4.2.1 The Creative Personality

The questions within the area of the creative personality include the identification of traits or characteristics to differentiate creative persons from their less creative peers. The major response to this type of question has been research through biographical descriptive and empirical methodologies utilizing readily identified “creators” and attempting to distil their attributes. The end products of these investigations are lists and tests of characteristics and traits that have something to do with being creative. These lists do not provide a comprehensive picture of the creative personality. As MacKinnon has emphasized … "There are many paths along which persons travel toward the full development and expression of their creative potential, and there is no single mould into which all who are creative will fit. The full and complete picturing of the creative person will require many images."

Many psychological theorists have provided a diversity of characteristics of the creative person. Torrance introduced a multi‑faceted model for thinking about the search for creative behaviour. This model takes into consideration, in addition to creative abilities, creative skills and creative motivations. He stated that "High level(s) of creative achievement can be expected consistently only from those who have creative motivations (commitment) and the skills necessary to accompany the creative abilities." Other multi‑faceted models for dealing with the creative personality have been put forth by Amabile, Gowan, and Rerizulli.

Within the scope of research into the creative personality, the questions concerning why people choose to create are central. Amabile also refers to a three‑faceted model for examining creativity. Hers includes domain‑relevant skills, creativity‑relevant skills and task motivation. She focuses her attention on the former and promotes the hypothesis that intrinsic motivation is important for creativity.

Another aspect to the study of the creative person relates to knowing more about the personal orientation toward problem solving and creative thinking. Isaksen and Treffinger suggest that it is helpful for individuals to have information regarding their learning and thinking style when learning how to use creative problem solving. Some of the current research within this area focuses on studying different styles of creativity and how these styles may affect different elements of creativity. Certain personality characteristics will influence preferences regarding what type of information people pay attention to, how they collect and analyze that data, and how they choose to use the information. Most previous literature on the creative personality focused upon the difference in level of tendency or achievement. It is the area of style of creativity which provides an entirely new lens to utilize regarding the study of the creative person. The new focus is upon how people differ in their approach to using their creativity, not upon their level of qualitative factors. Selection Twelve provides an overview to this emerging line of style of creativity through the work of Kirton.