4. Research Question
Asian teenager who have strict culture to obey the
elders would be creative thinking lower than the
western teenagers who high flexibility or not?
5. A Comparative study British and Thai
undergraduates
in Torrance Test of Creative Thinking
Western Asian
Einon D, (2002).
Runco, Mark A.& Robert S. Albert, (2004).
S.R. Smith & L. Handler, (2007).
Taylor & Francis, (2004).
7. Procedure of Study The Torrance Test of Creative
Test Thinking
Research Instruments.
Fluency
Elaboration Flexibility
Originality
Torrance(1974)
8. Sample of the study
25 students,
Faculty of Computer science,
Rajamangala University, Thailand
25 students,
Faculty of Computer science,
University of Hertfordshire, UK.
9. Research Instruments
The Torrance Test of Creative Thinking-Figural. (TTCT-
Figural), the TTCT Verbal-Figural is formally titled
“Thinking Creatively with Pictures” It consists of three
activities; Picture Construction, Picture Completion, and
Repeated Figures of Lines or Circles. Ten minutes are
required to complete each activity.
10. Results
90
80
70
60
50 Asian
40 Western
30
20
10
0
Fluency Flexibility Originality Elaboration
The creativity results compared between Asia and Western showed
that the Western’s mean scores of Fluency, Flexibility, Originality,
and Elaboration were higher than Asia’s mean scores at the
statistic significant of level .05.
11. conclusion
The findings of this research tend to shown a difference
on the fluency, flexibility, originality, and elaboration.
Thus, it can be concluded that the learning environment
between Asia and western can be the main aspects of
creative thinking. This section will discuss which effective
on the two places above, considering the present
approaches and the results of the studies.
12. Discussion
confront a problem
Western
Western Asian
Thai
Elaboration
Fluency Matt Armstrong, 2008
13. Discussion
Queue when waiting
Western Thai
Elaboration
14. Discussion
How to Express Anger
Western Thai
Originality
15. Discussion
punctuality
Western Thai
Elaboration
16. Discussion
Sense of self
Western Thai
Originality
Fluency
17. Discussion
Status of Leader
Western Thai
Flexibility
18. Discussion
Weekend Activities
Western Thai
Originality
Flexibility
Matt Armstrong, 2008
19. Reference
• Anderson, J. R., 2000. Cognitive psychology and its implications. Worth Publishers. ISBN 0716716860.
• Bandura, A., 1977. Social Learning Theory. New York: General Learning Press.
• Bruce, Tina., 2004.Cultivating Creativity in Babies, Toddlers, & Young Children. London: Hodder & Stoughton.
• Chase, CI., 1985. Review of the Torrance tests of creative thinking. In JV Mitchell Jr (ed.), The Ninth Mental Measurements Yearbook, pp.
1631-1632. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska, Buros Institute of Mental Measurements.
• Einon, Dorothy., 2002. Creative Child: Recognize and Stimulate Your Child's Natural Talent. Hauppauge, NY: Barron's Educational Series.
• Fisher, Robert, and Mary Williams., 2004. Unlocking Creativity: A Teacher's Guide to Creativity Across the Curriculum. London: Taylor &
Francis.
• Guilford, J.P., 1967. The Nature of Human Intelligence. New York: McGraw-Hill.
• Hebert, TP., 2002. E. Paul Torrance: His life, Accomplishments, and Legacy. Storrs, CT: University of Connecticur, National Research
Center on the Gifted and Talented (NRC/GT).
• Johnson and Fishkin.,1999. Assessment of cognitive and effective behaviors related to creativity. IN AS Fishkin, B Cramond and P
olszewski-Kubilius (eds.), Investigating Creativity in Youth: Research and Methods, pp. 265-306. Cresskill NJ: Hampton Press, Inc.
• Keane, Michael A.,2004. Brave new world: understanding China's creative vision. International Journal of Cultural Policy 10(3):pp. 265-
279.
• Lee, Abby.,2003. Commercializing creativity and culture. Government information Office http://publish.gio.gov.tw/FCJ/past/03032871.html.
[Accessed 27 April, 2004]
• Liu, Shifa.,2004. Bring about a creative century: take action to develop a Creative China. China Culture Market. April 2004.
http://www.ccm.gov.cn/netCultureChannel/main/lt-cyzg.html.
• Louiseasl.,2009. The creative economy: What are the difference between East Asia learning style and Western learning style? See
http://www.education.com/question/difference-east-asia-learning-style/.
• McGray, Douglas.,2002. Japan’s gross national cool Foreign Policy. May-June see
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/issue_mayjune_2002/mcgray.html.
• Mouchiroud and Lubart.,2001. Children's original thinking: An empirical examination of alternative measures derived from divergent
thinking tasks, Journal of Genetic Psychology 162 (4), pp. 382–402.Niu, Weihua.
