Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi Turkish Journal of Giftedness

2014
4/1
TÜZED
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
Haziran 2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1
ISSN 2146-3832
TJGE
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education
June 2014, Volume 4, Issue 1
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
Haziran 2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
June 2014, Volume 4, Issue 1
TÜZED Hakkında
About the TJGE
Türk Üstün Zeka ve Eğitim Dergisi (TÜZED), zeka,
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education covers
üstün zeka, özel üstün yetenek ve yaratıcılık konula-
all aspects of giftedness, talent, and creativity and all
rında yayım yapan hakemli bir dergidir. Dergi, konu
types of high ability. It provides a scientific platform
kapsamı ile ilgili olarak bilimsel araştırmaların, ku-
for researchers, practitioners and administrators to
ramların, uygulamaların ve fikirlerin tartışıldığı bi-
discuss and disseminate scientific research, theories,
limsel bir platform sunmayı hedeflemektedir. TÜ-
and practices and ideas. The TJGE is a refereed jour-
ZED, Türkçe ve İngilizce dillerinde yayım yapmak-
nal which publishes original research articles, litera-
tadır. Dergiye gönderilen bütün taslak makaleler edi-
ture and book reviews in Turkish and English. Arti-
törün önincelemesinden sonra en az iki hakeme ince-
cles submitted to the TJGE undergo peer review pro-
lenmek üzere gönderilir. TÜZED, yılda iki kez çevri-
cess. The TJGE is an open-access online journal and
miçi olarak yayımlanmaktadır.
published twice a year.
Editör/Editor in Chief
Uğur Sak, Anadolu Üniversitesi
Sekreterya/Assistant to Editor
Bahadır Ayas
Hakem Kurulu/Editorial Review Board
Abdulkadir Erdoğan, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Oktay Aydın, Marmara Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Ahmed Mohamed, Asyut University, Egypt
Oktay Adıgüzel, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Albert Ziegler, Uni of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany
Omar Muammar, Uni of Dammam, Saudi Arabia
Atilla Cavkaytar, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Özgür Soğancı, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Aykut Ceyhan, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Peter Merrotsy, University of New England, Australia
Ayşegül Ataman, Gazi Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Roza Leikin, University of Haifa, Israel
Bahadır Erişti, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Seokhee Cho, St. John's University, USA
Cumali Öksüz, A. Menderes Üni, Türkiye
Serap Emir, İstanbul Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Fatih Karabacak, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Sezgin Vuran, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Gürhan Can, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Sinan Olkun, Ankara Üniversitesi, Türkiye
İbrahim H. Diken, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Sivanes Phillipson, Monash University, Australia
June Maker, University of Arizona, USA
Todd Lubart, Universite Paris Descartes, France
Lola Prieto, Universidad de Murcia, Spain
Usanee Anuruthwong, Srinakharinwirot Uni,Thailand
Murat Demirbaş, Kırıkkale Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Ümit Davaslıgil, Maltepe Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Murat Gökdere, Amasya Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Yavuz Akbulut, Anadolu Üniversitesi, Türkiye
Necate Baykoç Dönmez, Hacettepe Üni, Türkiye
Oğuz Serin, International Cyprus University, T. R. of
Northern Cyprus
Indexing/Abstracting: The TJGE is indexed and abstracted in Akademia Sosyal Bilimler İndeksi (ASOS), Akademik
Dizin, Citefactor, Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ), DRJI (Directory of Research Journals Indexing), eBooks, EBSCOhost Databases, Educational Research Abstracts Online (ERA), Gifted and Talented Abstracts, Google Scholar, Index
Copernicus International (IC), Informatics Open J-Gate, NewJour Electronic Journals & Newsletters, ProQuest, Researchbib, Türk Eğitim İndeksi (Turkish Educational Index), Ulrich's Periodicals Directory, WorldCat
Yazışma/Editorial correspondence: Ugur Sak, Editor, usak@anadolu.edu.tr; editor@tuzed.org
©2011, Her hakkı saklıdır/All rights reserved. Türk Üstün Zeka ve Eğitim Dergisi/Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
Haziran 2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
June 2014, Volume 4, Issue 1
İÇİNDEKİLER/CONTENTS
Editör Notu/Editorial
1
The Nuremberg Music-Ecological Approach: Why are some musicians internationally successful and others not?
Nürnberg Müzik Ekolojik Yaklaşımı: Neden Bazı Müzisyenler uluslararası
başarılı, diğerleri değil?
Albert Ziegler, Sabrina Straßer, Wolfgang Pfeiffer & Catherine Wormald
2
A Cross-National Comparison of School Students’ Perceptions Regarding High
Performing Peers
Öğrencilerin Üst Düzey Performans Sergileyen Akranlarına Yönelik Algılarının Ülkeler
Arası Karşılaştırması
Hyerim Oh, Margaret Sutherland, Niamh Stack, Maria del Mar Badia, Sheyla
Blumen, Anh-Thu Nguyen Quoc, Catherine Wormald, Julie Maakrun, Barbara
Baier, Martha Schmidt & Albert Ziegler
10
Chances and Limitations of Implementing Measures of Differentiation for Gifted
Children in Primary Schools: The Teachers’ Part
İlkokuldaki Üstün Zekâlı Öğrencilere Yönelik Program Farklılaştırma Uygulamalarındaki
Şanslar ve Sınırlılıklar: Öğretmen Kısmı
Martina Endepohls-Ulpe & Natascha Thömmes
24
The Associative Basis of Scientific Creativity: A Model Proposal
Bilimsel Yaratıcılığın Çağrışımsal Temelleri: Model Önerisi
Esra Kanlı
37
Economic Creativity Development
Ekonomik Yaratıcılığın Gelişimi
Nasseroddin Kazemi Haghighi & Ahmad Reza Kazemi Haghighi
51
An Interview with Buket Yakmaci-Guzel
Buket Yakmacı-Güzel ile Röportaj
Michael F. Shaughnessy
71
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
Haziran 2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
June 2014, Volume 4, Issue 1
Editorial
Editör’ün Notu
Dear our readers! Welcome to the new issue of
Değerli okuyucularımız! Yeni sayımıza hoş gel-
the TJGE. I am thankful to our authors for their
diniz. Öncelikle dergimize katkıları nedeniyle
contributions to the TJGE.
yazarlarımıza teşekkür ederim.
This issue of the TJGE includes three research
Türk Üstün Zeka ve Eğitim Dergisi’nin bu sayı-
articles, two literature reviews and an inter-
sında üç araştırma makalesi, iki literatür tara-
view. In the first article, Ziegler and his col-
ması ve bir görüşme yer almaktadır. Birinci ma-
leagues discuss the Nuremberg Music-Ecologi-
kalede Albert Ziegler ve araştırma ekibi Nürn-
cal Approach and test the hypothesis that suc-
berg müzik ekolojik yaklaşımını temel alarak
cessful professional musicians possess more
uluslararası düzeyde üne sahip müzisyenleri
Educational Capital as well as more Learning
analiz etmişlerdir. Bu yaklaşımda bireyin eylem
Capital than their less successful colleagues. In
alanında varolan kaynakları temel almışlardır.
the second article, Oh and her colleagues exam-
İkinci makalede Oh ve araştırma ekibi yedi
ine students’ perceptions of high-performing
farklı ülkede öğrencilerin üstün akademik per-
classmates about their expected intellectual
formans gösteren sınıf arkadaşları hakkındaki
abilities, positive social qualities and popularity
algıları incelenmiştir. Üçüncü makalede Ende-
among their peers across seven countries. In the
pohls-Ulpe ve Thömmes Almaya’da öğretmen-
third article, Endepohls-Ulpe and Thömmes an-
lerin program farklılaştırılmalarının üstün ze-
alyze German primary school teachers’ atti-
kalı öğrenciler için beklenen yararları ve öğret-
tudes towards different types of differentiations
men üzerinde oluşturduğu yükler hakkındaki
about expected benefits for gifted students and
algılarını ele almışlardır. Dördüncü makalede
anticipated work load for teachers. In the fourth
Kanlı bilimsel yaratıcılığın çağrışımsal boyutla-
article, Kanlı reviews associative bases of scien-
rını incelemiş ve bunun üzerine bir model ileri
tific creativity and proposes a model to explain
sürmüştür. Beşinci makalede Haghighi ve
it. In the fifth article, Hagighi and Haghighi dis-
Haghighi ekonomik yaratıcılığı tartışarak psi-
cuss the concept of economic creativity and ex-
kolojik boyutlarını irdelemişlerdir. Dergide yer
plain its psychological characteristics. The last
alan son çalışma Shaughnessy’nin yapmış ol-
study in the issue includes an interview carried
duğu bir röportajı içermektedir.
out by Shaughnessy with Buket Yakmacı-Guzel
on Dabrowski’s overexcitabilities.
Kuzey yarımkürede yaşayanlar için yaz geldi.
Yaz tatilinizin en mutlu ve en dinlendirici şe-
Summer has come for those who live on the
kilde geçmesini diliyorum. Tatil arasında dergi-
Northern hemisphere of the Earth. I wish you
mizin bu sayısını okumayı ihmal etmeyin.
enjoy your summer time and reading this issue!
Uğur Sak
Editor in Chief
1
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1, 2-9
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
2014, Volume 4, Issue 1, 2-9
______________________________________________________
The Nuremberg Music-Ecological
Approach: Why are Some Musicians
Internationally Successful and
Others Not?
Nürnberg Müzik Ekolojik
Yaklaşımı: Neden Bazı Müzisyenler
Uluslararası Başarılı, Diğerleri
Değil?
Albert Ziegler1, Sabrina Straßer2, Wolfgang Pfeiffer3, & Catherine Wormald4
Abstract
Öz
Success in music depends on a number of crucial factors with musical talent figuring prominently in gifted research. However, in the Nuremberg Music-Ecological Approach presented
in this paper a different view is taken. Instead
of talents and factors, the concept of available
resources in an individual´s actiotope (Ziegler,
2005) is put in the center of our analysis. Educational Capital refers to exogenous resources and
comprises five different forms of resources:
Economic Educational Capital, Cultural Educational Capital, Social Educational Capital, Infrastructural Educational Capital and Didactic Educational Capital. Learning Capital refers to endogenous resources and also comprises five different forms of resources: Organismic Learning
Capital, Actional Learning Capital, Telic Learning Capital, Episodic Learning Capital and Attentional Learning Capital. Results of an empirical study are reported which was designed to
test the claim that successful professional musicians possess more Educational Capital as well
as more Learning Capital than their less successful colleagues. The hypothesis was confirmed with a sample of professional musicians
who were successful on a local, regional or international level.
Keywords: Nuremberg Music-Ecological Approach, educational capital, learning capital
Müzik alanında başarı daha çok üstün zeka
araştırmalarında baskın yer bulan müzik yeteneği ile birlikte bir takım faktörlere bağlıdır. Bu
çalışmada sunulan Nürnberg Müzik Ekolojik
Yaklaşımında ise farklı bir bakış açısı ele alınmıştır. Yetenekler ve faktörler yerine bireyin eylem alanında varolan kaynaklar (Ziegler, 2005)
analizin merkezine alınmıştır. Eğitimsel Kapital
dışsal kaynakları ifade eder ve beş farklı kaynak
türünü kapsar: Ekonomik eğitimsel kapital,
kültürel eğitimsel kapital, sosyal eğitimsel kapital, altyapısal eğitimsel kapital ve öğretici/didaktik eğitimsel kapital. Öğrenme Kapitali içsel
kaynakları ifade eder ve beş farklı kaynak türünü içermektedir: Biyolojik öğrenme kapitali,
eylemsel öğrenme kapitali, öğrenme amaçları
kapitali, periyodik öğrenme kapitali ve dikkat
kaynakları öğrenme kapitali. Başarılı profesyonel müzisyenlerin eğitim ve öğrenme kapitallerinin daha az başarılı olan meslektaşlarına göre
daha sık sergiledikleri hipotezini test etmek
amacıyla tasarlanmış olan deneysel bir araştırmanın bulguları rapor edilmiştir. Hipotezler
yerel, bölgesel veya uluslararası düzeyde başarılı olan müzisyenlerden oluşan bir örneklem
ile doğrulanmıştır.
