysore University out of which 40 belonged to Electronics and communication, 44 were from Civil Engineering, 40 from Environmental Sciences, 37 from Biotechnology, 40 from Geography, 16 from mathematics, 20 from Food and Nutrition and 7 from Centre for Women Studies. Abbreviated Torrance Test for Adults and Levenson’s Locus of Control tests were administered on students and their socio – demographic information was taken. Results showed that highly creative students are significantly higher on Internal Locus of Control and the students who were low on creativity are significantly higher on External Locus of Control. The study also found that students at post graduate level were significantly higher on Powerful Others as compared to students at under graduate level. Students with low creativity at both post graduate and undergraduate levels and from all disciplines are significantly higher on powerful others (external locus of control) as compared to the students with high creativity, while students with high creativity at post postgraduate and undergraduate level and from all disciplines are significantly higher on individual control as compared to students with low creativity at both the levels. The results also show that students from Geography are significantly higher on powerful others as compared to students from other disciplines, while students from centre for women studies are significantly lower on powerful others as compared to students from other academic disciplines except food and nutrition students. Students from Centre for women studies are significantly lower on chance control as compared to students from mathematics, environment sciences, biotechnology, civil engineering, and geography. However the students of geography are significantly higher on chance control as compared to students from mathematics, food and nutrition, electronics and communication, and centre for women studies.

Highlights

In the opening lines of Handbook of creativity Sternberg and Lubart (2004) said ―If one wanted to select the best novelist, artist, entrepreneur or even chief executive officer, one would most likely want someone who is creative
Post Hoc Tests were applied for further analysis and the Duncan table (Table 1.4a) showed that Geography students were significantly high on Powerful others in comparison to students of Environmental Sciences, Civil Engineering, Electronics and Communication, Biotechnology, Mathematics and Food and Nutrition whereas students of Centre for Women Studies students were found to be significantly low on powerful other
The result shows that geography students scored highest on Powerful other and Chance control, whereas Center for Women Studies students scored lowest on Powerful others and chance control

Summary

Introduction

In the opening lines of Handbook of creativity Sternberg and Lubart (2004) said ―If one wanted to select the best novelist, artist, entrepreneur or even chief executive officer, one would most likely want someone who is creative. Today many CEOs are selected not for their pleasant personalities or their learning and memory skills, but for their creative vision of how to turn a company around‖. Creativity is the ability to produce work that is both novel (i.e. original, unexpected) and appropriate (i.e. useful, adaptive concerning task constraints (Lubart, 1994). Torrance defined creativity as ―the process of sensing problems or gaps in information, forming ideas of hypotheses, testing, and modifying these hypotheses, and communicating the results. This process may lead to any one of many kinds of products—verbal and nonverbal, concrete and abstract‖ (Torrance 1963). Few recorded internal locus of control to be related with high creativity (Montea & Siu, 2002; Ambile et al, 1990) while few found external locus of control to be associated with high creativity (Bolen & Torrence, 1978; Richmond et al, 1980) and others found no relationship between the two (Brink, 2003)

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