The Relationships between Creativity and Cerebral Hemisphericity for Creative Architects,Scientists,and Mathematicians

Abstract

The relationship between creativity and the specialized cognitive functions supported by each of the cerebral hemispheres (hemisphericity), was examined on archival data available for creative architects, scientists, and mathematicians. Hemisphericity was estimated by the A/P ratio, in which A represents performance on the Street Gestalt Completion test, a marker test of right hemipsheric processes and P represents performance on a marker test of left hemispheric functioning, the Similarities subtest of the WAIS. Creativity was indexed by objective indices (such as the number of patents earned by each scientist), subjective measures (such as peer evaluations of creativity) and by psychometric instruments that purport to measure creativity. Performance on a test of general intelligence was also examined. The data indicates that hemisphericity is related to some indices of creative performance (especially the objective measures) but not to the index of general intelligence. Moreover, the direction of the relationships were different for the creative architects than for the creative scientists and mathematicians. These data were taken as support for the proposition that creativity depends on the cognitive functions supported by both hemispheres: different professions demand a specific cognitive mode for efficient performance; creative performance is reflected in those who can also access and are efficient in using the cognitive mode supported by the complementary cerebral hemisphere.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Martindale

, Cognition and Consciousness, Dorsey Press, Homewood, Illinois, 1981.

Bogen

and Bogen

, The Other Side of the Brain III: The Corpus Callosum and Creativity, Bulletin of the Los Angeles Neurological Societies, 34, pp. 191–220, 1969.

Katz

, Creativity and the Right Cerebral Hemisphere: Toward a Physiologically Based Theory of Creativity, Journal of Creative Behaviour, 12, pp. 253–264, 1978.

Oexle

and Zenhausern

, Differential Hemipsheric Activation in Good and Poor Readers, International Journal of Neuroscience, 15, pp. 31–36, 1981.

Torrance

Reynolds

Riegel

, and Ball

, Your Style of Learning and Thinking, Forms A and B, Gifted Child Quarterly, 21, pp. 97–106, 1977.

Katz

, Creativity and Individual Differences in Asymmetric Hemispheric Functioning, Empirical Studies of the Arts, 1, pp. 3–16, 1983.

Martindale

Hines

Mitchell

, and Covello

, EEG Alpha Asymmetry and Creativity, Personality and Individual Differences, 5, pp. 77–86, 1984.

Falcone

and Loder

, A Modified Lateral Eye Movement Measure, The Right Hemisphere and Creativity, Perceptual and Motor Skills, 58, pp. 823–830, 1984.

MacKinnon

, IPAR's Contribution to the Conceptualization and Study of Creativity, in Perspectives in Creativity, Taylor

and Getzels

(eds.), Aldine, Chicago, pp. 60–89, 1975.

10.

MacKinnon

and Hall

, Intelligence and Creativity, in Science as a Career Choice: Theoretical and Empirical Studies, Eiduson

and Beckman

(eds.), Russell Sage Foundation, New York, pp. 148–152, 1973.

11.

MacKinnon

, Personality and the Realization of Creative Potential, American Psychologist, 20, pp. 273–281, 1965.

12.

Hall

and MacKinnon

, Personality Inventory Correlates of Creativity among Architects, Journal of Applied Psychology, 53, pp. 322–326, 1969.

13.

Gough

, A Personality Sketch of the Creative Research Scientist, paper presented at Conference on Personnel and Relations Research, University of California, Los Angeles, 1961.

14.

Gough

, Studying Creativity by Means of Word Association Tests, Journal of Applied Psychology, 61, pp. 348–353, 1976.

15.

Gough

and Woodworth

, Stylistic Variations among Professional Research Scientists, Journal of Personality, 49, pp. 87–98, 1960.

16.

Helson

, Women Mathematicians and the Creative Personality, Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 36, pp. 210–220, 1971.

17.

Helson

, Creative Mathematicians, in Genius and Eminence, Albert

(ed.), Pergamon Press, Oxford, pp. 311–330, 1983.

18.

Bogen

DeZure

TenHousten

, and Marsh

, The Other Side of the Brain IV: The A/P Ratio, Bulletin of the Los Angeles Neurological Societies, 37, pp. 49–59, 1972.

19.

Wechsler

, The Measurement of Adult Intelligence, 2nd edition, Williams and Wilkins, Baltimore, 1941.

20.

McFie

, The Diagnostic Significance of Disorders of Higher Nervous Activity: Syndromes Related to Frontal, Temporal, Parietal, and Occipital Lesions, in Handbook of Clinical Neurology, Vinkin

and Bruyn

(eds.), Volume 4, North Holland Publishing Company, Amsterdam, pp. 1–12, 1966.

21.

Meyer

and Jones

, Patterns of Cognitive Test Performance as Functions of the Lateral Localization of Cerebral Abnormalities in the Temporal Lobe, in Neuropsychological Testing in Organic Brain Dysfunction, Smith

and Philipus

(eds.), Charles Thomas Publishing, Springfield, Illinois, pp. 1–121, 1969.

22.

Street

, A Gestalt Completion Test, Contributions to Education, Number 481, Columbia University Teachers College, New York, 1931.

23.

DeRenzi

and Spinnler

, Visual Recognition in Patients with Unilateral Cerebral Disease, Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 142, pp. 515–525, 1966.

24.

Harshman

Crawford

, and Hecht

, Marijuana, Cognitive Style and Lateralized Hemipsheric Functions, in The Therapeutic Potential of Marijuana, Cohen

and Stillman

(eds.), Plenum, New York, pp. 205–254, 1976.

25.

TenHouten

, Social Dominance and Cerebral Hemisphericity: Discriminating Race, Socioeconomic Status, and Sex Groups by Performance on Two Lateralized Tests, International Journal of Neuroscience, 10, pp. 223–232, 1980.

26.

Barron

, The Disposition Toward Originality, Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 51, pp. 478–485, 1955.

27.

Brittain

, Creativity and Hemispheric Functioning: A Second Look at Katz's Data, Empirical Studies of the Arts, 3, pp. 105–107, 1984.

28.

Zoccolotti

and Oltman

, Field Dependence and Lateralization of Verbal and Configural Processing, Cortex, 14, pp. 155–163, 1978.

29.

Simonton

, Genius, Creativity and Leadership, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1984.

30.

Sternberg

, Implicit Theories of Intelligence, Creativity, and Wisdom, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 49, pp. 607–627, 1985.

31.

McGlone

, Sex Differences in Human Brain Asymmetry: A Critical Survey, The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 3, pp. 215–227, 1980.