Creative Research Research Articles

Sequence Generation and Evaluation: A Novel Assessment of Musical Creativity

ABSTRACT Music is often considered an important domain for creativity. Traditional studies of musical creativity have examined musical improvisation using jazz as a model. While this approach has yielded many valuable insights about creativity’s cognitive and neural mechanisms, it has limited the study sample to those with the means to engage in improvisation within one specific Western style. Here, we introduce a novel tool for assessing musical creativity in the broader sample of individuals with no specialized training. In two experiments (n = 165) we show that this sequencer can be used in people with minimal training to generate a database of sequences composed at the Bohlen-Pierce scale and to evaluate them for creativity. Results show that creativity ratings are predicted by length of melodies, number of distinct pitches used, and information content of pitch intervals. Results also show some external validity with existing creativity tasks. We advocate the use of this sequencer in creativity research, as it provides a theoretically motivated, rigorous tool to examine the iterative process of producing and evaluating musical creativity.

Towards more inclusive understandings of creativity

Creativity research could advantageously turn away from the notion that being creative is solely connected to novelty, youth, and renewal, and that the ability to be creative declines with age. On the contrary, it seems that people can find great value in being active, participating in the community, and creating—in the vegetable garden, with knitting, or together with others in choirs and community life. This commentary on Adams-Price and Morse “Creativity, aging, context and culture: Reimagining creativity in everyday life in older adults” invites the authors to go even further in their theoretical exploration of models of creativity adding an even stronger lifespan perspective on creativity.

Li Nationality Intangible Cultural Heritage in the Development of Cultural and Creative Products Research

As one of the main indigenous nationalities in Hainan Island, the unique intangible cultural heritage of the Li nationality is an important part of the multicultural treasure house of the Chinese nation. This paper aims to explore the li intangible culture in the product development application and research, through the analysis of li traditional spinning weaving techniques, rattan art, li silver and other intangible cultural connotation and artistic characteristics, put forward the use of modern design concept and technology for product development strategy, in order to protect and inheriting li intangible culture provide new ideas and methods.

Laboratory work in physics "The study of uniformly accelerated motion without initial velocity" using a robotic kit LEGO MINDSTORMS EDUCATION EV3

The article presents an example of using a robotic kit at physics and informatics lessons — a laboratory work "The study of uniformly accelerated motion without initial velocity" using the LEGO MINDSTORMS EDUCATION EV3 kit. This work is intended for students in 9–10th grades when studying uniformly accelerated motion in a physics course. During the laboratory work, it is necessary to: assemble an experimental setup and create a program for the EV3 control module, which should record the time of movement of a ball along an inclined chute with output to the EV3 module screen; enter the obtained measurement results into a calculation table compiled in an electronic spreadsheet, into which formulas for automatic calculation of acceleration and instantaneous velocity of the ball are preliminarily entered. The laboratory work can be carried out both in a physics and an informatics lessons, and in an optional lesson, you can also conduct an integrated physics and informatics lesson. The use of robotic modeling introduces students to the modern process of conducting physical research (experiments), helps to increase students' interest in experimental work, develop their skills in using robots in research and motivation for engineering and technical creativity.

PhEminist skins of resistance: creative activism as a decolonial tool for the empowerment of young people within the neo-liberal educational setting

ABSTRACT In this article, I discuss the legacy of the art historical trope of the female nude in perpetuating colonial narratives that inform young women’s understanding not only of the idealized female body, but also what is perceived as ‘good’ drawing in the contemporary art classroom. Theoretically informed by phEmaterialism (feminist new materialism and post-humanism in education), I review the skin as a post-human assemblage to diffract heteronormative and raced colonial imaginings of the female skin. I discuss the PhEminist Skins project, a collaboration with six young women artists (the YWAs), where critical engagement with creative methods, such as life drawing, mobilized the agency of the skin and created opportunity for creative activism. I further share how the methods developed by the YWAs instigated the creation of The Centre for Creative Explorations, a creative research centre that explores alternative pedagogical approaches to the decolonial endeavour in secondary education.

THE METHOD OF INCREASING THE ACTIVITY OF THE 5-6 THЕ GRADERS IN THE TEACHING OF "EDUCATION" SUBJECT

The article discusses the use of pedagogical technologies, interactive methods, educational games, and modern information and communication technologies in teaching the subject of upbringing in grades 5-6 by teachers. These approaches help students to think independently, expand their creative research and logical thinking, connect what they have learned in the classroom with real life, and increase their interest.