Anahtar Sözcükler: Nürnberg Müzik Ekolojik
Yaklaşımı, eğitim kapitali, öğrenme kapitali
Introduction
Musical activities are among the most pleasurable human experiences (Juslin & Sloboda, 2001).
Indeed, human nature and its evolution seems to be unimaginable without music (McDermott,
University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany
University of Wollongong, Australia
Correspondence email: albert.ziegler@fau.de
©Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi/Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education
ISSN 2146-3832, http://www.tuzed.org
1.2.3
4
Ziegler and others
Nurnberg Music-Ecological Approach
& Hauser, 2005; Patel, 2006). Music is held in high regard in virtually all known human societies (Benzon, 2001; Patel, 2008; Wallin, Merker, & Brown, 2000).
This is also true for the country in which the empirical research reported in this paper was
conducted. Germany has a flourishing music industry with 133 public and professional symphony orchestras, 83 music theatres as well as a variety of musical educational institutions (cf.
Deutsches Musikinformationszentrum, 2011a). Around 7 million amateur musicians live in
the country (Reimers, 2010). The government spends approximately 2.5 billion Euro per year
on music related activities. This is approximately 30% of the total cultural expenditure (cf.
Deutsches Musikinformationszentrum, 2011b). Private funding of musical activities (by donations, foundation means, sponsoring, etc.) adds approximately another 800 million to 2.6 billion Euro (cf. Deutsches Musikinformationszentrum, 2011b).
It therefore comes as no surprise that those who perform music professionally, also enjoy a
high degree of appreciation. In all countries music is a profession of its own, even though there
is no strict definition or profile of a musician. In Germany there are courses in music that can
be undertaken at a professional academy or a college of music. However, not all trained musicians can live on their salary. Many of them are forced to take a second job. On the other
hand there are also musicians who make their living completely with music although they did
not receive a formal musical education. But which factors determine the development of a high
level of performance as a professional musician and, which factors are responsible for success
in music?
From the perspective of gifted research the most common answer is: musical talent (Sternberg
& Lubart, 2006; Winner, 1996). However, in this article an alternative explanation is suggested.
Based on a systemic approach our basic assumption is that musicians who succeed had more
learning resources at their disposal (Ziegler & Baker, 2013).
The Nuremberg Music-Ecological Approach
The Nuremberg Music-Ecological Approach postulates that talent development in music takes
place in an actiotope which […] includes an individual and the material, social and informational environment with which that individual interacts“ (Ziegler, Vialle, & Wimmer, 2013, p.
3). It is regarded as an active process of self-organization during which individuals gradually
adapt to specific environments and the environments are gradually adapted to the growing
skill levels of the individuals. The crucial question is what determines successful adaptations?
Successful adaptation is equally dependent on exogenous and endogenous resources, the former located in the environmental component of the actiotope, the latter in the individual component of the actiotope. In the Nuremberg Music-Ecological Approach exogenous resources
are termed Educational Capital and endogenous resources are termed Learning Capital. They
are the necessary conditions for successful learning and talent development.
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
3
Ziegler ve diğerleri
Nürnberg Müzik Ekolojik Yaklaşımı
Within Educational Capital as well as Learning Capital five different forms can be distinguished, making in all, ten forms of Capital (for a detailed overview see Ziegler & Baker, 2013).
In Table 1 these Capitals are defined and illustrated with an example. The examples refer to
model learning and its consequences. In doing so it is assumed that a student listens fascinated
to the concert performance of a violinist and considers learning to play the violin himself.
Table 1: Forms of Educational and Learning Capital, Definitions and Examples
Capital
Definition
Example
Exogenous resources: Educational Capital
Economic Educational Capital
Cultural Educational
Capital
Social Educational
Capital
Infrastructural Educational Capital
Didactic Educational
Capital
“Economic Educational Capital includes
all those possessions and valuables,
which can be used for the initiation or
continuation of learning episodes.” (p.
10f.)
“Cultural Educational Capital includes
values, concepts and ways of thinking,
which can promote or impede the development of an effective Action Repertoire.” (p. 11)
“Social Educational Capital includes all
individuals and social institutions that
have direct or indirect impact on the success of learning episodes.” (p. 11)
“Infrastructural Educational Capital includes the material and policy options,
which can be used in support of learning.” (p. 11)
“Didactic Educational Capital is the
available knowledge on the design and
optimization of pedagogical approaches
A fundamental precondition for being able
to learn to play the violin is the availability
of a violin and that a student can afford violin instruction.
If the student’s peer group disapproves of
playing a classical musical instrument, the
probability that the student pursues the
plan to learn to play the violin is reduced.
The parents have to support the student’s
plans (financially, motivationally), a violin
teacher needs to be available.
Access to a nearby conservatory or a music
school may trigger the implementation of
the plan.
The didactic quality of his violin teacher
helps the student after some setbacks to increase his skill level and overcome some
motivational issues.
Endogenous resources: Learning Capital
Organismic Learning
Capital
Telic Learning Capital
Actional Learning
Capital
Episodic Learning
Capital
Attentional Learning
Capital
1
4
“Organismic Learning Capital refers to
the physiological and constitutive resources of a learner.” (p. 11)
“Telic Learning Capital refers to the
availability of learning goals.” (p. 11)
“Actional Learning Capital includes the
complete Action Repertoire of a learner,
or of which the learner is basically capable of utilizing.” (p. 11)
“Episodic Learning Capital represents
the available goal- or situation-related
patterns of actions for students.” (p. 12)
“Attentional Learning Capital refers to
the quantitative and qualitative attention
resources available for learning.” (p. 12)
Fatigue, a lack of dexterity, hearing impairments etc. might interfere with the student’s learning abilities.
If the student sets unrealistic musical goals,
disappointments are bound to occur and
the student may give up the violin.
If the student has more effective learning
strategies at his disposal, he will more easily overcome motivational obstacles.
After a period of time the student has acquired significant experience on how best
to master a difficult piece of music.
If the student is involved in further activities besides playing the violin (e.g. football
club, friends, computer games) he might
not have enough time at his disposal to
practice the music instrument sufficiently.
Definitions are quotes from Ziegler, Vialle & Wimmer (2013).
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
Ziegler and others
Nurnberg Music-Ecological Approach
It is assumed that more endogenous and more exogenous resources in an actiotope allow for
more successful adaptations in the musical domain and hence the development of more effective action repertoires. A straightforward hypothesis would be that professional musicians
with more resources become more successful in the long run than their colleagues with less
learning resources.
We found initial corroboration for the influence of Educational and Learning Capital on
achievements in a study with students from China, Germany, and Turkey. Achievements and
the amount of Educational and Learning Capital were significantly correlated (Vladut, Liu,
Leana-Tscila, Vialle, & Ziegler, 2013). Further evidence was collected in case studies with
world class professional athletes such as a world champion or a season´s MVP (most valuable
player) of the National Basketball Association (NBA) in the US, undoubtedly the strongest
Basketball League in the world. These world stars possessed substantial amounts of Educational and Learning Capital (Trottler, 2013; Ziegler, Vladut, Leavitt, & Speckenheuer, 2012).
The Current Study
In the current study we were interested to see whether it was possible to explain differences
in the professional successes of musicians on the basis of the Nuremberg Music-Ecological
Approach. We hypothesized that a critical period that predetermines future successes of musicians is the time when they made their decisions to pursue a career as a professional musician. Among other things they decided in this phase how high they would aim when applying
for a permanent engagement, if a second job would be necessary to make a living, how much
time and effort they would be willing to spend on practicing, etc. According to Ziegler and
Baker (2013) the availability of exogenous (Educational Capital) and endogenous learning resources (Learning Capital) would be crucial for these decisions. Thus, our general hypothesis
was that more successful professional musicians had more learning resources at their disposal
than their less successful colleagues. In our research we applied the contrastive paradigm (Chi,
2011), i.e. we compared three levels of experts according to the reach of their success: local,
regional (Federal state), or international.
Method
Participants
A total of 80 professional musicians participated in the study of which 38 were female and 42
were male. The average age was M = 32.1 years (SD = 12.29). The musicians started to learn
their musical instrument by the age of M = 7.79 (SD = 2.60) and made their decisions to pursue
a career as professional musicians by the age of M = 15.78 (SD = 4.69). In retrospect they estimated that when making the decision the daily time spent for deliberate practice amounted to
M = 139.05 (SD = 73.15) minutes a day.
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
5
Ziegler ve diğerleri
Nürnberg Müzik Ekolojik Yaklaşımı
According to the level of success the sample was divided into three groups. Professional musicians with success on an international level (N = 7) had engagements in more than just a
Federal State and their audience was not limited to the Federal State in which they lived. The
N = 21 professional musicians with success on a regional level (all musicians lived either in
Bavaria with 12.56 million citizens and Baden-Württemberg with 10.6 million citizens) had
engagements in the Federal State where they lived, their music was regularly played on a Federal State-wide radio or TV programs and their audience was not limited to their local region
or city. Professional musicians with local successes (N = 52) had predominantly occupations
at municipal opera houses or municipal orchestras.
Measures
In addition to a short biographical questionnaire taken from Gruber and Ziegler (1996) the
Questionnaire of Educational and Learning Capital (QELC) from Vladut et al. (2013) was administered after adapting it to the field of music. In the QELC each of the five forms of either
Educational or Learning Capital is assessed by five items. However, all the questions referred
to the point in time when the participants made their decision to pursue a professional career
in music.
Participants were asked to express their degree of agreement on a 5-point Likert scale ranging
from 1 “I strongly disagree” to 5 “I strongly agree”. Reliabilities of all the scales were satisfactory with all α´s above .68.
Results
The mean values of the different kinds of Educational Capitals are depicted in Figure 1and are
shown according to professional success. With the exception of Economic Educational Capital,
the most successful musicians had the most learning resources at their disposal.
For statistical purposes we grouped the professional musicians with local or regional successes
together. In order to test for mean differences a series of Mann–Whitney U tests using onetailed testing at a .05 level were conducted. The professional musicians with success on an
international level had in retrospect more Cultural, Social, Infrastructural and Didactic Educational Capital at their disposal when making the decision to pursue a career as a musician
(all p´s < 0.10). Mean differences in Economic Educational Capital were only marginally significant (p < 0.10).
6
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
Ziegler and others
Nurnberg Music-Ecological Approach
Notes: EC = Educational Capital. Min = 1, Max = 5.
Figure 1: Mean values of Educational Capital of professional musicians of different success levels.
The Mann–Whitney U tests revealed two significant differences concerning the possession of
Learning Capital among the professional musicians of different levels of success (see Figure
2). Excellent musicians had on average more Telic and Attentional Learning Capital at their
disposal than the combined group of professional musicians (p´s < 0.05). The mean differences
in Organismic, Actional and Episodic Learning Capital didn´t reach the set 0.05 level.
Notes: LC = Learning Capital. Min = 1, Max = 5.
Figure 2. Mean values of Learning Capital of professional musicians of different success levels.
Summary
In this paper we introduced the Nuremberg Music-Ecological Approach in order to explain
differences in the professional success of musicians. In contrast to talent accounts (e.g. Gagné,
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
7
Ziegler ve diğerleri
Nürnberg Müzik Ekolojik Yaklaşımı
2004; Heller, 2004) it is assumed that success in music depends on the coalescence of endogenous and exogenous resources within a person´s actiotope (Ziegler, 2005). A categorization of
these resources was offered which were summarized under the labels Educational and Learning Capital.
This empirical study investigated whether successful musicians have more of these Capitals
at their disposal when they decided to pursue a professional career than their less successful
colleagues. With a sample of professional musicians who were successful either on a local,
regional and international level the assumption was confirmed. The most successful musicians
had, with the exception of Economic Educational Capital more of the Capitals than the other
groups of professional musicians. Tests for statistical significance revealed that in seven of the
ten Capitals these advantages were statistically significant: Cultural Educational Capital, Social Educational Capital, Infrastructural Educational Capital, Didactic Educational Capital,
Telic Learning Capital, and Attentional Learning Capital.
In light of the empirical findings it seems promising to use the Nuremberg Music-Ecological
Approach in further studies dedicated to investigating the development of musical expertise.
