THE COGNITIVE SPIRAL - CREATIVE-THINKING AND COGNITIVE PROCESSING

Defining and measuring the construct of creative thinking has proven t o be an elusive task. As Clark (1979) has pointed out, the term creati vity is used as if there is general agreement as to what the construct means. Yet the fact is that research has taken many routes, and defin itions are more often specific to the particular author than a matter of consensus. However, when applying creative thinking to instructiona l design and presentation, it would be prudent to have a concise defin ition which separates out potentially confounding elements. The Cognit ive Spiral model conceptualizes creative thinking as an integral compo nent of all cognitive processing. This article details the synthesis o f a definition and the structure of a model of cognitive processing.