Long, H. (2014). An empirical review of research methodologies and methods in creativity studies (2003–2012). Creativity Research Journal, 26(4), 427–438.

As I embark on a quest to explore creativity, I realize I really don’t know much, and I really don’t even know where to begin. This article summarizes the types of research that were used to study creativity across five journals over the course of a decade, and after reading it, I also realize that what I learn will be defined by how I decide to search for answers. 

While the study outlined by this empirical review involved a decade of research that occurred a decade ago, the implications for future research possibilities are clear: more research on creativity is needed, and that research would benefit from increased emphasis on qualitative and mixed-methods approaches. The numbers speak for themselves.  Of the 510 studies examined, 83% of them used quantitative methods, 13% used qualitative methods, and 7% used mixed methods. (The author cited this as a significant shift in emphasis, sharing results from an earlier study that revealed that 100 dissertations from the late 90s used qualitative methods to study creativity.)  In discussing the quantitative tools used to delve into the concept of creativity, the author described everything from divergent thinking tasks and using human judges to score participants’ creativity, to using the Consensual Assessment Technique,  administering checklists and questionnaires, to having the same individuals complete several different assessments over time so that results could be compared. Qualitative tools cited included case studies and grounded theory methods. In the discussion of mixed-methods tools, the author noted that in addition to using both quantitative and qualitative tools, mixed-methods gave researchers the opportunity to triangulate research results, to “offset the weakness inherent within one method with the strengths of the other method.” (p. 433)  The author concluded that “progress can only be made in the field [of creativity research] when we achieve a balanced employment of diverse methodologies,” (p. 435) and suggests researchers need to combine results so that “converging evidence of creativity” (p. 435) is collected.

Although this study used information from only five journals, more recent research (Hernandez-Torrano, 2020, p. 6) confirms that the journals included in this study continue to be the repository of much of the published research on creativity. The author began with a description of the types of research historically used to investigate creativity. They distinguished between methods (strategies, procedures, techniques) and methodologies (theoretical underpinnings), and collected data on both during their literature review. The author thoroughly described the criteria used for collecting data, and shared the process used to eliminate bias from the survey results. At first glance it seemed like the author spent an inordinate amount of time discussing quantitative methods, which might call into question fairness; however, on second thought, the emphasis may have been an artifact of numbers–there were far more quantitative studies to review. One of the features of this article that was especially helpful were the references to data from literature reviews that predated the current article.  These references provided a historical context that helped envision the field of creative studies from a broader perspective. Explanations of methods and methodologies also served as a creativity research primer.

Two things stood out to me as applicable to my research interests. First, I found it odd that research for something as nebulous as creativity was primarily quantitative. Even with multiple iterations of assessments given to individuals over time, an individual is more or less creative on any given day for reasons too numerous to count. How is this quantifiable? On the other hand, it seems to me that the personal nature of the qualitative study might influence outcomes because of the transient  nature of creative inspiration and its susceptibility to suggestion (the power of collaboration). It makes sense to me that mixed methods approaches would offer the truest, most balanced revelations about creativity. Second, the author suggests that convergence is necessary in creativity research. That means that a sound definition of creativity is needed, which I anticipate will consume a good portion of my research time and attention. I also wonder if the nature of our dissertation would allow me to seek some micro-convergences–ask the same question and use three different mixed-methods approaches to find answers. The question would have to be specific enough to be manageable. Even so, I’m not sure it’s doable in the time we have in this program. But it sure would be interesting.

Additional Reference:

Hernández-Torrano, D., & Ibrayeva, L. (2020). Creativity and education: A Bibliometric mapping of the Research Literature (1975–2019). Thinking Skills and Creativity, 35, 100625.