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Creative thinking and creative performance in adolescents as predictors of creative attainments in adults: A follow‐up study after 18 years a
Roberta M. Milgram & Eunsook Hong a
b
Associate Professor, School of Education , Tel Aviv University , Israel
b
Assistant Professor, Counseling and Educational Psychology , University of Nevada , Las Vegas Published online: 20 Jan 2010.
To cite this article: Roberta M. Milgram & Eunsook Hong (1993) Creative thinking and creative performance in adolescents as predictors of creative attainments in adults: A follow‐up study after 18 years , Roeper Review, 15:3, 135-139, DOI: 10.1080/02783199309553487 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02783199309553487
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ment. Since some of the subjects were still in school and had not had time for attaining creative achievements, a correlation of .46 was regarded as satisfactory. However, it was clear that other variables were at work. The entire subject population was included in the 1971 follow-up. With 231 subjects participating, a validity coefficient of .51 resulted. If we considered the seniors, all of the creativity predictors were working better than they had five years earlier. The complete results of the 30-year follow-up are not yet available. The data for the 30-year follow-up predictive validity study have been collected by Christopher Nelson and will be presented in his doctoral dissertation (in preparation). However, using a composite creativity score, a Pearson productmoment coefficient of correlation of .25,
significant at the .02 level of confidence was obtained. From the data presented in this article, we can understand one reason why the prediction coefficient is smaller. Forces, such as love of one's work, persistence, purpose in life, love of challenge, diversity of experience, high energy level, a sense of mission, and other Beyonder characteristics are dominating over creative ability, intelligence, and high school achievement. Mario and Luann had reasonably high scores on intelligence and creativity tests, but not at a level expected of a Beyonder. Clearly, the test scores are insufficient to predict those who have gone beyond the accomplishments of their peers, beyond what the quantified measures could predict, beyond anyone's wildest dreams, but theirs.
REFERENCES Amabile, T. (1986). The personality in creativity. Creative Living, 150), 12-16. Cohen, J. (1988). Statistical power analysis for behavioral sciences. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. Mitchell, J. V. (Ed.). (1983). Tests in print. III. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska. (P. 192, ITED; pp. 216217, Lorge-Thomdike). Torrance, E. P. (1962). Guiding creative talent. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Torrance, E. P. (1965). Rewarding creative behavior. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Torrance, E. P. (1969). Prediction of adult creative achievement among high school seniors. Gifted Child Quarterly, 13, 71-81. Torrance, E. P. (1971a). Identity: The gifted child's major problem. Gifted Child Quarterly, 15, 147-155. Torrance, E. P. (1971b). Is bias against job changing bias against giftedness? Gifted Child Quarterly, 15, 244248. Torrance, E. P. (1972a). Predictive validity of the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking. Journal of Creative Behavior, 6, 236-252. Torrance, E. P. (1972b). Career patterns and peak creative achievement of creative thinking high school students twelve years later. Gifted Child Quarterly, 6(3), 75-88. Torrance, E. P. (1983). The importance of falling in love with "something." Creative Child and Adult Quarterly, 8, 72-78. Torrance, E. P. (In press). The Beyonders and their characteristics. Creative Child and Adult Quarterly. Torrance, E. P., & Safter, H. T. (in press). Making the creative leap beyond.... Buffalo, NY: Bearly Limited.
Creative Thinking and Creative Performance in Adolescents as Predictors of Creative Attainments in Adults: A Follow-up Study After 18 Years* Roberta M. Milgram Eunsook Hong Roberta M. Milgram is Associate Professor, School of Education, Tel Aviv University, Israel. She has been studying giftedness and creativeity in children and adolescents for over 20 years. Eunsook Hong is Assistant Professor, Counseling and Educational Psychology, University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Her work includes development and verification of gifted and talented children.
In this article we present a theoretical formulation and empirical evidence to support our position that the exclusive use of formal, schooloriented predictors of intelligence and school grades forfeits a great deal of talent. Moreover, we suggest that examining out-of-school activities in children helps find hidden abilities and reduce talent loss. The Milgram 4 X 4 Model of the structure of giftedness provides the rationale for expecting that measures of creative thinking and creative leisure activities may be more valid predictors of remarkable life accomplishments than intelligence and school grades. We present here the results of an 18-year longitudinal study in which this prediction was investigated. Implications of the findings for the identification and enhancement of giftedness are discussed as well.
