title: Creativity and Memory: Effects of an Episodic-Specificity Induction on Divergent Thinking.
abstract: People produce more episodic details when imagining future events and solving means-end problems after receiving an episodic-specificity induction-brief training in recollecting details of a recent event-than after receiving a control induction not focused on episodic retrieval. Here we show for the first time that an episodic-specificity induction also enhances divergent creative thinking. In Experiment 1, participants exhibited a selective boost on a divergent-thinking task (generating unusual uses of common objects) after a specificity induction compared with a control induction; by contrast, performance following the two inductions was similar on an object association task thought to involve little divergent thinking. In Experiment 2, we replicated the specificity-induction effect on divergent thinking using a different control induction, and also found that participants performed similarly on a convergent-thinking task following the two inductions. These experiments provide novel evidence that episodic memory is involved in divergent creative thinking.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Harvard University Center for Brain Science, Harvard University madore@fas.harvard.edu.
authors.forename: Kevin P
authors.initials: KP
authors.lastname: Madore
authors.affiliation: School of Psychology, The University of Auckland Centre for Brain Research, The University of Auckland.
authors.forename: Donna Rose
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Addis
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Harvard University Center for Brain Science, Harvard University.
authors.forename: Daniel L
authors.initials: DL
authors.lastname: Schacter
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D003405:Creativity; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007092:Imagination; D008297:Male; D061212:Memory, Episodic; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D011340:Problem Solving; D013850:Thinking; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: convergent thinking; creativity; divergent thinking; episodic memory; episodic-specificity induction; imagination