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Young Children's Creative Solutions To Realistic and Fanciful Story Problems
Author(s) -
ALEXANDER PATRICIA A.,
JETTON TAMARA L.,
WHITE STEVEN H.,
PARSONS JAMES L.,
COTROPIA KIMLA K.,
LIU HSAIOCHIN,
ACKERMAN CHERYL M.
Publication year - 1994
Publication title -
the journal of creative behavior
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.896
H-Index - 55
eISSN - 2162-6057
pISSN - 0022-0175
DOI - 10.1002/j.2162-6057.1994.tb00723.x
Subject(s) - originality , puppy , fluency , novelty , psychology , character (mathematics) , creativity , flexibility (engineering) , developmental psychology , social psychology , mathematics education , mathematics , linguistics , philosophy , statistics , geometry
This study examined the creative problem solving of young children as evidenced in their responses to realistic and fanciful stories posing similar problems (i.e., key character trapped and in need of rescue). One‐hundred young children listened to two stories; one about a puppy trapped in a hole (realistic) and one about a prince caught in a tower (fanciful). The children were asked to complete the stories by thinking of ways to get the puppy or the prince out. The children's responses were scored for fluency (number), elaboration (detail), flexibility (conceptual shifts), originality (novelty), effectiveness, and realism. Overall, the results suggest that the children's performance improved with age and experience, although their solutions tended to remain ineffective and unoriginal. As predicted, the children strongly preferred the puppy to the prince story, although preference did not generally affect their creative performance. The practical and theoretical implications of the study are discussed and suggestions for future research are presented.