| It has been argued that we all have the ability to be creative and that it is not a characteristic of a select few. The first question guiding this research was, if we all have the capacity to be creative, why aren't we? Although there are many variables that contribute to creative thinking and behavior, before any innovation can occur, one must be aware of his or her own creative potential. Bandura's self-efficacy theory tells us that what we believe about our abilities will influence what we do and how we try to do it, especially in challenging situations. This led to the second research question: What do people believe about their own creative abilities?;There is little in the literature regarding creative self-efficacy. Although there has been some research looking at implicit beliefs of creativity in general, there is a dearth of research investigating what people believe about their own creative abilities. The limited research that has appeared utilized closed-ended questionnaires and scales for quantitative analysis. This study used an open-ended questionnaire asking college students (N = 242) what they believed about their own creative abilities. It was found that the majority of students from this sample did not have a high level of creative self-efficacy. This finding, along with student beliefs about what creativity is, may contribute to our understanding of why learners are not more creative. |
