A Study on the Correlation between Creative Thinking of Iranian EFL Learners and Using Metaphor in Descriptive Writing Tasks

The main purpose of the present study was to determine whether there was any significant correlation between high, mid and low levels of creativity in male and female Iranian EFL learners and using metaphor in descriptive writing tasks. To this aim, a validated creativity questionnaire was administered to 50 intermediate and advanced EFL learners in order to determine the creativity levels of them. Consequently, 22 men and 28 women aged between 20 to 30 whose scores were between 50 to 75 (low creativity), 75 to 85 (mid creativity) and 85 to 100 (high creativity) were selected for the purpose of this study based on the results of the questionnaire. The data from the questionnaire were then compared to the learners? scores on descriptive writing prompt titled ?describe a face night of Tehran through an observation deck? which encouraged the use of metaphors. The writings were rated by three raters using Brown (2007) rubric of assessment. Applying Pearson correlation and one-way analysis of variance were employed to analyze the data. The results revealed that the low, mid and high levels of Iranian EFL learners? creativity and metaphor use in the process of descriptive writing tasks were correlated. The results have implications for language teachers and materials developers.