Milgram's efforts to clarify and operationalize a broader view of giftedness resulted in her 4 X 4 model of the structure of giftedness (1989b, 1990, 1991, in press). In the 4 X 4 model, giftedness is depicted in terms of (a) categories, two having to do with aspects of intelligence (general intellectual ability and specific intellectual ability) and two with aspects of original thinking (general original/creative thinking and specific creative talent), (b) four ability levels (profoundly gifted, moderately gifted, mildly gifted, and nongifted), hence the name 4 X 4 , and (c) three learning environments (home, school, and community) embedded in a framework of individual differences. The 4 X 4 Model is described in detail elsewhere (Milgram, 1989b, 1990, 1991, in press). However, in order to clarify the theoretical framework which guided the current 18 year follow-up study, the four categories postulated in the 4 X 4 model will be briefly summarized below. The first category, general intellectual ability or overall general intelligence, refers to the ability to think abstractly and to solve problems logically and systematically. This ability is measured in adults and children by performance on psychometric tests and is most frequently reported as an IQ score. The second category, specific intellectual ability, refers to
*An expanded version of this article appears, with permission of the publisher, in R. Subotnik, & K. Arnold (Eds.), 1993, Beyond Terman: Longitudinal Studies in Contemporary Gifted Education. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishers. Article submitted April, 1992. Revision accepted November, 1992. February/March, 1993, Roeper Review/135
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a clear and distinct intellectual ability in a given area, such as mathematics or foreign language, music, or science. For example, in mathematics a person in this category might demonstrate outstanding computational ability, knowledge of mathematical principles, or deep understanding of mathematical concepts. In art it is reflected in aesthetic appreciation and technical ability. Specific intellectual abilities are reflected in performance that may be highly competent, but not necessarily highly original. Specific intellectual abilities in children and adolescents are often, but not invariably, expressed in superior academic performance in school subjects as reflected in school grades and achievement tests.. he third category, general original/creative thinking, is the process of generating solutions that are unusual and of high quality. Creative thinkers generate ideas that are imaginative, clever, elegant, or surprising. This ability is measured by tests of divergent thinking. The fourth category, specific creative ability, refers to a clear and distinct domain-specific creative ability. Talent is manifested in both children and adults in socially valuable, novel products in science, mathematics, art, music, social leadership, business, politics, or any other human endeavor. One way to identify specific creative talent in children before these abilities become fully realized in one's vocation is by examining leisure-time, out-of-school activities. The approach to defining giftedness exemplified by the 4 X 4 Model and the tools developed based upon the model may provide some help in improving procedures for identification of gifted learners. If IQ and school grades are not valid predictors of gifted behavior in adults, we must consider alternative predictors. The 4 X 4 model suggests that creative thinking and the performance of creative leisure activities in children and adolescents are alternatives worth considering.
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Milgram and Milgram (1976a) reported moderate evidence of concurrent validity for the Tel-Aviv Creativity Test, with reference to the performance of creative activities in adolescents. The Tel-Aviv test is a measure of ideational fluency unconfounded with intelligence (Milgram & Milgram, 1976b). In the study described below, we used creative thinking data generated by the Tel-Aviv test to examine the long-term predictive validity of creative thinking with reference to the criterion of real-world accomplishment in adults.
