Revised Art Scale Research Articles

Bipolar Mood Disorder, Creativity and Schizotypy: An Experimental Study

Aims: Our purpose was to make an experimental assessment of the elements of creativity and the features of schizotypy in patients with bipolar disorder, compared with healthy control subjects and to investigate the effect of an acute affective episode (depressed or manic) and the features of schizotypy on the measurements of creativity. Methods: Forty patients with bipolar disorder, and 48 age- and gender-matched control subjects were studied. For the assessment of creativity the Revised Art Scale and the ‘inventiveness’ part of the Berlin Intelligence Structure Test (BIS) were used. The Oxford-Liverpool Inventory of Feelings and Experiences was applied for estimation of schizotypy. Results: The bipolar patients did not differ on the RAS scale from the control subjects but obtained significantly higher scores on the BIS-total as well as on the verbal part of the test. Their scores on the BIS scale during depression were significantly lower than in remission. The bipolar patients obtained significantly higher scores on all dimensions of schizotypy compared with the controls. Conclusions: These results confirm previous data showing higher scores on some creativity scales in bipolar patients compared with healthy subjects. They also corroborate a relationship between the features of schizotypy and creativity scores in bipolar patients.

P02-94 - Creativity construct and its links to alexithymia and depression

Creativity plays an important positive role in people's social and personal life (Flach, 1990; Runco, 2004). On the other hand, alexithymia and depression may affect psychological well being in a negative way and lead to mental health problems (e.g. Honkalampi et al., 2007; Warnes, 1986). The current study investigated the relationship between these three constructs (creativity, alexithymia and depression) and hypothesised that there are negative relationships between creativity and alexithymia as well as between creativity and depression. 39 participants, aged between18-58 (mean age 30) completed the 20-Item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) for the assessment of alexithymia and the Beck's Depression Inventory (BDI-II) for the assessment of depression. To investigate levels of creativity, participants completed a test of drawing preferences (Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale (RAS)). The results showed a negative correlation between creativity and alexithymia and positive correlation between alexithymia and depression. Although previous research has found support for a link between creativity and depression it has been described controversially in literature (e.g. Andresen, 2008; Pickering, 1974). The current study did not find a significant correlation between creativity and depression. The results reflect the complexity of the creativity - depression relationship and the need for further research, with more precise control for the type and severity of depression.

Using HyperCard to administer a figural test on the Apple Macintosh

To date, applications of automated assessment techniques in personality testing have largely been limited to objective personality instruments with text stimuli; few assessment applications have involved graphic stimuli. Although projective personality instruments generally include ambiguous graphic or pictorial stimuli, computer applications with these procedures have been limited to automated scoring and interpretation, administration of sentence completion devices employing text stimuli, and the use of mechanical methods rather than computer graphics to display visual stimuli. In the present report, we describe a Macintosh HyperCard application for administering an objective personality test with visual stimuli, the Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale of the Welsh Figure Preference Test. This test consists of a series of figural stimuli and a binary “like”/“dislike” response format, and it thus represents an administration procedure between standard objective self-report inventories involving text stimuli and a “true”/“false” response or variant, and tests such as the Rorschach or TAT that are both figural and free-response. The HyperCard language provides a variety of promising techniques useful for microcomputer test administration.

Creativity profile of university and conservatory music students

Abstract: Music students in conservatories appear to be driven, single minded, highly gifted individuals. Little research has been done concerning the differences, if any, between music students who choose to study in conservatory settings and those who choose a university. The creative potential, preference for high energy activities, and personality characteristics of music majors at the New England Conservatory of Music and at the University of Wisconsin were compared. Instruments used were: Barron‐Welsh Revised Art Scale, Adjective Check List (ACL) Creativity Scales, Drawing Task, and Action Preference Test. Results indicated that the conservatory students scored significantly higher on the Action Preference test than the university music students; otherwise the two populations appeared very similar. The 63 music students were significantly more creative than normative groups but not as creative as art students. They were distinctly different from norm groups on 19 scales of the ACL. Their preference ...

Creativity and schizotypal traits. Creativity test scores and perceptual aberration, magical ideation, and impulsive nonconformity.

Using a nonclinical and noneminent population, this study demonstrates an overlap in creative and schizotypal traits in the areas of perceptual functioning, behavioral and personality styles, and interests. No such overlap is observed in the area of divergent thinking. A battery containing five creativity measures was administered to a group of college student subjects scoring high on either the Perceptual Aberration Scale or the Magical Ideation Scale (N = 52) and to a group of control subjects (N = 65). A multivariate analysis of variance indicated that subjects high on the schizotypal traits of Perceptual Aberration or Magical Ideation (Per-Mag subjects) differed significantly from control subjects on the five creativity tests. Per-Mag subjects scored significantly higher than control subjects on the Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale, a measure of preferences for figures, and the How Do You Think, a biographical and personality measure. There was a tendency for female Per-Mag subjects to score higher than female control subjects on the Domino Creativity Scale of the Adjective Check List. Per-Mag and control subjects did not differ on the Gough Creative Personality Scale of the Adjective Check List or on the Alternate Uses test, a test of divergent thinking. Per-Mag subjects who scored above the median for their group and gender on the Impulsive Nonconformity Scale received the highest creativity scores on the Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale and the How Do You Think, although these results only approached significance. These findings argue for the specificity of areas of similarity and difference in schizotypy and creativity.

