Is Flexibility More than Fluency and Originality?

Abstract

Flexibility (i.e., the number of categorically different ideas), fluency (i.e., the answer quantity), and originality (i.e., the quality of ideas) are essential aspects of the ability to think divergently. Theoretically, fluency and ideational flexibility tasks are akin to one another. However, flexibility was also considered to be uniquely related to working memory capacity due to the task requirements involved in generating diverse answers (e.g., self-monitoring, suppression, and category generation). Given that the role of working memory is strengthened in flexibility tasks relative to fluency and originality tasks, flexibility should be more strongly related with working memory. Additionally, mental speed should show a similar pattern of results because mental speed has been previously related to task complexity. Based on a sample of N = 409 adults (Mage = 24.01 years), we found in latent variable models that fluency/originality strongly predicts flexibility and accounts for 61% of its variance. Creative flexibility was unrelated to working memory and mental speed after controlling for fluency/originality. Additionally, the residual of a latent flexibility factor was unrelated to self-reported creative activities. We concluded that flexibility, as measured here, can be deemed primarily a method factor that did not show value over and above fluency/originality as assessed in traditional fluency and originality tasks. We discussed perspectives for disentangling trait and method variance in flexibility tasks.

Relationships between empathy and creativity in collective games: a comparison between handball and sitting ball

“…Fluid players are the most flexible and are also those realized the best performances ( p < 0.001). These results corroborate those obtained in the literature ( Lubart et al, 2015 ; Weiss and Wilhelm, 2022 ). However, unlike handball, there is no positive correlation between the three indicators of creativity and instrumental empathy.…”

Driving factors of individual differences in broad retrieval ability: Gr is more than the sum of its parts.

“…The verbal task tapped the narrow Gr abilities of IF, EF, and WF, respectively.These factors have been prominently used in the literature and allow reliable assessment of fluency performance. Further narrow Gr abilities, for example, abilities that include the assessment of flexibility or originality have not been included in this study as they have been criticized regarding their reliability and collinearity with fluency (Weiss & Wilhelm, 2022). Essential features of items applied in this study are summarized in Table 2.…”

Age-related differences in creative cognition: The mediating role of executive functions and associative processes.

“…The results for shifting are not consistent either, with some authors reporting a relationship with divergent creativity (e.g., Nusbaum & Silvia, 2011; Pan & Yu, 2018), while others found no such association (e.g., Benedek et al, 2014). Regarding updating, there is some evidence for a relationship both with convergent creativity (e.g., Byrne & Murray, 2005) and with measures of fluency and flexibility in divergent creativity (Benedek et al, 2014; Weis & Wilhelm, 2022). However, in other studies, a WM capacity measure predicted convergent creativity, but not divergent creativity scores (e.g., C.…”