Another approach to the assessment of creativity focuses on leisure activity. Leisure activities in children may be a valid predictor of talented accomplishment in adults (Milgram, 1989b, 1990, 1991, in press). Leisure activities are intrinsically motivated out-of-school hobbies and activities that young people do for their own enjoyment and by their own choice, rather than to fulfill school requirements or to earn grades or credits. Even though they are not related to school, these may be highly intellectual endeavors (e.g., computer programming, working out mathematical solutions, conducting scientific experiments, composing music). The voluntary performance of unusual and high quality leisure activities reflects not only intellectual abilities, but also task commitment, persistence, and other cognitive and personal-social attributes that strongly determine life outcomes. For these reasons one could argue that leisure activities in adolescents are stable and valid indicators of similarly unusual and high quality accomplishments in adults. uilding upon the work of Holland and his associates (Holland, 1961; Holland, 1985; Holland & Austin, 1962; Holland & Nichols, 1964; Holland & Richards, 1965; Richards, Holland, & Lutz, 1967) and that of Wallack and Wing (1969), Milgram developed the Tel-Aviv Activities Inventory. A major innovation of the new scale was to replace the general undifferentiated list of items tapping creative accomplishment with the following nine specific domains of creative performance: music, science, art, social, literature, community service, drama, sports, and dance. The instrument has been used in studies of individual differences in creative performance in children ranging in age from preschool through high school (Gorsky, 1990; Hong & Milgram, 1991; Kfir, 1989; Milgram, Dunn, & Price, in press; Milgram & Milgram, 1976a; Milgram, Yitzhak, & Milgram, 1977). Although some evidence for short-term predictive validity of measures of creative performance has been reported, the long-term predictive validity of measures of creative performance remains to be investigated. In the current study we utilized data collected 18 years ago from the entire senior class (N=159) of a Tel-Aviv High School. The data were measures of intelligence, school grades, divergent thinking, and out-of-school activities. The first wave of this study was described in detail by Milgram and Milgram (1976a). Here we compared the Activities Inventory protocols gathered 18 years ago from adolescents with current measures of accomplishment in five life areas: academic, vocational, community service, family, and leisure activities. Adult accomplishments were defined operationally as those activities that are unusual and of high quality.
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We developed a self-report questionnaire that consisted of items tapping adult attainments in each sphere. Each of the five areas consisted of items in ascending order of accomplishment, from relatively frequent activities of low quality to relatively rare items of high quality. For example, in the work area a high score was obtained by subjects who reported that their duties carried a high level of responsibility, initiative, and independent decision-making. Subjects who reported that their relationship to spouse and children were highly important sources of support, encouragement, and satisfaction and who reported exceptionally successful communication within the family and a wide variety of usual activities, also received high scores in the area. A wide variety of community and leisure activities were presented and the responses of subjects reflected the degree of their participation and its quality in the various leisure activities. e first examined the adult accomplishments of adolescents who had high scores on general leisure activities; that is, who reported a large number of leisure activities across a variety of different domains. We expected that scores on measures of general creative thinking and overall creative performance gathered in adolescence—but not IQ scores and school grades gathered at the same time—would be related to creative achievement in adults. Remarkable career attainments in adults, with few exceptions, focus on a single domain of endeavor. It is reasonable to expect youngsters destined to become gifted adults to demonstrate early and intensive interest and ability in a specific domain. In addition to the predictor-criterion relationships cited above in which the total score for leisure activities was the predictor and the five life areas were the criteria, we examined the predictive validity of domain-specific leisure activities in adolescence with specific reference to adult vocational accomplishments. We expected: (a) a relationship between the domain of leisure activity in adolescence and the domain of vocational activity in adulthood, and (b) a higher level of work accomplishment for those subjects whose adolescent leisure activities and adult occupation were matched. The study focusing on the role of domain-specific leisure activities in career guidance of gifted and talented adolescents is described in full detail elsewhere (Hong, Whiston, & Milgram, 1992).
