[kictanet] Creativity and Living Abroad

[Luvisia Bakuli]

Maddux and Galinsky (2009) have published a thought-provoking article
reporting a significantly positive relationship between living abroad
and creativity. The researchers wanted to answer the question:"does
spending time in new cultures transform individuals into more creative
beings?"

Using five creative contexts to answer the question, the researchers
said that in one test that involved a creative negotiation deal, the
results indicated that "the amount of time spent living abroad, but not
traveling abroad, significantly predicted whether a deal was reached
even when [they] controlled for a variety of important personality and
demographic factors. Openness to experience predicted creative
deals . . . " 

Access to a greater number of novel ideas and concepts; ability to
approach problems from different perspectives; and psychological
readiness to accept and recruit ideas from unfamiliar sources -- which
may lead to unconscious idea recombination and conceptual expansion,
both being critical processes in the creative process, are among the
elements that contribute to the creativity.

I think this article will spawn a long list of research. It leads to
many questions, some of which I can guess to be: Is there is a positive
relationship between living in another culture, within a country, and
creativity? For example, are Kambas who have lived in Nyanza more
creative than those who never left Ukambani? If so, how long would they
need to live in the alien culture to improve their creativity? What are
the educational policy implications for educational institutions - does
having a students spend a good amount of time in a foreign culture
improve their creativity? At what age should one go abroad, and for how
long, in order to improve their creativity?

The complete citation for the article is: 

Maddux, William W. and Adam D. Galinsky. Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology,  Vol. 96, No. 5, pp. 1047-1061. 

Here is a link to the article:
http://www.apa.org/journals/releases/psp9651047.pdf

And a summary of the article is also here:
http://www.apa.org/releases/creativity.html 


What do you think? I'd be interested in your take on the article. 

Best regards, 

DBL