The two next steps should be that, firstly, the questionnaire data should be supplemented with
more qualitative studies such as the aforementioned case studies with successful people on a
world class level (Trottler, 2013; Ziegler et al., 2012). Secondly, longitudinal data are needed in
order to establish the causal link between the Capitals and the skill development of musicians.
Given these studies provide further evidence for the Nuremberg Music-Ecological Approach,
more fine-tuned studies would be appropriate to discover exactly how the Capitals influence
skill development and in what way they correlate.
References
Benzon, W. L. (2001). Beethoven’s anvil: Music in mind and culture. New York: Basic Books.
Bundesverband Musikindustrie: Deutscher Musikmarkt zum 1. Halbjahr 2013 leicht im Plus. 2013.
[German music market in the first half-year of 2013 lightly in the black] [online] URL:
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bei der Untersuchung des Expertiseerwerbs. In H. Gruber & A. Ziegler (Eds.), Expertiseforschung: Theoretische und methodische Grundlagen [Expertise research: Theoretical and
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Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1, 10-23
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
2014, Volume 4, Issue 1, 10-23
______________________________________________________
A Cross-National Comparison of
School Students’ Perceptions
Regarding High Performing Peers
Öğrencilerin Üst Düzey Performans
Sergileyen Akranlarına Yönelik
Algılarının Ülkeler Arası
Karşılaştırması
Hyerim Oh1, Margaret Sutherland2, Niamh Stack2, Maria del Mar Badia3, Sheyla
Blumen4, Anh-Thu Nguyen Quoc1, Catherine Wormald5, Julie Maakrun5, Barbara Baier1, Martha Schmidt1, & Albert Ziegler1
Abstract
Öz
This cross-national scenario based study examined fourth-grade students’ perceptions of
high-performing classmates in terms of their expected intellectual abilities, positive social qualities and popularity among their peers across
seven countries. The overall results show that
high academic achievements predominantly
lead to positive expectations within the peer
group. However, pronounced differences were
found between the countries. The results indicated that students from Spanish-speaking
countries viewed their potential high-performing peers most favorably, followed by students
from Australia, the United Kingdom and Germany. The least favorable expectations, but by
no means negative attitude, were exhibited by
students from the two East-Asian countries Korea and Vietnam. In contrast, the respondents’
gender and the gender of the hypothetical successful classmates had less influence on student
perceptions of high-performers. These findings
have implications for the educational provision
of high performing students in different crossnational contexts.
Keywords: High achieving students, peer perceptions and expectations, cross-national comparisons
Çok uluslu ve durum temelli bu çalışmada yedi
farklı ülkeden dördüncü sınıf öğrencilerinin üstün performans sergileyen akranlarının beklenen zihinsel yeteneklerine, olumlu sosyal özelliklerine ve popülaritelerine yönelik algıları
araştırılmıştır. Sonuçlar genel olarak yüksek
akademik başarının baskın bir şekilde akran
grubu çerisinde olumlu beklentilere yol açtığını
göstermektedir. Bununla birlikte ülkeler arasında belirgin farklılıklar da bulunmuştur. Sonuçlara göre yüksek performans potansiyeli
olan öğrencilere karşı en olumlu algıya İspanyolca konuşan ülkelerin öğrencilerinin sahip oldukları görülmüş, sıralamanın ise Avustralya,
İngiltere ve Almanya şeklinde devam ettiği bulunmuştur. Hiçbir şekilde olumsuz tutum olmamakla birlikte, en az olumlu tutumun doğu
Asya ülkeleri olan Kore ve Vietnam öğrencileri
tarafından sergilendiği görülmüştür. Buna karşılık, katılımcı öğrencinin cinsiyetinin ve hipotetik olarak oluşturulan başarılı sınıf arkadaşının cinsiyetinin, öğrencilerin üstün akademik
başarı gösteren öğrencilere yönelik algıları üzerinde çok az etkisi olmuştur. Bulguların, üstün
performans sergileyen öğrenciler için farklı ülkelerdeki eğitsel uygulamalara yönelik doğurguları bulunmaktadır.
Anahtar Sözcükler: Üstün başarılı öğrenciler,
arkadaş beklentileri, uluslararası karşılaştırma
University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany,
University of Glasgow, United Kingdom
3University Autonomous of Barcelona, Spain
4Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Peru
5University of Notre Dame, Australia
Correspondence email: albert.ziegler@fau.de
©Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi/Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education
ISSN 2146-3832, http://www.tuzed.org
1
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Students’ Perceptions: High Performing Peers
Introduction
A wealth of literature exists demonstrating the influence of both students’ own self-perceptions and peer perceptions on their academic achievement. This includes studies like Chevalier, Gibbons, Thorpe, Snell & Hoskins (2009), they found that high school pupils who held a
more positive view of their academic abilities were more likely to expect to continue to higher
education even after controlling for measures of ability and personal characteristics. So we
know that students’ self-perceptions regarding their academic ability can influence their educational choices. However we also know that the cross-cultural picture is more complex than
this. Shen & Tam (2008) in their cross national study examined the relationship between 8thgraders' mathematics and science achievement and their self-perceptions and found that when
the measures were aggregated at the country level, there was a negative relationship between
self-perceptions and achievement. They argued that one possible explanation for this pattern
might be that the findings reflect the high academic standards in high-performing countries
and the low academic standards in low-performing countries. So the importance of acknowledging contextual influences is evident. This may be true not only across countries but also
within the social contexts and relationships within classrooms. In their longitudinal study,
Hughes, Dyer, Luo, & Kwok et al. (2009) found that for children with relatively low literacy
skills, peer academic reputation made a unique contribution to a child’s risk for lower academic competence, less effortful engagement, and lower achievement, above the effects of both
peer liking and teacher perceptions of ability. It is therefore also clear from the educational
literature that students’ perceptions of their peers’ academic abilities may influence their interactions with classmates in ways that impact upon their achievement.
In contrast to the above findings relating to students with low literacy skills, the research
points to the potential positive effects of being a high-achiever. Some researchers have found
a significantly positive correlation between the scholastic performance of high-performing students and their social well-being (Cauce, 1987; Pyryt, & Mendaglio, 1994). Both, gifted and
high performing students, have been found to benefit from their academic success in relation
to positive self-perception, emotional competence and more positive peer relations compared
to their lower performing class mates (Bain & Bell, 2004; Nail & Evans, 1997; Lee, OlszewskiKubilius, & Thomson, 2012; Berlin, 2009; Kerr, Colangelo, & Gaeth, 1988). In some specific
school subjects like languages high performers enjoyed a reputation of having positive characters with high intellectuality and a sociable and good personality (Händel et al, 2013; Hannover & Kessels, 2002). In some countries high achievements appear to be especially valued,
in particular in East Asian countries (cf. Phillipson, Stoeger, & Ziegler, 2013). Korean and Vietnamese school children in America, for example, always score high in academic rankings.
Both cultures share a common cultural denominator: successful academic education is considered a necessity for one’s career and social status in the society
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However the picture for high achieving students is complex and contradictory. In fact, a large
body of empirical research suggests that students may have a negative image of high-performers. Students with high achievements in North America, as well as in Western Europe, are in
danger of being subject to perceived negative social labels such as “nerd” (Händel, Duan, Sutherland, & Ziegler, 2013; Landsheer, Maassen, Bisschop, & Adema, 1998; O’Connor, 2012; Pelkner & Boehnke, 2003). This negative labeling can lead to unpopularity and cause high performing students to suffer social isolation and hold low self-perceptions. Research has shown that
the fear alone of being labeled a ‘nerd’ can have a detrimental influence on school achievement
(Pelkner, & Boehnke, 2003). However, the negative image of high-performers seems to be restricted to the core academic subjects at school. For example, high-performers in sports are
much more popular among peers than high-performers in math, sciences, and foreign languages (Händel, Vialle, & Ziegler, 2013; Ziegler, Fidelman, Reutlinger, Neubauer, &
Heilemann, 2011).
The importance of context and cultural differences also emerges in the gifted literature and
indicates that in some settings high achievements can act as a risk factor. For example, some
minority ethnic groups in the U.S. like African American and Puerto Rican students actively
disparage academic achievement because they view high academic achievement as a commodity of the upper class that only benefits White Americans (Fordham, & Ogbu, 1986; FloresGonzalez, 1999). This belief may be one of the reasons why some immigrant groups in the U.S.
are constantly behind every other cultural subgroup when it comes to graduation (Fordham
& Ogbu, 1986; Sankofa, Hurey, & Allen, 2005). The few students from minority ethnic groups
who did perform well, on the other hand, experienced identity problems in trying to resolve
their academic identity with their cultural identity (Cauce, 1987; Fordham & Ogbu, 1986;
Sankofa, Hurey, & Allen, 2005; Steel & Aronson, 1995).
Aim of the Study
The above review of the literature demonstrates that the evidence regarding students’ perceptions of high-performing students and the potential influence of these perceptions is ambiguous. In order to disentangle the evidence a promising first step seems to be to study the stereotype of high-performing students among their peers. To isolate the examination of this stereotype from the interference of other potential confounding variables (such as physical appearance and socio-economic status) this study employed a scenario-based design focusing on the
attributes of a fictitious high-performing student rather than a real high-performing student.
This study compared the expectations of fourth-grade students. This focus was chosen because
this is an age period in which children develop an elaborated concept of their own, as well as
their classmates’, abilities (Stipek, 1981; Stipek & Daniels, 1988). Thus, this is just the age at
which to expect the possible formation of any potential stereotypes.
Having clearly established within the literature review the potentially significant influence of
culture (e.g., Händel et al., 2013), this study also incorporates a cross-national design. The
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Students’ Perceptions: High Performing Peers
study includes student cohorts from seven different countries: two East-Asian countries with
a collectivistic cultural background (Vietnam, Korea), three Western countries with an individualistic cultural background (Australia, Germany, United Kingdom), two Spanish-speaking countries one with a collectivistic cultural background (Peru) and one with a mixed individualistic-collectivistic cultural background (Spain).
Method
Participants
School students across nine countries are participating in an ongoing international study on
this topic. The interim results reported here are a random sample from seven of the nine participating countries which have been balanced for gender within each country cohort Vietnam
(N = 100), Korea (N = 106), Peru (N = 100), Spain (N = 100), Australia (N = 100), United Kingdom
(N = 100), and Germany (N = 100), respectively.
All students who participated in the study are in grade 4 in elementary school with the exception of the UK sample where the equivalent school stage is Primary 6 but all students are
within a comparable age range. The mean age of all the students included in this sample was
M = 10.94 (SD = .42) and ranged across the countries sampled from M = 10.81 years in Australia
to M = 11.13 years in Germany.
Materials
All participants received an identical questionnaire. The cross-national design of the research
means that participants had multiple different first languages consequently all instruments
were translated into the first language of each country cohort and re-translated to ensure accuracy in translation.
In the questionnaire students were asked to imagine two fictitious new classmates were joining their class. The order of the questionnaire was gender balanced so that half of the students
started with a fictitious male classmate, the other half with a fictitious female classmate. The
following instructions were provided to participants:
For the following statements, we want to know what expectations you have, when a new girl
(boy) comes into your class. The only thing you know about her (him) is that she (he) was the
best student in her (his) previous school. Read each statement and colour the circle that best
describes your feelings about the statement.
This design was employed as similar formats have been widely used in studies of impression
formation (Heise, 2010; Rossi & Nock, 1982). Previous research has demonstrated that this format successfully enables controlled studies of judgments that would be difficult to study
through observation.
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Students were asked to indicate their expectations of the new classmate in relation to a list of
fourteen pre-defined characteristics. The items were to be answered on a 6-point Likert scale
(from 1 – “totally disagree” to 6 – “totally agree”) for each hypothetical new female and male
student. Similarly to Händel et al. (2012, 2013) the items were categorized into three areas:
intellectual abilities (e.g. “…is very intelligent”, “… has many good ideas”), positive social
qualities (e.g. “… has a sense of humor”, “…communicates well”) and popularity (e.g. “…will
be popular in the class”, “… is carefree and cool”). Cronbach’s α show satisfactory values (>.68)
for all scales across the gender of the high-achieving person.
