PSY30008 Psychology of Personality
Assignment
Personality and Creativity
The overarching aim of the assignment is to examine the associations between personality and
creativity. The two are closely linked, with certain personality traits more likely to be associated with
both a person’s creative self-concept and their creative behaviour (Batey & Hughes, 2017; Silvia,
Nusbaum, Berg, Martin, & O’Connor, 2009).
For the purposes of the assignment, personality is defined in terms of the five-factor trait model of
personality, and specifically, the Huge Two meta-traits (see Karwowski & Lebuda, 2016). Creativity is
defined in terms of both how creative an individual thinks they are (creative self-concept; Karwowski,
2016) as well as the creativity of their behaviour in tasks requiring convergent and divergent cognitive
abilities (Cropley, 2006).
Anecdotally, creative types are often seen as having poor self-control, yet there is little research in
this area. Self-control, an aspect of inhibitory control, is the ability to regulate emotions, thoughts, and
behaviour in the face of temptations and impulses (Baumeister, Vohs, & Tice, 2007). Self-control can
be depleted or replenished over time depending on the demands placed on the individual (Baumeister
et al., 2007). Depletion of self-control appears to differentially affect creative performance in tasks
requiring convergent and divergent cognitive abilities (Radel, Davranche, Fournier, & Dietrich, 2015)
For your assignment, you will write a full lab report that addresses the following research questions:
1. How do the Huge Two meta-traits of personality relate to creative self-concept and
performance on creativity tasks requiring (a) convergent cognitive abilities and (b) divergent
cognitive abilities?
2. How does self-control depletion affect performance on creativity tasks requiring (a) convergent
cognitive abilities and (b) divergent cognitive abilities?
Essential details
• Submission is electronic through Turnitin.
• The lab report must not exceed 3200 words
o Word count does not include title page, Abstract, or reference list.
• The submission must be presented in APA style (6th edition).
• Worth 40% of your final mark.
• Late Penalty: 10% per day. Submissions more than 5 days late will receive zero marks.
Method
Participants
Participants were third-year psychology students at Swinburne University. (Further participant
information will be contained in the data set which will be posted on Blackboard once data collection
is complete).
Measures
Demographic variables: Sex (male, female, or other) and age.
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Personality: The IPIP-NEO 120 (Maples, Guan, Carter, & Miller, 2014) was selected to assess the
personality meta-traits of Stability and Plasticity. It is a validated measure of the Big Five. The scale
consists of 120 phrases, and participants are asked to rate how accurately each statement reflects
how they are on a 5-point likert-type scale ranging from 1 (very inaccurate) to 5 (very accurate).
Scores on each of the Openness to experience and Extraversion items were summed to create the
total Plasticity score, and scores on the Conscientiousness, Agreeableness and Neuroticism scores
were summed to create the total Stability score.
Creative self-concept: The Short Scale of Creative Self (Karwowski, 2012) was used to measure
creative self-concept. The scale consists of 11 statements which participants rate according to how
accurately they reflect their self-concept. Responses are given on a 5-point likert-type scale ranging
from 1 (definitely not) to 5 (definitely yes). Scores on individual items are averaged to create a
creative self-concept score ranging from 1-5 with higher scores indicating greater creative selfconcept.
Experimental tasks
Self-control depletion
Self-control was experimentally depleted using a computerised version of the Simon Task (Proctor,
2011). For each trial, a red or blue square appeared on either the left or the right side of the screen.
Participants were instructed to press the left shift key when they saw a blue square, and the right
shift key when they saw a red square. There were congruent and incongruent trials. When the blue
square appeared on the left side of the screen the trial was congruent, and incongruent when it
appeared on the right side of the screen, and vice versa for the red square. In order to create both a
high and low self-control depletion condition, two versions of the Simon task were used, one with
50% incongruent trials (high self-control depletion) and the other with 10% incongruent trials (low
self-control depletion). Participants were randomly allocated to only one of the conditions.
Creativity tasks
One divergent thinking task and one convergent thinking task were used to assess creative
behaviour.
The divergent thinking task, Guilford’s Alternate Uses Task (Guilford, 1967), required participants to
come up with as many uses as possible for the following common items in 3 minutes: “a brick”, “a
newspaper”, and “a shoe”. Responses were scored using the subjective multiple-rater method
outlined by Silvia et al. (2008), based on how uncommon, remote and clever the responses were.
Each response received a rating from 1 (not at all creative) to 5 (highly creative). For the creativity
index, participants’ scores were summed then divided by the number of responses. Overall scores
range from 1-5.
The convergent thinking task, the Remote Associates Test (Mednick, 1962), required participants to
look at three remotely associated words (e.g., paint/doll/cat) and come up with a fourth word that is
related to all three (e.g., house). Thirty questions were presented in 3 minutes with one mark given
for each correct response. Total scores range from 0-30 and are expressed as a proportion of total
correct responses.