Thriving futures

This Special Issue of the journal Art, Design & Communication in Higher Education (ADCHE) revisits the purpose and potential of art and design from an Australian perspective. It draws on the November 2023 Australian Council of University Art & Design Schools (ACUADS) 43rd conference, co-convened by Thao Nguyen, School of Art, RMIT University and myself. This national forum sought to consider the following: (1) how can creative education and research embrace our unique Australian perspective and integrate First Nations knowledge to cultivate a ‘thriving future’? (2) What is the potential of creative research and pedagogy in responding to the climate crisis and other urgent societal concerns? (3) How has the global pandemic disrupted and catalysed innovation in creative art education, including the rapid uptake of digital media by traditionally haptic disciplines? What are the key technological agendas for art and design schools? Drawing on our unique perspective, with particular acknowledgement of First Nations knowledge and ways of being, our colonial history and Asia–Pacific context, this edition considers how creative education and research can contribute not only to economies but also to the array of pressing social, environmental and cultural issues necessary to enable thriving futures.

Soundscape Composition in the Framework of Cognitive Systems

After more than fifty years of development, soundscape composition has evolved from its initial purposes of education and archival work into a significant branch of contemporary music creation. With the advancement of recording technology, digital audio processing tools, and computer music software, the creative means of soundscape composition have been greatly expanded. At the same time, soundscape composition requires composers to make comprehensive use of multiple fields such as technology, art, science, society and culture. However, this also introduces more complex creative challenges, as composers may need to efficiently coordinate the use of various tools in multitasking environments and manage multidimensional interactive scenarios, which demands higher levels of cognitive ability and clearer workflow. This paper aims to discuss my own soundscape composition project within the framework of cognitive theories (extended mind and distributed cognition), in order to explore underdeveloped perspectives on the practice and learning of soundscape composition. This perspective may provide soundscape composers with a richer cognitive theoretical foundation and potential methodological support in the creative process, helping composers or researchers understand the dynamic cognitive processes of soundscape composition based on an analysis of the entire environment.

Nurturing teachers’ creativity: Exploring leadership roles and constraints

Creativity research suggests the profound effect of leadership on the social environment that influences creativity within organisations. Despite numerous studies that claimed a role for leadership in nurturing creativity, the effects of instructional and innovative leadership on creativity development leading to organisational growth have remained largely overlooked. Therefore, this study examines the influence of leadership on teachers’ creativity. Data were collected from 369 teachers serving in secondary schools in Malaysia. In addition, three principals were also interviewed to understand how school leadership strategies can enhance teachers’ creativity within the school context. In addition, their challenges in supporting teachers’ creativity and innovation were explored. Results indicate that they mostly preferred instructional leadership rather than innovative leadership which aimed to influence their creativity. Findings from the structural model have confirmed that instructional leadership was the most preferred leadership practice compared to innovative leadership when enhancing teacher creativity. In exploring support for creativity, principals mainly used incentive and informal support and encouragement with teachers. In understanding principals’ constraints, senior teachers who are reluctant to change and principals’ heavy workloads and shortage of time are mentioned as challenges that principals need to face while supporting teachers’ creativity in schools. This study recommends that school leaders must possess sufficient knowledge and skill to support teachers’ creativity which requires that school leaders are open to and supportive of creative activities. The results also indicate that school leaders need to understand teachers’ requirements as providers of creative teaching and learning.

Lego Serious Play in Psychology: Exploring Its Use in Qualitative Interviews

ABSTRACT Lego Serious Play (LSP) developed in corporate settings to encourage collaboration, problem-solving, and drive creativity. As a creative research method, LSP is relatively under-researched. The constructive ‘build, share, listen’ process of LSP has considerable potential to promote reflection and elicit talk in phenomenological research interviews. We draw on our experiences using LSP in interviews to explore the meaning of happiness with five young adults in Hong Kong, who had moved back to their parental home. We explain our approach and discuss the potential benefits, limitations and considerations when using LSP to enhance individual interviews. It is a participant-led approach, which reduces anxiety, enables ‘flow,’ self-expression and reflection, access to tacit knowledge, use of metaphor and symbolism. Considerations and limitations include the time burden, aspects of our approach which were more researcher- than participant-led, potential improvements to enhance data generation and ethical reflections on the cathartic nature of the LSP-supported interviews.

Creative Research Engagement from Design through Application to Dissemination: Maximizing the Research Impact through Creativity

ABSTRACTThe value of research is often determined by its impact and ability to catalyze positive change in the life of communities, technological developments, and the advancement of education. However, translating research findings and innovative conceptualizations into practical applications is not always easy for various reasons. As a result, there may be difficulty achieving a buy‐in from community and industry partners who are essential for elevating innovative ideas to the level of working models and tangible outcomes. Similarly, it is not always immediately clear how research findings should be integrated in teaching and learning to improve the relevance of education to community and industry needs. In many situations, creativity and imagination are key to transforming research into impactful applications. Can we reimagine partnerships for the benefit of praxis? Can we design unique methods of research dissemination that will reach and engage a broader community, beyond a specialist circle? Can we present ideas and concepts to the world in a way that excites and motivates people, moving them to action? The presenters will provide examples of work that addresses these questions and will work with the audience to help with guidance in their own work.