Results
Three Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) were conducted with country and sex of
the participants as independent variables. In the first MANOVA the expected intellectual abilities of a new high-performing girl in class and a new high-performing boy in class were the
dependent variables. Significant country differences were detected Wilks  = .741, multivariate F(12,1370) = 18.5, p < 0.001, partial η² = .14. In accordance with Cohen (1988) this can be
interpreted as a large effect. Two univariate Analyses of Variance (ANOVA) show that the
effect holds for both sexes of new students female new student: F(6,686) = 27.83, p < 0.001,
partial η² = .20, male new student: F(6,686) = 30.68, p < 0.001, partial η² = .21. Neither the sex
differences Wilks  = 1.00, multivariate F(2,685) = 0.17, p < 1.0, partial η² = .00 nor the country
X sex interaction Wilks  = .977, multivariate F(12,1368) = 1.31, p < 1.0, partial η² = .11 reached
statistical significance levels.
All country means were in the upper half of the scale indicating that high intellectual abilities
are considered an attribute of a high-performing student (see Figures 1a and 1b).
Figure 1a: Expected intellectual abilities of a high-performing new female student
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Figure 1b: Expected intellectual abilities of a high-performing new male student
However, post-hoc conducted namely Fisher's Least Significant Difference Tests (LSD) reveal
a number of significant country differences. Interestingly, three clusters of nations seem to
emerge. Students from the two East-Asian countries, Vietnam and South Korea, have the lowest expectations concerning intellectual abilities of new high-performing classmates. All differences between these two countries and other participating countries were significant (p <
0.05). This finding is in line with previous research indicating that students from East-Asian
countries attribute achievements less to gifts and talents, but rather to diligence and learning
(Cheng, & Si. Phillipson, 2013). The highest expectations concerning intellectual abilities of
new high-performing classmates were reported by students from the two Spanish speaking
countries Peru and Spain. The post-hoc test between these two countries was not statistically
significant. However all the other comparisons between the two Spanish speaking countries
and the other countries are statistically significant with the exception of the comparison with
the United Kingdom students´ concerning expectations towards a new high-performing girl.
In contrast, no post-hoc comparisons between Australia, United Kingdom and Germany
reached statistical significance.
With the exception of the Korean students’ expectations towards a new female high-performing student the expectations concerning positive social qualities of a new high-performing
classmate were also in the upper half of the scale. A second MANOVA was conducted this
time with the expected positive social qualities of a new high-performing girl in class and a
new high-performing boy in class as dependent variables (See Figures 2a and 2b). This analysis identified significant country differences Wilks  = .614; multivariate F(12,1370) = 31.51,
p < 0.001, partial η² = .22. Again according to Cohen (1988) this can be considered a large effect.
Two univariate Analyses of Variance (ANOVA) show that the effect holds for both sexes of
new students female new student: F(6,686) = 16.50, p < 0.001, partial η² = .13; male new student: F(6,686) = 61,80, p < 0.001, partial η² = .35. This main effect was qualified by a significant
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interaction of country and sex of a small effect size Wilks  = .967; multivariate F(12,1370) =
1.95, p < 0.05, partial η²=.02. Two ANOVAs show that the effect only holds when the sex of
the new fictitious classmate is male female new student: F(6,686) = .65, p < 1.0, partial η² = .01;
male new student: F(6,686) = 2.52, p < 0.05, partial η² = .02. The main effect for sex did not
reach statistical significance levels Wilks  = 1.0, multivariate F(2,685) =.17, p < 1.0, partial η²
= .00.
Figure 2a: Expected positive social qualities of a high-performing new female student
Figure 2b: Expected positive social qualities of a high-performing new male student
Post-hoc tests of mean differences among the students from the seven countries revealed a
similar pattern of results as in the previous analysis on participants’ expectations of intellectual
abilities. Students from the two Spanish Speaking countries, Spain and Peru, have the highest
expectations of positive social qualities in relation to the high achieving student and students
from the two East-Asian countries, Vietnam and Korea, have the lowest expectations of new
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high achieving classmate having positive social qualities. However, although the country differences between the two East-Asian countries and the other participating countries were significant, not all of the country differences between the two Spanish speaking countries and the
remaining three countries reached statistical significance. No discernible pattern emerges in
the analysis of the 2-way-interaction of country and sex regarding expectations of the new
male high-performing classmate. Within the three clusters of countries all kind of possibilities
could be observed: Lower expectations of girls in Vietnam were reported, but higher expectations of girls in Korea. Similarly, there were lower reported expectations of girls in Peru, but
higher expectations of girls in Spain. Within the remaining three countries, there were lower
expectations of girls than boys in Australia, and higher expectations of girls in the United
Kingdom, but identical expectations of both male and female high achieving students in Germany.
The third MANOVA which examined the expected popularity of a new female and a new male
high-performing classmate revealed a medium significant main effect for country Wilks  =
.79, multivariate F(12,1370) = 14.68, p < 0.001, partial η² = .11, but an insignificant main effect
for sex Wilks  = .996, multivariate F(2,685) = 1.25, p < 1.0, partial η² = .00 and an insignificant
interaction of country and sex Wilks  = .997 multivariate F(12,1370) = .72, p < 1.0, partial η² =
.01. The main effect for country holds irrespective of the hypothesized sex of a new student
female new student: F(6,686) = 12.31, p < 0.001, partial η² = .13, male new student: F(6,686) =
7.50, p < 0.001, partial η² = .10.
Figure 3a: Expected popularity of a high-performing new female student
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Figure 3b: Expected popularity of a high-performing new male student
Post-hoc analyses of the mean differences of the expectations concerning the popularity of a
new high-performing girl demonstrated similar patterns as were found in the previous country comparisons. The two East Asian countries hold the least positive expectations, whereas
the two Spanish-speaking countries hold the highest expectations. The findings from Australia, the United Kingdom and Germany fall in between. However, the situation was very
different for the expected popularity of a high-performing new male classmate. This time, students in Germany have the lowest expectations with all other country comparisons with Germany being statistically significant. Next follow the two East-Asian countries. Their means
differ significantly from the means of Spain, Australia and the United Kingdom.
Discussion
As discussed within the introduction there is a concern in the research literature that high
academic achievement may lead to peer rejection and social isolation (Feldhusen, & Dai, 1997;
Moulton, Moulton, Housewright, & Bailey, 1998). This fear may lead to gifted pupils purposively underachieving or parental concerns about identifying their children’s abilities for fear
of the negative social and emotional implications. This fear is substantiated to a degree by the
literature evidencing that not all gifted students grow up to be high achieving adults (e.g.
Freeman, 2006a, 2006b, 2010). However, the research findings are inconsistent and there is also
substantial body of research that argues the opposite position: High-performing students may
be especially respected by their peers (e.g., Bain & Bell, 2004; Berlin, 2009; Lee, OlszewskiKubilius, & Thomson, 2012; Pyryt & Mendaglio, 1994). Research has demonstrated that in
some specific academic subjects, like languages, high performers enjoyed a reputation of having a positive character with high intellectuality and a sociable and good personality (Händel
et al. 2013).
Faced with these contradictory findings this study aimed to add to the research literature in
three respects. Firstly, by focusing on pure stereotypes through the use of the fictitious new
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classmate and hopefully isolating this from other potentially confounding variables evident in
previous literature. Secondly, by assessing the use of stereotypes by elementary school children in a developmental phase when these stereotypes might just arise. Thirdly, in light of
previously reported cross-cultural differences in the existing literature, the cross-national design of the current study allowed comparisons between several countries with diverse cultural
backgrounds.
A key positive outcome of the current research was the absence of any evidence of a negative
stereotype towards high-performing classmates among fourth-graders in any of the countries.
Quite the contrary, high-performing students in all countries were predominantly positively
perceived with the results scoring in the upper halves of the three scales measuring expected
intellectual abilities, social qualities and popularity. Thus, in elementary school at least expectations turned out to be very positive. However, some country and some gender influences
were found and merit discussion and further consideration.
Students from Vietnam and South Korea reported the lowest expectations concerning the intellectual abilities of a new high-performing classmate. This finding is consistent with the fact
that in East-Asian cultures achievements are predominantly attributed to diligence and learning (Phillipson et al., 2013). The expectations of students in Australia, the United Kingdom and
Germany sit in the middle of the range of expectations and the highest expectations regarding
intellectual abilities of a new high-performing classmate were reported by the students from
the two Spanish speaking countries Peru and Spain. This pattern of results reflects nicely the
differential degree of importance for the development of extraordinary achievements attributed to gifts in these countries (Blumen, 2013; Kaufman & Sternberg, 2007).
The expectations reported regarding high achieving students’ positive social qualities followed a similar pattern. Students from the two East-Asian countries Vietnam and Korea had
the lowest expectation and the two Spanish speaking countries Spain and Peru had the highest
expectations towards positive social qualities of a new high achieving classmate. The three
other countries fell between. However, it is noteworthy that students from Korea held slightly
lower expectations towards a new female high-performing student concerning her positive
social qualities, but not significantly below the scale mean.
An interesting pattern of results was found for the expectations concerning the high achieving
students’ popularity. Expectations towards a new high-performing girl follow the typical pattern of the previous country comparisons, i.e. the two East Asian countries hold the least positive expectations, whereas the two Spanish speaking countries hold the highest expectations.
Australia, United Kingdom and Germany fall in between. However, an unexpected pattern
emerges with respect to the expected popularity of a high-performing new male classmate.
Surprisingly students in Germany hold the lowest expectations and then the two East-Asian
countries follow this with expectations slightly above the scale mean. The highest expectations
were found among the students from the Spanish-speaking countries who usually hold the
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
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Öğrenci Algıları: Yüksek Performanslı Akranlar
highest positive expectations. Unfortunately, it seems impossible to discern these findings on
the basis of the available literature (e.g., Chandler, 2013; VanTassel-Baska, 2013; Phillipson, &
McCann, 2007; Ziegler, Stoeger, Harder, & Balestrini, 2013).
In conclusion, the most important finding from this research is the students’ favorable expectations regarding the intellectual abilities, positive social qualities and popularity of high-performing classmates across the seven participating countries. It is encouraging that students
from these countries do not appear to have negative associations with high achievement. By
implication this may mean that they would not fear demonstrating their own abilities. Overall,
the students in the Spanish-speaking countries held the most desirable expectations for highperforming classmates, followed by the students from Australia, the United Kingdom and
Germany. The least positive expectations were exhibited by the students of the East-Asian
countries these scores were predominantly located slightly above the scale means. However,
it is difficult to decide if this really indicates a relative indifference towards high-performing
students. An alternative explanation might be that these results might simply indicate that the
students had not yet developed a full concept of ability (see Stipek, 1981; Phillipson, 2013). In
order to decide this issue further research that covers a wider age range is needed.
Limitations of the Study
As with all research, the current research has a number of limitations. Firstly, the use of a
fictitious scenario to investigate the expectations of students towards high-performing students while a strength, in that the student characteristics are not confounded with other variables and this therefore allowed for an error-free investigation of expectations towards highperforming peers, it is also a limitation. Reality is more complex and different variables may
work in interaction to influence peer academic reputations e.g. a student’s physical appearance
may mediate peer’s perceptions of their ability (Ziegler et al., 2011). Also because of the scenario based design we cannot see how students’ perceptions turn into actions. We are unable
to determine from our data if the expectations students hold about their peers actually influences either their own behaviour or the behaviour of their high-performing peers. A second
limitation is that we did not compare interpersonal and intrapersonal expectations with actual
achievement data (Beghetto & Baxter, 2012). That is, we do not investigate how high or lowperforming students describe themselves in contrast to a high-performing student. This is
important as a student’s own abilities may influence their perceptions and expectations of high
achieving peers. Finally, the results of our study do not allow for causal interpretations. As the
results are based on scale means of expectations towards high-performing peers assessed via
a questionnaire, further qualitative research is needed to investigate their meaning. Such research could also provide further enlightenment on the reasons for the pattern of results found
in the current study and help explain what caused the gender by country interactions.