Comparison of Barron-Welsh Art Scores of Artists and Nonartists and between Dancers of Two Training Styles

The Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale was administered to 144 female and 68 male university undergraduates in art, music, dance, and general studies to test whether experience and training in the arts would be associated with choices consistent with openness to perceptual experience. It was hypothesized that training in modern and jazz dance, which is stylistically less classical and formal, would be associated with greater sensitivity to experience than would training in ballet and flamenco, more formalized dance styles. No differences between art students and nonart students or among dancers with various training experiences were observed.

Relationship of the Ammons' Quick Test of Intelligence to Verbal and Nonverbal Tests of Creativity

100 participants were administered three forms of the Quick Test, both the Verbal and Figural Torrance Tests of creativity, the Remote Associates Test of creativity, and the Revised Art Scale. In addition two non-creative tests were administered, the Hidden Words Test, a test of closure and the Deciphering Language Test, a test of logical reasoning. The Quick Test correlated significantly and low to moderately with all scales of Torrance's Verbal test, the elaboration subscale of Torrance's Figural test, the Remote Associates Test, and the Deciphering Language Test. These results indicate that the most commonly employed verbal tests of creativity have a substantial component of verbal intelligence.

Relationships between Humor, Formal Operational Ability, and Creativity in Eighth Graders

Abstract The present study investigated the hypothesized relationship between the understanding of verbal humor and the attainment of formal operational thought and further explored the relationships between humor and creativity proposed by earlier investigators. Two humor tests (one developed by the authors), the Remote Associates Test, the Barron Welch Revised Art Scale, and the Lunzer Quiz (a measure of formal operations) were administered to 117 eighth-grade boys and girls. Confirmation was found for the first hypothesis and only partial confirmation for the second. A theoretical discussion is presented relating the findings to the concept of flexibility and the stage of formal thought.

Study of Graves Design Judgment Test and Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale

Previous research suggests that scores on both the Graves Design Judgment Test and the Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale correlate with education in art and with aspects of creativity but have little validity with respect to artistic performance. With a heterogeneous group of 48, the Graves test correlated significantly with fine-arts education, interest in the arts, artistic achievement, and creative independence. The Barron-Welsh scale correlated significantly with only fine-arts education in a similar group of 47.

Artistic creativity and aging in India.

This paper is a focused consideration of artistic creativity in relation to different phases of the Hindu life cycle. Life history and psychological test data collected from 110 male Brahmin folk painters at an orthodox sacred pilgrimage center in western India are presented. Folk theories of creative process and the psychogenesis of creative energy for symbolic expressive behavior throughout the life cycle are related to recent theoretical interest in ego boundary maintenance, to Jungian psychoanalytic theory, and to Hindu notions of achieving psychological wholeness, balance, and augmented creative potential in later life. It is argued that artistic creativity does not necessarily decline with chronological age. Male painters asked to rank each other along a creativity continuum into three groups according to high or low degree of perceived creativity are discussed: mean ages for each of these painter-defined groups are presented. Scores on the Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale from painters of all three groups are related to preferences for perceptual complexity, ambiguity, and asymmetry.

Effects of instructional set on production of creative responses.

Two groups of 40 highly creative Ss and 2 groups ( ns = 40) who scored low in creativity on the Revised Art Scale of the Welsh Figure Preference Test were given the test again under standard instructions or a set to be creative. Highly creative Ss remained high but did not improve, low initial scorers increased creativity scores under the set to be creative. Analysis showed level of creativity and instructions as well as their interaction contributed to total variance.

Effects of a Creativity Training Program on Stimulus Preferences

It has been suggested that modifications of a person's cognitive style may be instrumental in facilitating creative behaviour. From this, it was hypothesized that effective creativity training programs, as well as improving abilities associated with creativity should necessarily influence particular aspects of an individual's cognitive style; in this case, stimulus preferences. 36 Ss participated: E Ss completed a creativity training program; controls were students who had enrolled for the creativity training program but not yet commenced it (C1), and students who had completed a developmental reading program (C2). The Alternate Uses Test was used to measure the effects of the training on fluency and flexibility; the Revised Art Scale was used to measure stimulus preferences of Ss. Description of the data by simple analyses of variance and Duncan's multiple-range test supported the hypothesis. The discussion presents suggestions for development of future creativity training programs.

The Barron-Welsh Art Scale as a Predictor of Adolescent Creativity

Although there was a consistent trend for the creative adolescents to score higher on the Revised Art Scale (RA) than the controls, the only significant difference was found in the boys' artistic field. Studies using the scale will have to allow for sex and specialty differences in performance.

Creativity and masculinity-femininity in ninth graders.

656 urban ninth-grade boys and girls were categorized by sex and as high- or low-creatives on the basis of their scores on the Revised Art Scale (RA) of the Welsh Figure Preference Tests (WFPT). Ms and SDs were calculated for all four groups on the following masculinity-femininity (mf) scales: WFPT Female-Male (FM), MMPI Mf, CPI Fe, and Nichols' Subtle and Obvious. (High scores on all mf scales are feminine.) Significance of the differences between the mf means of high- and low-creative boys and of high- and low-creative girls were calculated. On FM, both the high-creative boys and girls scored significantly higher ( p < .001) than the low-creatives. There were no significant differences between high- and low-creative boys on other mf scales. High-creative girls had lower Ms than low-creatives on Subtle ( p < .001), Obvious ( p < .05), and Mf ( p < .01), although absolute differences were small.