****Note that some other tasks were given to participants in this study but they are not
being used for the lab report assignment and therefore don’t need to be mentioned in
the lab report****
Procedure
Participants first completed the Simon task followed by the creativity tasks in a counterbalanced order
in class at their usual tutorial time. The tasks were undertaken in the Inquisit program, taking
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approximately 45 minutes in total to complete. The self-report questionnaire containing the measures
of personality and creative self-concept was completed via Qualtrics at a time and location convenient
to participants, but within 1 week maximum of their tutorial. Scores on the Simon task, creativity tasks
and self-report measures were linked via a unique code number randomly allocated to each
participant at the start of the Simon task in Inquisit. The code number also permitted anonymous
participation in the study.
Before beginning the study in class, participants were informed via a consent statement of their rights
as volunteers not to participate in the study if they so choose and that they could withdraw their
participation at any time prior to submitting their results. A debriefing statement was provided at the
end of the survey detailing the aims of the study.
The independent variables for the study were age, sex, the personality variables of Plasticity and
Stability, and self-control depletion. The dependent variables were self-reported creative self-concept
and performance on the divergent thinking and convergent thinking tasks.
The Assignment
Note: The maximum number of words is the absolute maximum and markers will stop reading at the
word limit. The word count includes everything except for the Abstract and Reference list.
The assignment will be presented in the form of a lab report containing the following sections:
• Title page
o Come up with a title for your study – be creative!
• Abstract
o 120-150 words; contributes 5% to your overall mark for the assignment
• Introduction
o 800-1000 words (approx.); contributes 30% to your overall mark
o You must include at least three hypotheses
At least one hypothesis must address relationships between the Huge Two
meta-traits of personality and creative self-concept.
At least one hypothesis must address relationships between the Huge Two
meta-traits and performance on creativity tasks requiring (a) convergent
cognitive abilities and (b) divergent cognitive abilities.
At least one hypothesis must address how self-control depletion affects
performance on creativity tasks requiring (a) convergent cognitive abilities
and (b) divergent cognitive abilities.
It is important that you present directional hypotheses that are clearly linked to
the studies reviewed in your Introduction. Ensure that they hypotheses can be
tested using the given data.
• Method
o 500-600 words (approx.); contributes 5% to your overall mark
o You can base this section on the Method information described above. Do not just
copy and paste the Method information provided on this handout.
• Results
o 500-600 words (approx.); contributes 20% to your overall mark
o Includes descriptive statistics (M, SD) for the variables used in your analyses and the
results of hypothesis testing
o Present results according to APA 6th standards
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• Discussion
o 800-1000 words (approx.); contributes 30% to your overall mark
o Were the hypotheses supported? Why/Why not?
o How do the results of this study compare with previous studies?
o What are the implications of the findings for theory and practice in personality
psychology?
o What are the methodological limitations of the study and how could they have affected
the findings? Future directions?
o Present a coherent conclusion.
• Reference list
o Along with the quality of grammar/expression in the report and adherence to APA 6th
referencing style contributes 10% to your overall mark
Starter References
(You may use additional references than those listed here. The ones below are provided to help
you get started).
Batey, M., & Hughes, D.J. (2017). Individual difference correlates of self-perceptions of creativity. In
M. Karwowski & J.C. Kaufman (Eds.). The Creative Self: Effect of Beliefs, Self-Efficacy,
Mindset, and Identity (pp. 185-218). London, UK: Academic Press. ***e-book available
through the library; Chapter 11 only***
Baumeister, R. F., Vohs, K. D., & Tice, D. M. (2007). The strength model of self-control. Current
Directions in Psychological Science, 16, 351-355. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8721.2007.00534.x
Cropley, A. (2006). In praise of convergent thinking. Creativity Research Journal, 18(3), 391-404.
doi:10.1207/s15326934crj1803_13
Guilford, J.P. (1967). Creativity: Yesterday, today and tomorrow. Journal of Creative Behaviour, 1,
3–14.
Karwowski, M. (2016). The dynamics of creative self-concept: Changes and reciprocal relations
between creative self-efficacy and creative personal identity. Creativity Research Journal,
28, 99-104. doi:10.1080/10400419.2016.1125254
Karwowski, M., & Lebuda, I. (2016). The Big Five, the Huge Two, and creative self-beliefs: A metaanalysis.
Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 10, 214-232.
doi:10.1037/aca0000035
Maples, J.L., Guan, L., Carter, N.T., & Miller, J.D. (2014). A test of the International Personality Item
Pool representation of the revised NEO personality inventory and development of a 120-item
IPIP-based measure of the Five-Factor model. Psychological Assessment, 26, 1070-1084.
doi:10.1037/pas0000004
Mednick, S. A. (1962). The associative basis of the creative process. Psychological Review, 69,
220-232.
Proctor, R. W. (2011). Playing the Simon game: Use of the Simon task for investigating human
information processing. Acta Psychologica, 136(2), 182-188.
doi:10.1016/j.actpsy.2010.06.010
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Radel, R., Davranche, K., Fournier, M., & Dietrich, A. (2015). The role of (dis)inhibition in creativity:
Decreased inhibition improves idea generation. Cognition, 134, 110-120.
doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2014.09.001
Silvia, P.J., Nusbaum, E.C., Berg, C., Martin, C., & O’Connor, A. (2009). Openness to experience,
plasticity, and creativity: Exploring lower-order, high-order, and interactive effects. Journal of
Research in Personality, 43, 1087-1090. doi:10.1016/j.jrp.2009.04.015