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1, 24-36
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
2014, Volume 4, Issue 1, 24-36
______________________________________________________
Chances and Limitations of
Implementing Measures of
Differentiation for Gifted Children
in Primary Schools: The Teachers’
Part
İlkokuldaki Üstün Zekalı
Öğrencilere Yönelik Program
Farklılaştırma Uygulamalarındaki
Şanslar ve Sınırlılıklar: Öğretmen
Kısmı
Martina Endepohls-Ulpe¹ & Natascha Thömmes²
Abstract
Öz
The presented study analyzes German primary
school teachers’ attitudes towards several
measures of internal differentiation with respect to the anticipated benefit for gifted pupils
and the anticipated work load for teachers. Besides, correlations of these attitudes with teachers’ statements on the frequency of adopting the
measures in their own classes were inspected.
One-hundred thirty-seven teachers and teacher
students were interviewed with a questionnaire
on the assessed consequences and the frequency of the usage of several methods of differentiation. Data analysis was done by analyses of variance and calculation of Pearson correlation coefficients. Results show that teachers,
as well as teacher students, mostly assessed the
listed measures of internal differentiation to be
appropriate for the promotion of gifted pupils,
but for teachers there were significant negative
correlations between assessed work load and
frequency of usage in their own classes.
Keywords: measures of internal differentiation,
gifted children, primary school teachers
Bu araştırmada Almanya’daki ilkokul öğretmenlerinin üstün zekalı öğrencilere yönelik çeşitli program farklılaştırma uygulamalarının
beklenen faydaları ve öğretmenler üzerinde yaratabileceği hakkındaki tutumları incelenmiştir. Bununla birlikte, öğretmenlerin tutumları
ve belirtilen durumları kendi sınıflarında uyarlama frekansları arasındaki korelasyon da araştırılmıştır. Araştırma 137 öğretmen ve öğretmen adayı ile yürütülmüştür. Katılımcılara çeşitli farklılaştırma stratejilerini ne sıklıkta kullandıklarını ve iş yüklerini sorgulayan bir ölçek
uygulanmıştır. Verilerin istatistiksel analizinde
varyans analizi ve Person korelasyon katsayıları hesaplanmıştır. Sonuçlar göre; hem öğretmenler hem de öğretmen adayları farklılaştırma stratejilerinin üstün zekalı öğrencilerin
eğitimini desteklemek için uygun olduklarını
bildirmişler, öğretmenlerin iş yükleri ile stratejileri sınıflarında kullanma frekansları arasında
ise negatif korelasyon bulunmuştur.
Anahtar Sözcükler: program farklılaştırmaları,
ilkokul, üstün zekâlılar, ilkokul öğretmenleri
Introduction
As a consequence of the insight that the principle that “individually differentiated talent prerequisites and learning needs demand differentiated scholastic curricula and instructional
strategies” (Heller, 2005, p.193) is not limited to the instruction of children with special needs
caused by learning difficulties or cognitive deficits, a lot of programs, curricula and materials
have also been developed to meet the needs of extraordinarily bright and talented children
Corresponding author, PhD., Institute of Psychology, University of Koblenz-Landau, Koblenz, Germany;
endepohl@uni-koblenz.de
2University of Koblenz-Landau, Koblenz, Germany; natasha.thoemmes@web.de
©Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi/Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education
ISSN 2146-3832, http://www.tuzed.org
1
Endepohls-Ulpe & Thömmes
Measures of Differentiation
during the last decades. Nevertheless, we are still far away from a definite agreement about
how special educational strategies and curriculum contents for these children should look like.
One of the controversial issues in gifted research and education policy is the question whether
or not gifted children should be educated in homogenous or heterogeneous groups. Measures
of homogenous grouping or external differentiation are very popular, such as e.g. special
schools for gifted children, after school clubs, study groups or pull-out programs, where bright
and high achieving students can work on problems or materials at their own pace at least for
a limited time of the day or week.
Measures of External Differentiation
Advocates of grouping argue that increasing homogeneity and the resulting narrow range of
variation of cognitive level and academic achievement in a class will produce benefits for
learning that are not possible with less homogeneity e.g. an accelerated pace of instruction,
avoiding frustrating passages of boredom for gifted children, optimizing methods of instruction to the needs of highly able students, more time for individualized promotion of interests,
assignment of teachers specifically trained for this certain group of students, etc. From the
teachers’ perspective grouping seems to be a relief from organizational overload (Vock,
Preckel & Holling, 2007).
Actually, teachers seem to prefer teaching homogeneous groups to teaching heterogeneous
classes and there is indeed empirical evidence that ability grouping has benefits for gifted
and/or high achieving students. There are studies demonstrating that students in special classes profit in their intellectual development and perform better than gifted students in regular
classes (for an overview see Vock et. al, 2007, pp. 44-50). But grouping does not have a positive
effect on achievement in general. In their meta-analysis of studies on the effects of different
grouping settings, Kulik and Kulik (1992) found out that homogenous grouping does not seem
to increase achievement in middle- and low-ability groups. There is a small positive effect in
high-ability groups. Crucial conditions for distinct positive effects appear to be that the curriculum is adapted to the learning level of the group, e.g. by compacting, acceleration, and enrichment, and methods of instruction are also tailored to the target group. With respect to
academic self-concept, grouping even seems to have detrimental effects for gifted students
(e.g. Rindermann & Heller, 2005), though a fact that has to be put into perspective, since the
academic self-concept of gifted students in homogenous learning groups is still better than
that of average students (e.g. Rost & Hanses, 1994).
Arguments against homogeneous grouping often refer to the disadvantages for middle- or
low-ability groups e.g. missing learning models or discrimination of children with low SES
and/or migratory background in the educational system, or promoting elitist attitudes in the
group of gifted children. A second class of arguments is disadvantages for teachers like decreasing motivation to teach in “rest-classes” of low achieving students or work overload
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Program Farklılaştırma
caused by the necessity of providing differentiated and challenging learning materials (see
Vock et al., 2007).
A fact, which makes thinking about methods of instruction to promote gifted children in heterogeneous classrooms indispensable, is that special measures for gifted students are not always available due to financial and organizational limitations. Thus, for numerous gifted children there simply is no access to a special measure. And finally, gifted children are a very
heterogeneous group with respect to both their cognitive and non-cognitive personality profiles (Solzbacher, 2006). Even in a special program children’s profiles of strengths and weaknesses may be very distinct. Hence, it seems naïve to assume that teaching them in homogeneous groups will relieve teachers from the task of differentiation of materials and instructional methods.
Measures of Internal Differentiation and Individualized Instruction
In contrast to the popularity of special programs for gifted children amongst politicians and
teachers mentioned above, several authors cast doubt on the assumption that there is a special
gifted-child-pedagogy (Kaplan, 2003; Ladenthin, 2006). Tomlinson (1996) as well as Coleman
and Cross (2005) postulate essential commonalities between good instruction in general and
instruction for highly-able learners (for an overview see Endepohls-Ulpe, 2009).
Indeed, teaching students in heterogeneous classes combined with methods of internal differentiation or individualized instruction seems to have positive effects on the learning outcomes
of all ability groups (Vock et. al, 2007). But crucial condition for positive effects for this integrating within class approach definitely is that “… curricular and instructional provisions for
the gifted must be carefully maintained lest they disintegrate into a non-program format”
(Delcourt, Loyd, Cornell & Goldberg, 1994, p. xviii, cf. Olszewski-Kubilius, 2003).
According to Coleman & Cross (2005) differentiation in classroom, which takes the needs of
gifted children into account, means accepting and dealing with a wide range of ability, advanced knowledge in areas, a rapid learning rate and intense involvement in some topics.
Curriculum compacting is also essential to give space for enrichment activities. Heller & Hany
(1996) name individualized level of difficulty of assignments, self-regulated learning, enquirybased learning, and resource rooms as essential aspects of a gifted friendly classroom. Montgomery (1994, p. 320) postulates three principles: 1. “The setting of different tasks at different
levels of difficulty suitable for different levels of achievement.” 2) “The setting of common
tasks that can be responded to in a positive way by all pupils/students.” 3) “The setting of
common tasks to which all pupils/students can contribute their own knowledge and understanding on collaborative activities and so structure their experiences and progress from surface to deep learning and thus be enabled to achieve more advanced learning outcomes.” Hertzog (1998) suggests open-ended activities as such an instrument of providing students with
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Measures of Differentiation
tasks they can respond to on their personal level of knowledge and skills. She offers an expanded definition of open-ended activities as activities that “provide learners with choices in
the content, process, or product domain”.
German authors like Bönsch (2004), Reketat (2001), Schulte zu Berge (2005), and Paradies &
Linser (2009), who deal with internal differentiation, frequently do so in the tradition of approaches from progressive education, which have a long history in Germany and have already
reflected on the needs also of gifted children nearly 80 years ago. Internal differentiation in
this tradition can happen by variation of learning pace (Busse, 2007), aspiration level (Schulte
zu Berge, 2005), social form and method (Bönsch, 2004). Furthermore, provision of varying
approaches to subjects (visual, auditory, action-oriented, abstract or conceptional) and methods like sharing circle, tutoring systems/cooperation, working with individual weekly schedules, free activity, project work, and enquiry based learning or open learning (self-determined,
independent and interest guided) are adopted (for an overview see Schulte zu Berge, 2005).
Issue and Conception of the Study
In Germany, like in other countries with tracking systems in secondary school, primary school
is usually the last stage of schooling where children of all levels of abilities are instructed in
one classroom. Especially for younger children special measures for the gifted are rare, existing measures like pull-out programs have limited capacity and measures with a non-public
provider are often simply too expensive for parents with limited financial resources. Thus,
when aiming to meet the needs of all children, the implementation of measures of internal
differentiation seems to be essential. However, with respect to differentiation and individual
furtherance, in spite of the already illustrated tradition of progressive pedagogy, German primary school teachers mostly seem to focus on children with learning deficits. Possible reasons
may be the above mentioned fear of work overload or simply lack of knowledge about what
can be done for gifted children in a heterogeneous classroom.
Theories from the field of social psychology like e.g. Ajzen and Fishbein’s (1980) theory of
reasoned action, postulate that the intention to perform a certain behavior, which is correlated
with performing the behavior, is amongst others determined by the anticipation of possible
outcomes of performing the behavior and by the knowledge of normative expectations in the
social environment. Accordingly, the presented study analyzes primary school teachers’ and
teacher students’ attitudes against several measures of differentiation with respect to the following questions:
1. How suitable do teachers assess these measures for gifted education?
2. Which amount of effort and time do teachers assess for adopting measures of internal
differentiation in their classes?
3. How frequently do teachers adopt these measures in their classes?
4. Is there a correlation for certain measures between assessed eligibility, assessed effort,
and frequency of adoption?
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Program Farklılaştırma
5. Are there differences between the attitudes of teachers and students with and without
information on the topic of giftedness?
Method
Measuring Instrument and Participants
A sample of teachers and teacher students were interviewed with a questionnaire comprising
amongst others three parts with questions (4-Step-Likert items) on the following aspects: 1.
assessed eligibility, 2. assessed expenditure of work and time, and – only for teachers – 3. frequency of the usage of several methods of differentiation in their classes. The questionnaire
also contained several questions concerning personal data and in addition to that a question
on teachers’ sources of information with respect to gifted education.
Item examples:
1. How suitable do you assess the following measure for the promotion of gifted children?
Internal differentiation by variation of aspiration level:
(1) not suitable (2) less suitable (3) suitable (4) very suitable
2. How do you assess your personal effort of work and time to implement the following methods of
promotion of gifted children in your classes?
Open learning:
(1) low (2) still manageable (3) hardly manageable (4) too high
3. How often do you use the following measures in your classes especially for gifted children?
Individual work schedule for every pupil:
(1) never (2) sometimes (3) often (4) very often
134 questionnaires were distributed at 14 primary schools and 99 questionnaires were distributed in several advanced courses for teacher students at the University of Koblenz. The return
rate for teachers was 48% (N = 60) and 78% for students (N = 77), which can be accepted as
sufficient.
Data Analysis
In order to analyze the differences in the attitudes of the subgroups, 2 (teacher vs. student) x 2
(information vs. no information on giftedness) analyses of variance were conducted with item
values on assessed consequences (eligibility for gifted education, work load) as dependent
variables. For the subgroup of teachers Pearson correlation coefficients were calculated for
each measure between the degree of assessed work load, the degree of assessed eligibility and
the frequency of usage of methods of internal differentiation in their own classes.