Academician Dmitrii Arkad'evich Zhdanov: Personality and Time

The article, devoted to the 100th anniversary of D.A. Zhdanov'sadmission to the medical faculty of the Voronezh State University, is dedicated to the creativity and scientific research of this outstanding anatomist, the founder of Russian lymphology. Five main periods of the scientist's life are considered - Voronezh, Gorky, Tomsk, Leningrad and Moscow - presented in the context of historical events and legislative changes in the field of education and science that took place in the 20th century in the RSFSR. The article uses previously unpublished archival materials that help to better understand the personality traits of D.A. Zhdanov.

Possibilities: A commentary on creative aging

This commentary offers a critical and personal perspective on Adams-Price and Morse’s “Creativity, aging, context and culture: Reimagining creativity in everyday life in older adults.” The commentary provides a close reading of the authors’ premise which argues for bridging creativity theory and research on creative aging. The commentary also suggests next steps, emphasizing the need to engage with contemporary issues of privilege and discrimination.

Visible-light-driven F/C co-doping g-C3N4 nanosheets for efficient hydrogen evolution: Charge redistribution on C4 delocalized large π bond

Developing photocatalytic hydrogen evolution technology based on graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4, CN) has emerged as a potential solution for the future energy shortage in recent years. Herein, carbon (C) and fluorine (F) co-doping graphitic carbon nitride nanosheets (CFCN) were synthesized via a one-pot co-thermal method without introducing any metal element. Exceptional hydrogen production activity (3.87 mmol/h/g) was achieved by CFCN under visible light irradiation, which was 4.2-fold increase compared to the pristine CN. It could be attributed to the large specific surface area (51.59 m2/g) and efficient mass transfer facilitated by the porous sheet-like morphology of CFCN. Additionally, the modification of the band structure and internal charge redistribution were investigated via density functional theory (DFT) calculations, which confirmed there was a unidirectional and fast electron transfer channel from N through the C4 delocalized large π bond to F. This creative research uncovered the pivotal role of F/C co-doping in enhancing photocatalytic hydrogen evolution efficacy, offering cutting-edge insights into the design of sustainable and eco-friendly photocatalysts based on metal-free CN.

Inheriting the family: emotions, identities and things

This introduction to the special issue ‘Inheriting the family: emotions, identities and things’ briefly explores how attention to different forms of inheritance as emotional practices offers new ways to understand ‘intergenerational emotion’. It explains the importance of new methodologies to interrogating this emotion and introduces a range of possibilities that are taken further by the contributors in the issue. These include analysis of emotional concepts, object-oriented investigations, particularly as parts of interviews and ethnographies, postmemorial creative practices and researcher self-reflexivity, notably in relation to family history research.

Robert K. Merton and Innovation-Related Topics: Three Theoretical Ideas

As in other disciplines, such as organization science, sociology, and economics, there are good reasons for scholars in innovation and entrepreneurship research to revisit the classics within and outside their own research fields. Robert K. Merton (1910–2003) is not usually explicitly connected to innovation research, but to fields such as the sociology of science and knowledge. However, his scholarly productions include texts relevant to innovation and entrepreneurship. In 1935, he published on invention and innovation in American industry, and in 1938, he put forward the idea of innovation as deviant behavior or nonconformist adaptive behavior (Merton 1938a). In 1945, he began writing about the concept of serendipity, which he later discussed several times. This paper discusses how theoretical insights from Merton may inspire entrepreneurship, creativity, and innovation research. The discussion is framed around Merton’s innovation-related ideas and their relevance today, based on 20–25 Merton publications from 1934 to 2004 drawn from his larger scholarly production. The paper extracts three main examples of Merton’s theoretical ideas and insights. The first is his interest in simultaneous independent discoveries (Merton 1961a; 1961b), which has later been seen as a zeitgeist perspective on (scientific) creativity. The second is his view of innovation as deviant behavior and an adaptive response (Merton 1938), which is relevant to, among others, discussion of the dark side of innovation. The third is his interest in the idea of serendipity in scientific discovery (Merton 1945; 1948a), which is relevant today in relation to entrepreneurial opportunity and accidental innovation.

