Displaying items by tag: psychology

Marilyn is a Director of the Creativity Centre UK Ltd, and Chief Executive of the Creativity Centre Educational Trust - a voluntary role. A chartered psychologist and author, her work has been presented and published internationally.

Marilyn enjoys talking about creativity education in the UK. This was the theme of her keynote presentations at the Annual Meeting of the Japanese Association of Educational Psychology in Shizuoka, Japan; the Torrance Lecture Series, Athens, Georgia; and the International Forum on Creativity at the opening of the Nobel Prize Centennial Exhibition in Kuala Lumpur where she was also a panel member for Forging the Creative Agenda for Malaysia. Marilyn has also undertaken consultancy on the development of creativity for various government bodies in the UK and overseas.

Before co-founding the Creativity Centre with Caroline, Marilyn spent much of her career in the university sector undertaking research and teaching creativity education, developmental and cognitive psychology. At Leeds Metropolitan University, where she was Reader in Psychology, she set up the cross-university Centre for Innovation and Creativity (CIC) as well as devising and delivering a series of undergraduate and postgraduate courses in applied creativity, supervising research and undertaking her own research into creativity in education.

One of the things Marilyn most enjoys is meeting people from all over the world and collaborating with them to create publications and learning resources in the area of creativity and human development, which is one reason why she enjoys being an editor of this journal.

Why is creativity so difficult to pin down?

Can it be evaluated?

Can anyone be creative?

What's the relationship between genius and creativity?

These are some of the questions addressed in this article.

Yosuke Yamaguchi was born in Osaka, Japan. He graduated from Osaka University with a Bachelor's degree in Human Sciences in 2009 and a Master's degree in Human Sciences in 2011. From 2011, he has been taking a doctoral course in the Graduate School of Human Sciences at Osaka University. His research is focused on theoretical and intervention issues in the development of creativity, especially the relationship between belief and behaviour in creative thinking activities.

Dr. Machiko Sannomiya is a Professor at the Graduate School of Human Sciences at Osaka University. She received her PhD from Osaka University in 1985. Her research background is in cognitive psychology, and her current interest is in thinking, communication and metacognition. In 1990 she received the Research Award for Educational Technology at the 5th Conference on Japan Society.

The present article explores the nature of creativity in craft and does so with the help of a case study of traditional Easter egg decoration. It starts by positioning the domain of folk art in relation to fine art and within a larger category of everyday life forms of creative expression. Following this, a cultural psychology approach to creativity is introduced and its framework used to unpack the actors and processes involved in craftwork. Analysing what is characteristic for folk art uses these particular theoretical lenses and requires paying attention to externalisation, integration, internalisation, and social interaction aspects, which are discussed in turn. Findings reveal fundamental features of craft such as its materiality, the presence of a strong traditional background, the importance of continuous learning, and the role of family and community relations. Towards the end, connections are made with the existing literature and final reflections offered on whether the characteristics above say something about creativity more generally, beyond the context of craft.

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Vlad Glaveanu has a BA in Psychology from the University of Bucharest, and an MSc in Social and Cultural Psychology from the London School of Economics where he recently completed a PhD in Social Psychology. In September 2012, he became Associate Professor at Aalborg University. His main interest is in creativity and innovation and in particular the intersections between creativity, society and culture.

His work aims to develop a socio-cultural psychology of creativity, one that offers a situated and micro-level account of the phenomenon and explores creative acts in everyday life contexts. Vlad has published several articles on these topics in creativity journals (such as the Creativity Research Journal, the Journal of Creative Behavior and Thinking Skills & Creativity) as well as in social and general psychology outlets (such as the Review of General Psychology, Culture & Psychology, the Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour and Theory & Psychology). He is currently the Editor of Europe's Journal of Psychology (EJOP), a peer-reviewed open access publication published by PsychOpen.