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Results
Sample
The final sample consisted of 137 subjects, N=52 teachers, N=77 teacher students, N=4 teachers
on probation and N=4 supply teachers. As the subsamples of teachers on probation and supply
teachers were very small, they were not incorporated as subgroups in the ANOVAS.
The mean age of the teachers was 41 years and the mean age of the students was 23 years. 91%
of the subjects were female, which is consistent with the gender ratio in the total population of
primary school teachers in Germany (Statistisches Bundesamt, 2010, p. 134).
79 subjects declared that they had been informed on the subject of giftedness and on gifted
education (23 students and 56 teachers). Sources of information for teachers were continuing
education for teachers (N=17), teacher training courses (N=20), and various other sources
(N=45), like literature, media, etc. Sources of information for students were mainly university
courses on the topic of giftedness.
Assessed Eligibility of Methods of Differentiation
Means of the assessed eligibility of methods of differentiation reveal that teachers, as well as
students, estimate most of the listed methods as “suitable” to “very suitable” for the promotion
of gifted children (table 1). Differentiation with respect to aspiration level was rated most suitable, followed by enquiry based learning, weekly schedules with additional tasks and individual weekly schedules, open learning, differentiation with respect to approaches to subjects,
project work, free activity and resource rooms. Only internal differentiation with respect to
handling time for tasks, amount of learning matters and the sharing circle were estimated between “less suitable” and “suitable”.
Interestingly, from the listed methods of external differentiation only study groups for gifted
students and pull-out programs were rated between “suitable” to “very suitable”. Special parents’ evenings and measures of acceleration – early school enrolment, grade skipping and
grade telescoping, were estimated less favorably, between “less suitable” and “suitable”.
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
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Endepohls-Ulpe ve Thömmes
Program Farklılaştırma
Table 1. Assessed Eligibility of Methods of Differentiation
N
M¹
SD
…handling time of tasks
....amount of learning matters
…aspiration level
…approaches to subjects
Open learning
133
133
136
132
131
2.62
2.85
3.77
3.36
3.50
.765
.821
.455
.657
.625
Weekly schedule with enrichment offers / special tasks
136
133
134
136
132
135
119
127
130
3.56
3.56
3.15
3.30
3.61
3.08
2.10
3.09
3.54
.568
.678
.710
.648
.519
.820
.694
.591
.573
117
119
2.85
3.33
.847
.702
118
3.16
.613
126
121
128
2.55
2.64
2.88
.733
.644
.742
Internal differentiation with respect to
Individual weekly schedules
Free activity
Project work
Enquiry based learning
Tutoring system / cooperation
Sharing circle
Resource rooms
Study groups for gifted pupils (e.g. chess, creative writing, astronomy)
Special parents‘ evenings (for parents of gifted children)
“Discovery Day” (high achieving students gather and work together on one the day of the week)
Pull-out-Programs (high achieving students gather and work
together for a couple of hours)
Early school enrolment
Grade skipping
Grade telescoping
No differences between the subgroups of teachers and students or subjects with and without
information on the topic of giftedness could be shown in the analyses of variance.
Assessed Effort of Work and Time for Measures of Internal Differentiation
There was not a single measure of differentiation where the necessary personal average effort
of work and time to implement them in classes was assessed to be “hardly manageable” or
“too high” (see table 2). Measures that were rated the most extensive, between “still manageable” and “hardly manageable”, were individual weekly schedules, internal differentiation
with respect to approaches to subjects, enquiry based learning and project work. Apparently,
individual weekly schedules were the measure, which was estimated to be the most laborious.
Internal differentiation with respect to handling time, tutoring system and sharing circle were
rated to require rather low effort.
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Endepohls-Ulpe & Thömmes
Measures of Differentiation
Table 2. Assessed Effort of Work and Time, ANOVA Results for Subgroups Teachers and Students,
Subjects with and Without Information on Giftedness
Internal differentiation with
respect to
…handling time of tasks
... amount of learning matters
…aspiration level
…approaches to subjects
Open learning
Weekly schedule with enrichment offers / special tasks
Individual weekly schedules
Free activity
Project work
Enquiry based learning
Tutoring system / cooperation
Sharing circle
Resource rooms
F occupational
category
F status of information
N
M¹
SD
133
1.48
.572
.051
.659
130
133
131
1.85
1.98
2.23
.544
.522
.615
2.034
.012
.987
.525
.010
.262
127
1.97
.603
.457
.049
135
136
134
131
130
135
124
127
1.93
2.85
1.84
2.14
2.15
1.42
1.30
2.04
.521
.739
.560
.565
.586
.553
.598
.635
2.749
3.582*
.306
4.743**
1.708
.564
.467
.412
2.258
2.551
.263
2.264
2.080
.092
.012
.010
Notes. ¹(1) low (2) still manageable (3) hardly manageable (4) too high
*p<.10; **p<.05
With respect to individual weekly schedules there was a tendency (p=.06) for a significant difference between the ratings of students and teachers. Teachers estimated the effort for creating
individual weekly schedules slightly higher (M=2.88; SD=.784) than students did (M=2.84;
SD=.694). Furthermore, there was a significant interaction effect between occupational group
and status of information on giftedness for this item (F (1,124)=6.989; p<.01). Teachers (M=2.84,
SD=.766) and students with information (M=3.05; SD=.575) assessed the effort for this measure
as hardly manageable, students without information between still manageable and hardly
manageable (M=2.76; SD=.725), whilst teachers without information rated the effort for individual weekly schedules as too high (M=4, SD=0). As the group of teachers without information on giftedness consisted of only two subjects these results have to be interpreted with
great caution.
For project work as a measure of furtherance there was a significant difference between the
ratings of teachers and students. Teachers (M=2.04, SD=.577) rated the required effort lower
than students (M=2.21, SD=.552; F (1,119) = 4.743) did. Again there was a significant interaction
effect occupational group x status of information (F (1,119) = 4.371; p<.05). Students (M=2.09,
SD=.515) and teachers (M=2.06; SD=.592) with information on giftedness assessed the required
effort as still manageable, students without information (M=2.26, SD=.552) a little higher,
whilst the two teachers without information rated time and effort for project work to be low
(M=1, SD=0).
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
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Endepohls-Ulpe ve Thömmes
Program Farklılaştırma
Frequency of Adoption of Measures for Promoting Gifted Students
At first, it has to be stated that only one of the measures was used “often” with respect to the
frequency teachers adopted the listed measures in their classes. This was the use of tutoring
systems or cooperation. Measures of internal differentiation with respect to handling time of
tasks, amount of learning matters, aspiration level and free activity were used between “sometimes” and “often” with ratings nearer to the “often” tail, followed by open learning, sharing
circle, weekly schedule with additional materials, enquiry based learning, project work, resource rooms and varying approaches to subjects with means above 2.0. Individual weekly
schedules were the less frequently used method (“never” to “sometimes”) (see table 3).
Table 3. Frequency of Adoption of Measures (Only for Teachers) and Pearson’s Product Moment Correlation with Assessed Eligibility and Assessed Work Load
N
M¹
SD
59
2.81
.861
60
2.97
.758
60
60
2.82
2.05
.770
.622
59
2.49
.796
Assessed eligibility Assessed work
(p 2-tailed)²
load (p 2-tailed)²
Internal differentiation
with respect to
…handling time of tasks
... amount of learning
matters
… aspiration level
… approaches to subjects
Open learning
Weekly schedule with
enrichment offers / special tasks
Individual weekly schedules
Free activity
Project work
Enquiry based learning
Tutoring system / cooperation
Sharing circle
Resource Rooms
60
2.40
1.012
60
58
60
59
1.63
2.52
2.10
2.22
.882
.883
.543
.696
59
51
57
3.00
2.45
2.07
.891
1.119
.678
.363**
.222
.137
-.227
.099
-.214
.150
.131
-.337*
-.374**
.316*
-.360*
.307*
-.499**
.381**
.233
.157
.324*
-.321*
-.214
-.472**
-.125
.231
.145
-.076
-.192
Notes. ¹ (1) never (2) sometimes (3) often (4) very often
*p<.05, **p<.01, ***p<.001
Pearson correlations of the self-reported frequency of use and the assessed eligibility of the
listed measures were altogether consistently positive. This means that an estimated high eligibility for the promotion of gifted children goes together with an increased frequency of use of
the measure in instruction. Correlation coefficients were significant for differentiation with
respect to handling time of tasks, weekly schedules with enrichment offers, individual weekly
schedules, free activity and the use of a tutoring system.
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
Endepohls-Ulpe & Thömmes
Measures of Differentiation
Inversely, correlation coefficients between self-reported frequency of use and assessed work
load for the measures were mostly negative (except for variation in handling time of tasks),
indicating that an assessed high amount of work load for a measures goes together with a
decline of frequency of adopting the measure in instruction. Significant coefficients were all
negative and resulted for differentiation of approaches to subjects, open learning, weekly
schedules with enrichment materials, individual weekly schedules, free activity and enquiry
based learning.
Discussion
First of all, it can be stated that German primary school teachers’ as well as teacher students’
attitudes with respect to methods of internal differentiation, as far as their eligibility for the
promotion of gifted children in instruction is concerned, seem to be consistently positive. Remarkably, this is especially true for challenging measures, where special materials have to be
provided, like e.g. differentiation with respect to aspiration level, enquiry based learning,
weekly schedules with additional tasks, individual weekly schedules, and so on. In contrast
to studies revealing a general preference of teachers for measures of homogeneous grouping,
the results of the presented study support the notion that teachers have a preference for
measures which allow gifted children to remain in their age group for schooling. Especially
measures of acceleration like early enrolment at school or grade skipping, were judged as less
suitable for promoting gifted children (see also Heinbokel, 2008).
As far as the amount of anticipated effort of work and time is concerned, teachers judge
measures of internal differentiation as “manageable”, or even lower. Values for measures that
require additional learning materials, such as individual weekly schedules, internal differentiation with respect to approaches to subjects, enquiry based learning and project work, were
slightly higher. Individual weekly schedules were judged to be the most laborious method.
But in spite of their positive judgments with respect to eligibility of measures of internal differentiation for the instruction of gifted children and an only moderate amount of anticipated
work load, teachers seem to adopt measures of differentiation rarely. Positive correlations of
frequency of use with assessed eligibility in combination with negative correlations with assessed work load possibly reveal teachers’ conflict between general knowledge on instructional methods and anticipated personal consequences of adopting them. Solzbacher (2006)
assumes that teachers are simply unable to cope with heterogeneity in a school system, which
is standardized in every respect, which would mean that the system hinders them to differentiate in general. The results of this study lead to the hypotheses that especially measures that
require the provision of special learning materials and/or enhanced monitoring and structuring of children’s individual activities like weekly schedules, enquiry based learning, and open
learning or free activities seem to be afflicted in their use by anticipation of too much work.
There were only a few significant differences between teachers’ and students’ attitudes. Interestingly, teachers assessed the necessary work load for individual weekly schedules slightly
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
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Endepohls-Ulpe ve Thömmes
Program Farklılaştırma
higher than students did. Students without information assessed project work to be more laborious than teachers and students with information on giftedness. But altogether the attitudes
of primary school teachers and teacher students with respect to eligibility of measures and
anticipated work load appeared to be very similar. Even the self-reported level of information
on giftedness does not seem to make much difference at least for teacher students. A possible
reason for the lacking effects of occupational experience or academic instruction and other
resources of information on giftedness may be that these experiences do not provide teachers
or students with information or skills on adopting methods of differentiation for gifted children.
The two teachers who rated themselves as not informed on giftedness were a rather special
group and tended to give extremely deviating answers, e.g. that project work requires no effort
at all for the teacher. Apparently, these two had some reservations against the topics of giftedness and internal differentiation and expressed their reservations by taking a somewhat extreme position.