Creative research with indigenous women: challenging marginalisation through collective spaces and livelihoods practices

PurposeIn this paper we ask: “What are the opportunities and challenges that creative methods pose in terms of conducting research processes with indigenous peoples impacted by emergencies and disasters?” To do that, we critically examine the creative and collaborative methodological approaches applied in the research project, Moving with Risk: Forced Displacement and Vulnerability in Colombia. This project sought to understand the trajectories of risk of families who were forcibly displaced as a result of the armed conflict in Colombia and resettled in areas at risk of disaster.Design/methodology/approachThis article is intentionally written from the perspective of the researchers’ positionality. In doing so, we embrace writing that is situated and embodied in the researcher’s experiences and positionalities. This reflexive writing allows us to question the methodological experience of the research project we are analysing and, at the same time, ourselves, “the researchers” be questioned by it.FindingsIn this paper, we show how creative methods and participatory research can foster awareness and become the basis for inclusive and reciprocal research processes with indigenous communities in disaster studies. Specifically, we show that the use of creative methods helped us recognise that agency needs to be framed in collective spaces with the indigenous women we were working with and in relation to their livelihoods needs. We argue that finding spaces to conduct collaborative research and recognize agency is inextricably related to how the researchers reflect on their positionality.Originality/valueThis article contributes to critical perspectives in Disaster Studies and to an overall understanding of the role that creative methodologies play in research processes with people affected by disasters. It provides a novel perspective on the opportunities and challenges of applying arts-based methods in disaster risk studies with indigenous communities in Latin America.

Storying connectivity and value: the south west creative technology network’s cultural ecologies as network visualisations

ABSTRACT This paper explores the productive connectivity developed by university-industry knowledge exchange (KE) programmes for research and development (R&D) and their emergent cultural value. The South West Creative Technology Network (SWCTN) is our case study. We build on Dovey et al.'s. work to visualise the cultural ecology supported and created by cohort-led R&D programmes. Our visualisations, combined with interview data, evidence that new connections create diverse forms of value, including inspiration, mentoring, training, and recruitment opportunities, and cooperation through collaborative working. We supplement social network and visualisation tools with rich qualitative data to explore the “why,” “how” and “to what end” of new connections, contributing to the field of Mixed Methods in Social Network Analysis (MMSNA). This methodology is novel to the field of creative economy research. We argue for new forms of R&D funding for the creative sector to take a cultural ecology approach if we wish to take seriously and invest in the diverse forms of value beyond economic drivers, sometimes described as “intangible,” that play an important role in building regional capacity, innovation and productivity.

Transformational Creativity, Care, and the Common Good: Toward a Refined Definition?

ABSTRACTThe concept of transformational creativity has been widely embraced as a desired shift in creativity research. Transformational creativity emphasizes the development of creativity in service to the common good. However, to date, what precisely constitutes this “common good” for researchers of transformational creativity remains unclear. As evidenced by the recent Handbook of Transformational Creativity, the term “common good” has been deployed on numerous occasions without any definition or rationalization of its meaning. The aim of this article was therefore to delineate what may constitute a common good which is worth contributing to. Motivated by transdisciplinary outlooks, it explores the concept of the common good through the lenses of human needs, degrowth, and the ethics of care. This article redefines transformational creativity as the creation of new ideas, artifacts, or practices that promote the common good by fostering caring, needs‐responsive relationships and enabling communities to collectively contribute to their well‐being and support a sustainable, ecologically nurturing, and preserving livelihood.

Cohort Builder: Simplifying Cohort Creation

ObjectiveThe Cohort Builder package aims to streamline the cohort building process using R, with simplicity and efficiency as the primary focus. Researchers can generate cohorts from TRE (Trusted Research Environment) datasets by specifying simple cohort definitions as YAML (YAML Ain't a Markup Language) parameters using this package, eliminating the need to write complex queries. ApproachCohort Builder offers researchers a user-friendly interface for defining cohort criteria by abstracting away the complexities of database queries using YAML configuration files. The package enables researchers to focus on defining the desired cohort characteristics rather than navigating the database and tables. Users can easily specify inclusion and exclusion criteria, demographic constraints, temporal constraints, and other dataset parameters to create cohorts tailored to their research goals and reproduce the results using the same configuration file. ResultUsing the Cohort Builder, users may quickly create cohorts from TRE datasets with minimum code. The package facilitates reproducibility, transparency, and increased productivity. Researchers gain from having to rely less on specialised database expertise and having more flexibility when defining and exploring cohorts. ConclusionCohort Builder offers a straightforward yet effective method for defining cohorts. The package frees researchers from having to worry about intricate technological details in favour of their analytical objectives. ImplicationsMoving forward, Cohort Builder will support creative research projects across a range of disciplines and promote collaboration among researchers by allowing them to share configuration files for their cohorts.