Individual differences in creativity: Personality, story writing, and hobbies

This study investigated the relationship between creativity and personality among college students from a variety of major fields of study. Indicators of creativity were ratings of written stories, lists of personal hobbies, and scores on the Creative Personality Scale (CPS; Gough, 1979). Personalit y was assessed broadly using the NEO-Five Factor Inventory (Costa and McCra e, 1985) as well as measures of depersonalization, intolerance of ambiguity ,, faith in intuition, and problem-solving styles. The results showed a pos itive relationship between openness to experience and all creativity, measu res. Moreover; high scores on intuition and extraversion were the best pred ictors for creativity as measured by the CPS. Story creativity was predicte d by low scores on conscientiousness. Depersonalilzation was not significan tly related to creativity. The results of this investigation confirm and ex tend previous research in demonstrating a close association between creativ ity and specific personality traits. Future research should clarify the nat ure of the creative personality across individuals of differing levels and domains of expertise. Copyright (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.