Conclusion
In spite of their positive attitudes towards measures of internal differentiation as means of
promoting gifted children at school, teachers as well as teacher students, see difficulties in
adopting some very effective methods of differentiation. Information on the topic of giftedness
in general does not seem to make a difference concerning this matter. Teachers apparently are
in conflict between their knowledge of how instruction should be in the best case and anticipated work load. A very simple, but verisimilar explanation for this situation may be that they
just do not know how to implement more challenging methods in their classes. Introducing
only one single method of differentiation like e.g. providing above level-materials to advanced
learners may require various further alterations in the classroom (Johnsen, Haensly, Ryser &
Ford, 2002), a process that just may overstrain teachers who are not trained and supported to
use methods of differentiation. Hence, it seems necessary to think about ways of supporting
teachers in implementing these methods, e.g. by advanced training or provision of materials.
Furthermore, methods of internal differentiation should already be imparted in teacher training at universities.
References
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Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
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Busse, S. (2007). Integration von hochbegabten Schülerinnen und Schülern in Unterricht und Schulleben der Grundschule [Integration of intellectually gifted students in instruction and every day
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Coleman, L. J., & Cross, T. L. (2005). Being gifted in school. Waco, Texas: Prufrock Press.
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Heller, K. A., & Hany, E.A. (1996). Psychologische Modelle der Begabtenförderung. [Psychological models of fostering the gifted]. In F.E. Weinert (Hrsg.), Enzyklopädie der Psychologe, Psychologie des Lernens und der Instruktion, Pädagogische Psychologie, Bd. 2, 477-503,
Göttingen: Hogrefe.
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Child Quarterly, 42(4), 212-227.
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classroom practices to adapt for gifted students. Gifted Child Quarterly, 46(1), 45-63.
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Herausforderung für die Pädagogik. Münstersche Gespräche zur Pädagogik (Promotion of the
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Montgomery, D. (1994). The promotion of high ability and talent through education and instruction. In K. A. Heller & E. A. Hany (Eds.), Competence and Responsibility. The third
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11-14, 1992. Vol. 2, Proceedings of the Conference, 319-335.
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& I. B. Weiner (Eds.), Handbook of Psychology, Vol7, Educational Psychology, Hoboken: John
Wiley & Sons, pp.487-510.
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Auflage). Berlin: Cornelsen.
Reketat, H. (2001). Offener Unterricht – Eine Fördermöglichkeit für hoch begabte Kinder in Regelschulen [Open Learning – A way of promoting gifted children in regular classes]!? Erziehungswissenschaft. Bd. 49. Münster: LIT.
Rindermann, H., & Heller, K.A. (2005). The benefit of gifted classes and talent schools for developing students‘competences and enhancing academic self-concept. German Journal of
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Zum Selbstkonzept hoch- und durchschnittlich begabter Kinder. [Extraordinary gifted:
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1, 37-50
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
2014, Volume 4, Issue 1, 37-50
______________________________________________________
The Associative Basis of Scientific
Creativity: A Model Proposal
Bilimsel Yaratıcılığın Çağrışımsal
Temelleri: Model Önerisi
Esra Kanlı¹
Abstract
Öz
Creativity is accepted as an important part of
scientific skills. Scientific creativity proceeds
from a need or urge to solve a problem, and involves the production of original and useful
ideas or products. Existing scientific creativity
theories and tests do not feature the very important thinking processes, such as analogical
and associative thinking, which can be considered crucial in creative scientific problem solving. Current study’s aim is to provide an alternative model and explicate the associative basis
of scientific creativity. Emerging from the reviewed theoretical framework, Scientific Associations Model is proposed. This model claims
that, similarity and mediation constitutes the
basis of creativity and focuses on three components namely; associative thinking, analogical
thinking (analogical reasoning & analogical
problem solving) and insight which are considered to be main elements of scientific associative thinking.
Key Words: Creativity, scientific creativity, associative theory
Yaratıcılığın bilimsel becerilerin önemli bir
yönü olduğu kabul edilir. Bilimsel yaratıcılık
bir ihtiyaç veya bir problemi çözme isteği durumlarında ortaya çıkar ve özgün ve yararlı fikir veya ürünlerin ortaya konulması sürecini
kapsar. Mevcut bilimsel yaratıcılık teorileri ve
testleri, fen bilimleri alanında hem alan bilgisi
hem de problem çözme, özellikle farklı bakış
açılarını kullanarak yani yaratıcı şekilde problem çözmek için çok ciddi önem arz eden analojik ve çağrışımsal düşünme süreçlerine yer
vermemektedirler. Mevcut çalışma alternatif
bir model önerisi sunmayı amaçlamakta ve bilimsel yaratıcılığı çağrışımsal temelleri üzerinden irdelemektedir. İncelenen kuramsal çerçeveden hareketle oluşturulan Bilimsel Çağrışımlar Modeli, bilimsel yaratıcılığın temelinde benzerlik ve aracılığı içeren çağrışımsal düşünmenin yer aldığını savunmakta ve çağrışımsal düşünme, analojik düşünme (analojik nedenselleme & analojik problem çözme) ve içgörü olmak üzere 3 temel bileşene odaklanmaktadır.
Anahtar Kelimeler: Yaratıcılık, bilimsel yaratıcılık, çağrışımsal teori
Giriş
Son yıllarda bir yenilik ve yaratıcılık fırtınasının içerisinde yaşıyoruz. Her yeni gün genetiği
değiştirilmiş organizmalar, cep bilgisayarları, farklı tedavi yöntemleri gibi yeni bir tekniğin
yahut makinenin adını duyuyoruz. Hem toplum hem de çeşitli meslek alanlarının,
yaratıcılığın önemini vurgulamaya başladığı bir zamandayız, fakat yaratıcılığa olan ilgi sadece
günümüze ait değildir. Mesela Plato toplumun yaratıcı bireylere ihtiyaç duyduğundan bahsetmiş ve bu kişilerin gelişimini desteklemek için yollar önermiştir (Cropley, 1999). Başlarda
yaratma eyleminin tanrıyla yahut bir başka özel güçle ilişkili olduğu varsayılıyor ve
dolayısıyla insanların bu karmaşık fenomene tek başlarına sahip olamayacakları
M.A., Research Assisstant, Istanbul University, HAY Faculty of Education, Department of Special Education, Division of Gifted Education, Istanbul, Turkey, esrakanli@gmal.com
©Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi/Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education
ISSN 2146-3832, http://www.tuzed.org
1
Kanlı
Bilimsel Çağrışımlar Modeli
düşünülüyordu. Fakat zaman geçtikçe ve kültürler değiştikçe, evrim sadece türlerde değil
yaratıcılıkla ilgili fikir ve inançlarımızda da gerçekleşti.
Siyasiler, ekonomistler, mühendisler, psikologlar, eğitimciler ve daha bir çok meslek grubu
yaratıcılığın öneminden bahsetmektedir. Fakat önemi üzerinde bu kadar durulmasına rağmen
Sternberg (2003), yaratıcılığın psikolojide hala az çalışılan konular arasında olduğunu ifade
etmektedir. Medeniyetin gelişmesinde en fazla role sahip olduğu iddia edilebilecek bu
kavramın üzerinde fikir birliğine varılmış açık bir tanımının olmaması da bir başka ilginç noktadır. Her ne kadar uzlaşılmış tekil bir tanım olmasa da, alan yazında bir çok farklı yaratıcılık
tanımı bulunmaktadır ve pek çoğu bazı ortak özelliklere sahiptir. Bu özellikler arasında
özgünlük, uyarlanabilirlik (Guilford, 1950; McKinnon, 1962; Mednick, 1962; Sternberg, 2003)
uzmanlar tarafından kabul gören fikir-ürün ortaya koyma (Vernon, 1989; Csikszentmihalyi,
1988; Amabile,1996) ve yenilik (Sternberg, 2003; Boden, 2004) sayılabilir. Yaratıcılık alanındaki
çalışmaların öncülü sayılan ve üzerinde en fazla fikir birliğine erişilen Guilford’un (1950)
tanımında ise yaratıcılık, üzerinde çalışılan konuya göre özgün-yeni ve uygun-uyarlanabilir
fikirler ve ürünler üretme olarak tanımlanmaktadır. Torrance (1974) ise, Guilford’un fikirlerini
geliştirmiş ve yaratıcılığın düşünsel akıcılık, özgünlük ve bilgideki boşluklara duyarlılık gibi
bilişsel değişkenleri içerdiğini ifade etmiştir. Belli kavramlar üzerinde anlaşılmış tanımlarda
bile yaratıcılığı açıklamaya dönük olan yaklaşımlar farklılaşmaktadır. Yaratıcılıkla ilgili
çalışmalarda ilk bilimsel yaklaşım Geştalt psikologları tarafından getirilmiştir. Onlar,
yaratıcılığı bir çeşit “içgörü (insight)” olarak tanımlamışlardır (Jo, 2009). Geştalt psikologları
problemlerin bir bütün olarak düşünülmesini önemli bulmuşlardır ve düşünmenin üretken
ve tekrarlayan olmak üzere sınıflanabileceğini ifade etmişlerdir. Üretken düşünme, problemin
içgörü kullanılarak çözülmesini içerir. Kişi bir problemle karşılaştığında bileşenleri arasındaki
ilişkileri analiz eder ve bunun sonucunda “keşif anı- (Aha moment)” deneyimini yaşar (Weisberg, 2006).
Yaratıcılık son yıllarda disiplinler arası bir bilim dalı olmuştur.
Bu değişim yaratıcılık
araştırmalarının odak noktalarında ve metodolojilerinde de bir değişime sebebiyet vermiştir
(Kaufman, 2009). Son zamanlardaki yaratıcılık araştırmalarındaki önemli eğilimlerden bir tanesi yaratıcı düşünceler, performanslar ve ürünleri etkileyen temel bileşenleri ortaya koymak
iken (Amabile, 1996; Lubart, 1999; Sternberg & Lubart, 1995); diğeri bilimsel yaratıcılık gibi
alana özgü yaratıcılığın bileşenlerini ortaya koymaktır (Baer, 1998; Plucker, 1998).
Yaratıcılık Genel mi Yoksa Alana Özgü Bir Yetenek midir?
Yaratıcılık uzun yıllardır psikologlar tarafından üzerinde çalışılan bir konu olmasına rağmen
yaratıcı bilim insanları ve özellikle de belirli bir alan ya da disiplindeki kişilerle ilgili çalışmalar
oldukça sınırlıdır (Mansfield & Busse, 1981). Bunun sebeplerinden birisini yaratıcılık
kavramının genel mi yoksa alana özgü bir yetenek mi olduğu konusundaki tartışmaların
oluşturduğu varsayılabilir. Yaratıcılıkla ilgili yapılan teorik (Csikzentmihalyi, 1988; Feldman,
1994) ve ampirik (Baer, 1991, 1993; Runco, 1989) çalışmalar yaratıcılığın önceden varsayıldığı
38
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
Kanlı
Scientific Associations Model
gibi genel bir yetenek olmaktan ziyade alana özgü bir yetenek olduğu yönünde bulgular
içermektedir.
Yaratıcılığın genel mi yoksa alana özgü bir yetenek mi olduğu tartışması, alana özgü bir
yaratıcılık çeşidi olduğu kabul edilen bilimsel yaratıcılığı tanımlamaya çalışan araştırmacılar
için çok önemlidir. Guilford’un Zekanın Yapısı Teorisi ile ilintili olarak, Simon (1986) gibi bilim insanları yaratıcılığın genel bir yetenek olduğunu ve bir alanda yaratıcı potansiyel
gösteren kişinin başka alanlarda da yaratıcı potansiyele sahip olduğunu savunmuşlardır. Bu
düşüncelerin temeli Guilford’un teorisine ve çoğul düşünmeyi yaratıcılığın temeline alan
fikirlerine odaklanmaktadır (Kogan, 1994). Bu fikrin karşısında ise Amabile (1996) gibi
yaratıcılığın alana özgü olduğunu savunan araştırmacılar vardır. Alana özgü yaratıcılık teorilerinde üzerinde daha çok durulan kavram, bir alandaki yaratıcı düşünme potansiyelinin
başka bir alanı kestiremeyeceğidir.
Alan yazın irdelendiğinde yaratıcılığın genel mi yoksa alana özgü bir yetenek mi olduğu
sorusunun daha çok yaratıcılık ölçüm araçları üzerinden tartışıldığı görülmektedir.