• Piaget, J.,1985. Equilibration of cognitive structures. University of Chicago Press.
Hinweis der Redaktion
Creativity is the ability to see something in a new way, to see and solve problems no one else may know exists, and to engage in mental and physical experiences that are new, unique, or different. Researchers have found environment to be more important than heredity in influencing creativity, and a child's creativity can be either strongly encouraged or discouraged by early experiences at home and in school (Einon D 2002 ) . Creative individuals tend to share certain characteristics, including a tendency to be more impulsive or spontaneous than others then it can also be a sign of creativity. Many creative individuals are unafraid of experimenting with new things; furthermore, creative people are often less susceptible to peer pressure, perhaps because they also tend to be self-reliant and unafraid the voice from their true feelings even if those go against conventional wisdom (Keane, Michael A.2004).
Teenagers are highly critical of the products they make and ideas they have. They try to express themselves creatively in a more adult-like way. Their creativity is influenced by their individual differences, physically, mentally, emotionally, and socially. Adolescence is also a time for rapid cognitive development (S.R. Smith and L. Handler 2007).Piaget describes adolescence as the stage of life in which the individual's thoughts start taking more of an abstract form and the egocentric thoughts decrease. This allows the individual to think and reason in a wider perspective (Piaget 1985). As Lee (2003) said, Social environment and parents are still important for the behaviors and choices of adolescents. Adolescents who have a good relationship with their parents are less likely to engage in various risk behaviors, such as smoking, drinking, fighting, and/or sexual intercourse. But this focus makes their thoughts less flexible because they also follow them parent in the parent ways.
At this point, push this study that Asian teenager who have strict culture to obey the elders would be creative thinking lower than the western teenagers who high flexibility or not?
According to differences between the West and Asia, we will see there are many different including culture and education that are effective to their creative thinking, culture is concern about social that make people learning by social learning theory (Bandura A.,1977). Social learning theory explains human behavior in terms of continuous reciprocal interaction between cognitive, behavioral, an environmental influences. Western culture stresses individualism more. McGray & Douglas (2002) said, Asia stresses conformity more. Students are expected to memorize their instructor's lectures and repeat the answers essentially verbatim on exams, while in the West, our education encourages more in-class discussion and problem-solving exercises.
Education is different in different parts of the world. The east typically focuses on math and science. Teachers believe in rote memorization. Students are encouraged to memorize most material and assessed with large exams at the end of the term. The western education model focuses on reading and understanding concepts rather than memorization. Students are assessed through multiple methods such as class participation, essays, and tests. Both methods have advantages. The eastern method creates students whose math and science background are advanced due to memorization of early math facts. The western model is also advantageous because students learn a variety of ways to express themselves, In the example of the difference above. It is interesting about the differences of creativity between two areas. Then we will use the results of TTCT to explain the difference in creativity happens.
Procedure of study It was a case-study; it was the Test of creative thinking by TTCT comparison of creative thinking between Asia and Western undergraduate students. Results of the TTCT were originally expressed of four factor: Fluency (The number of relevant ideas), Originality (the number of statistically infrequent ideas), Flexibility (the number of shifts or categories in responses), and Elaboration (the number of details used in response). The TTCT test can be administered as an individual or group test from the kindergarten level (age 6) through the graduate level and beyond. They require from 30 to 45 minutes working time. So speed is important and the Figural version of the test requires some drawing ability, however, artistic quality is not required to receive credit (Chase, 1985). The data were collected and analyzed then presented in the form of table and graph; the statistics were calculated by mean scores. Creativity means score, standard deviation, t with a significance level of .05.
The samples of this experiment were taken from 25 students, Faculty of Computer science , Rajamangala University who Asia representative and 25 students, Faculty of Computer science, University of Hertfordshire who western representative The scope of study was narrowed down to only the creative thinking of students in experiment.
The results show that the creative thinking of Asian and Western were different. The Asian’s mean score of Fluency is 7.76, Flexibility is 5.28, Originality is 13.16, and Elaboration is 34.48. The Western’s mean score of Fluency is 11.32, Flexibility is 7.96, Originality is 17.56, and Elaboration is 37.60.To summarize, the creative thinking of Asian were lower than Western, to a statistically significant level of .05
According to Sternberg (2002), another variable is a decision: an individual becomes creative only when he decides to do so, and takes risks. Individuals’ creativity may vary under different emotional and motivational circumstances either when they work alone or in groups, as they may sometimes have high self-confidence and sometimes low. The decision concept may explain such differences in being creative. It can be said that the process of western life style may encourage individuals to decide to be creative. As a result, the creative thinking process can be said to have the following effects: since it is open-ended and semi-structured, it increases tolerance for uncertainty and triggers curiosity.