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inventory consisted of 43 items that tap out-of-school activities in nine areas. The test yielded scores for nine areas of activity and a summed total score for overall leisure activity. The areas and the number of questions in each subscale (in parentheses) are as follows: Music (8), Science (4), Art (3), Social (6), Literature (6), Community Service (3), Drama (6), Sports (5), and Dance (2). Subjects indicated their out-of-school activities by marking yes or no to each of the items on an answer sheet. Dance items were not included in the current study because there were only two items. In order to investigate the relationship between the leisure activities in adolescence and adult work accomplishment, we computed four scores for each subject: Arts, Science, Social Activities, and Sports. The Arts score combined items in the Music, Art, Literature, and Drama areas of the Activities Inventory. The Social Activities score combined items from the Social and Community Services. The four scores were computed by summing the number of "yes" responses on each item of the respective scales for each individual. These scores measured in adolescents were used to predict adult occupations. Inventory of Adult Accomplishment (Milgram, 1989a). The instrument consisted of 55 items tapping adult attainments in five life domains (i.e., Work, Academic, Family, Community, and Leisure Activities). Subjects answered yes or no to each item. In addition, subjects were given the opportunity to give details and elaborate on their answers. The occupations reported by subjects on the Inventory of Adult Accomplishment (Milgram, 1989a) were classified according to the 12 occupational interest areas of the Guide for Occupational Exploration (GOE; U. S. Department of Labor, 1979). The occupations reported by our subjects fell into seven interest areas: Artistic, Scientific, Mechanical, Industrial, Business Detail, Humanitarian, and Leading-Influencing. Inspection of items of the Activity Inventory and GOE interest areas indicated that the Social items in the predictor measure better matched the Leading-Influencing interest area, and the Community Service items in the predictor better matched the GOE Humanitarian area. Accordingly, we created a new area that combined the work interest areas of Humanitarian and Leading-Influencing and named it Social-Leadership. here was only one subject whose adult occupation was in the Industrial area and two subjects in Business Detail. Accordingly, the two areas were combined and categorized as Other. Since the Activities Inventory administered in adolescence did not include any items that might have predicted the Mechanical area of occupation, it too was categorized as Other. Thus, four broad categories of occupational interest (i.e., Artistic, Scientific, Social-Leadership, and Other) were used as the criteria in examining the relationship between the focus of out-of-school activities in adolescence and the domain of vocational activity in adulthood. In addition to classifying adult occupations, the Inventory of Adult Accomplishment also yielded a score for work accomplishment. It consisted of a total score that combined items tapping work responsibility and work accomplishment. Creative thinking measures An adapted version of the Wallach and Kogan (1965) measure of ideational fluency consisting of four subtests (alternate uses, pattern meanings, similarities, and line meanings) with four items per subtest was the measure of creative thinking. The test was scored for ideational fluency, the number of discrete responses given, and unusual or rare ideas, that is, responses given by 5% or less of the group.
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Method Subjects Subjects were 67 of the 159 subjects who participated in a study of creative thinking and creative performance that was conducted 18 years ago. The data base included the entire senior class of a high school in Tel Aviv, Israel and was described in detail by Milgram and Milgram (1976a). Subjects with missing values for one or more variables were eliminated from the analysis. The resulting sample was 48 (20 men and 28 women). The subjects ranged in age from 34 to 36 years, with a mean of 35.02 years.
Instruments Tel-Aviv Activities Inventory (Milgram, 1973). The current study utilized the Tel-Aviv Activities Inventory scores collected 18 years ago by Milgram and Milgram (1976a). The
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Intellectual ability and scholastic achievement The Milta (Ortar, 1966) group intelligence test was used. It consisted of five verbal subtests (sentence completion, vocabulary, verbal analogies, oddities, and arithmetic). The measure of scholastic achievement was a grade point average based on six major school subjects. The Tel-Aviv Activities Inventory was group-administered in a single session in December 1973. In 1990, subjects were located and whenever possible contacted by phone ahead of time to enlist their cooperation in the study. Following the phone contact, the Inventory of Adult Accomplishment was mailed to each subject. Strenuous efforts, including an additional mailing and follow-up phone calls were made to maximize the number of questionnaires returned. Although 67 or 42% of the original 159 subjects returned the questionnaire, only 48 or 30% were usable. Among the 19 subjects eliminated from the analysis, 11 subjects did not specify their occupations, and eight subjects had missing information on their outof-school activities reported 18 years ago.
Results We first examined the relationships between the four predictor measures (intelligence, school grades, creative thinking, and overall leisure activities) and the five criterion scores of adult accomplishment (work, academic, family, community service, and leisure activities). The total creative performance score was related to two criterion scores, work accomplishment, r - .26, p < .05, and family satisfaction r = .26, p < .05. The general creative thinking score was related to adult leisure activities, r(46) = .37, p