Yaratıcılığın ölçülmesi için kullanılan testler çoğunlukla genel bir yetenek olduğu varsayımına
dayanmaktadır fakat bu görüş son yıllarda sıklıkla eleştirilmektedir (bkz. Baer,1994, Crammond, 1994). Her iki fikrin sonuçlarını da destekleyen araştırmalar bulunmaktadır. Lakin bu
araştırmalar genel bir analize tabi tutulduğunda kullanılan yöntemin sonuçları etkilediği
söylenebilir (Plucker, 1998). Performansın gözlenmesi ve ölçülmesine dayalı değerlendirmeler
alana özgü olduğuna ilişkin bulgular ortaya koyarken (Baer, 1991, 1993, 1994, 1996; Runco,
1989), yaratıcılık gözlem listeleri ve geleneksel ölçüm araçlarının kullanıldığı araştırmalar
genel bir yetenek olduğu sonucuna erişmektedirler ( Hocevar, 1979; Plucker, 1999). Yaratıcılık
bilgiden bağımsız gerçekleşmemektedir (Weisberg, 2006), bilgi ise ancak belli bir alanı temsil
edebilmektedir. Mesela Einstein şiir yazmış olsaydı, soneleri ortaya koyduğu teoriler kadar
yaratıcı olacak mıydı, yahut Picasso’nun resimlerinde gördüğümüz yaratıcılığı matematik kuramları üzerinde de sergileyebileceğini iddia edebilir miyiz? Bu bağlamda gerçek anlamda
ortaya konulan yaratıcı performansın alana dönük olduğu ifade edilebilir.
Bilimsel Yaratıcılığın Kavramsal Temelleri
Yaratıcılığın bilimsel becerilerin önemli bir yönü olduğu kabul edilir. Problem çözme, hipotez
oluşturma, deney tasarlama ve hipotez test etme, çıkarsama ve öngörme bilime özgü
yaratıcılık için gerekli olan bileşenlerdendir (Liang, 2002). Bilim ve teknolojinin hiçbir dalında
ezberlenen bilgiler ile başarılı olmak mümkün değildir. Bilimin tüm dallarında daha önceden
var olan bilgilerin üzerine yaratım yoluyla eklemeler yapılması söz konusudur. Bilimin ilerleyebilmesi için yaratıcılığa mutlak surette ihtiyaç vardır (Noyanalpan, 1993, aktaran Aktamış,
2007). Dunbar’a (1999) göre bilimsel yaratıcılığın psikologların ilgisini çekmesinin temel
nedenlerinden bir tanesi, bilim insanlarının keşifleri ve bu keşif sürecindeki yaratıcılıktan tıpkı
şair, yazar ya da ressamlar gibi söz etmeleridir. Diğer sebep ise özellikle A.B.D’de bilimin
yüksek derecede değer gören bir alan olmasından kaynaklanmaktadır. Bilimsel yaratıcılığın
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Bilimsel Çağrışımlar Modeli
doğasını anlama çabası özellikle A.B.D. ve S.S.C.B arasında var olan yarıştan dolayı siyasilerin,
psikologları bu alanda araştırma yapmaya yönlendirmesi neticesinde artış göstermeye
başlamış ve uzay çağıyla birlikte de bu artış eksponensiyel olarak sürmeye devam etmiştir.
Bilimsel yaratıcılık bir ihtiyaç veya bir problemi çözme isteği durumlarında ortaya çıkar. Bilimsel keşifler aniden olamaz, bilimsel yaratıcılık öncül bilgileri ve alan becerilerini gerektirmektedir (Liang, 2002). Bu nedenle bilimsel yaratıcılığın genel yaratıcılıktan ayırılması ve
alana özgü olarak araştırılması gerekmektedir. Sak ve Ayas (2013), yararlılık ve özgünlüğü
bilimsel yaratıcılığın iki temel şartı olarak tanımlamış ve bilimsel yaratıcılığın bu iki özelliği
taşıyan fikirler ve ürünler üretmek olduğunu ifade etmişlerdir.
Simonton (2004), farklı disiplinlerden pek çok araştırmacının bilimsel yaratıcılığı açıklamaya
çalıştığını ve bunun için tartışmalar öne sürdüğünü, bu tartışmaların da “metabilimler (metasciences)” olarak isimlendirildiğini ifade etmiştir. Metabilimlerin en önemlileri arasında bilim
tarihi, bilim felsefesi, bilim psikolojisi ve bilim sosyolojisi bulunmaktadır. Bu metabilimlerin
her biri kendi bilimsel yaratıcılık yorumuna sahiptir. Simonton’a (2004) göre bu metabilimler
arasındaki farklar, bilimsel yaratıcılığın dört önemli bileşeni üzerinden incelenmesine dayanmaktadır. Bu bileşenler mantık, deha, şans ve zeitgeist (zamanın ruhu) olarak ifade edilebilir.
Simon’un (1986) bilimsel yaratıcılık ile ilgili görüşlerinden bilim psikolojisi üzerinde çalışan
bazı araştırmacılar da etkilenmişlerdir. Simon, bilimsel yaratıcılık sürecini mantıksal bir bakış
açısından açıklamaya ve bunu sağlamak için de keşif programları ismini verdiği bilgisayar
programlarını kullanmaya çalışmıştır. Bu programlarda bilim insanlarının önemli buluşlarını
bilgisayarların temel ampirik verileri ve herustiklerin kullanıldığı mantıklı düşünme
adımlarını kullanarak yeniden bulması amaçlanmış ve neticede de bu amaca erişilmiştir. Bu
bulguyu değerlendiren Simonton (2004), bir bilim insanı eğer, bilimin mantığı ve belirli bir
disiplininin yapısı üzerinde uzmanlaşırsa yaratıcılığın bir anlamda garantileneceğini ifade
etmiştir.
Beklenmedik olay ve durumların bilimsel yaratıcılığa sebebiyet vermesi ise şans olarak ifade
edilmekte ve bu da bilimsel yaratıcılığa bakışta farklı bir perspektif ortaya koymaktadır. Simonton (2004), bu gibi buluşların beklenmedik olduklarını ve bu sebepten ötürü bilim tarihini
ciddi şekilde etkilediklerini ifade etmiştir. Beklenmedik buluşların en bilindik örnekleri
arasında X-ışınlarının, radyoaktivitenin, tefalin ve penisilinin bulunmasını sayabiliriz. Şans
eseri ortaya çıkan beklenmedik buluşları Simonton’da Mednick gibi “rastlantısal keşif” olarak
isimlendirmiştir. Fakat yine Mednick gibi Simonton da bilimsel yaratıcılığa şans perspektifinden bakıldığında rastlantısal keşif yapan bilim insanlarının sadece şanslarından dolayı bu
bulgulara erişmediklerini ifade etmiştir. Bunu Edison’un sözleriyle açıklayacak olursak şansın
hazırlıklı beyinlere yardım ettiğini ifade edebiliriz. Nitekim Simonton da aynı bakış açısına
sahiptir ve diğerlerinden daha şanslı gibi görünen bilim insanlarının problemlerin bulunması,
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
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Scientific Associations Model
formülize edilmesi ve çözülmesi aşamalarına diğerlerinden daha çok yoğunlaştıklarını ifade
etmektedir (Simonton, 2004).
Dunbar (1999) bilimsel yaratıcılığı incelemenin en yaygın yollarının, ya yaratıcı bir bilim insanın hayatını incelemeye ya da bilim insanın bir keşfi ortaya koyma sürecinin incelemesine
dayandığını ifade etmektedir. Bu çalışmaların amacı, bilim insanlarının bir keşfi ortaya koyma
sürecindeki zihinsel süreçlerini anlamaya ve açıklamaya çalışmaktır. Araştırmacılar bilim insanlarının kullandıkları stratejileri ortaya koymak için otobiyografileri, lab raporlarını ve
görüşmeleri kullanmışlardır.
Dunbar (1999), kullanılan yöntemlerle toplanan verilerin bilimsel yaratıcılık literatürüne katkısını ifade etmekle birlikte eksik ve yetersiz yanlarını vurgulamış ve konunun kapsamlı bir
açıklamasının yapılabilmesi için bilim insanlarının çalıştıkları ortamda gözlenmesi gerektiğini
ifade etmiştir. Dunbar (1999) yaptığı araştırmalarda bilimsel bilgi ve becerinin yaratıcılık için
yeterli olup olmadığını araştırmış ve neticede bilim insanlarının yaratıcı fikir ve çözümlere
birlikte yaptıkları laboratuvar toplantıları neticesinde eriştiklerini ortaya koymuştur. Bu bulgulaya erişebilmek için 1 yıl boyunca bir moleküler biyoloji laboratuvarının toplantılarını
takip etmiştir. Bunların ötesinde Dunbar (1999) yaptığı çalışmalar neticesinde, Simon’un
(1986) görüşlerine benzer bir sonuca ulaşmış ve bilim insanlarının zihinlerinde kurguladıkları
zihinsel modelleri bir kez anlamayı başarırsak bunu psikoloji laboratuvarlarında gerçek ortamında (in vivo) yapılan çalışmalar olarak deneyebileceğimizi ifade etmiştir.
Bilimsel yaratıcılık alanında var olan en önemli eksikliklerden bir tanesi alanyazında kavramı
açıklamaya çalışan az sayıda kuramsal modelin bulunmasıdır. Bu durumun ortaya çıkardığı
sorunları fark eden araştırmacılar son yıllarda alternatif modeller önermişlerdir. Alanyazında
bilimsel yaratıcılık üzerine önemli kavramsal çerçeve oluşturma çalışmalarından biri Hu ve
Adey (2002) tarafından gerçekleştirilmiştir. Araştırmacılar geliştirdikleri modele Bilimsel Yapı
Yaratıcılık Modeli (Scientific Structure Creativity Model) adını vermişlerdir. Bu model, Guilford’un Zekanın Yapısını Modelini ve çoğul düşünmeyi temele almaktadır. Modelde fen ve
yaratıcılık alanlarındaki ortak temalar analiz edilmiş ve yaratıcılığın doğası ile ilgili üç boyutlu
bir yapı ortaya koyulmuştur. Bunlar; özellikler, süreçler ve ürünlerdir. Akıcılık, esneklik ve
özgünlük modeldeki özellikleri, teknik ürünler, fen bilimleri bilgisi, bilimsel fenomenler ve
fen bilimleri ile ilgili problemler ürünleri, yaratıcı imgelem ve yaratıcı düşünme ise süreçler
boyutunu oluşturmuştur. Önerdikleri modeli temele alarak Hu ve Adey (2002) ikinci kademe
öğrencilerinin bilimsel yaratıcılıklarını ölçmeyi hedefleyen bir test de geliştirmişlerdir.
Klahr (2000), bilimsel yaratıcılığın temel bileşenlerini içeren iki boyutlu bir taksanomi
önermiştir. Boyutlardan biri alanla ilgili genel ve özel bilgiyi içerirken diğer boyut bilimsel
keşifte önemli olan temel süreçleri (hipotez üretme, deney tasarlama, veri değerlendirme)
içermektedir. Bir başka kavramsal çerçeve oluşturma çalışmasında Mohamed (2006), Gardner’ın Çoklu Zeka Teorisi, Sternberg’in Triarşik Zeka Kuramı, Piaget’nin Gelişimsel Teorisini
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
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Bilimsel Çağrışımlar Modeli
temele almış ve bunları Amabile’in Konsensüs Değerlendirme Tekniği, Bilimsel Süreç Becerileri, Performans Değerlendirme ve Taba’nın Öğretim Stratejileri ile entegre etmeye
çalışmıştır. Fakat Mohamed’in çalışmasında dikkat çeken unsur model geliştirmeden ziyade
bir ölçme aracı geliştirme amacıdır. Alanda var olan pek çok test gibi sadece Guilford’un fikirlerinden ziyade farklı kuramcıların bakış açılarını bilimsel yaratıcılığı anlamak ve açıklamak
için kullanmış olması bu çalışmanın önemli artılarındandır. Fakat bir araya getirmiş olduğu
bu teorileri ve yöntemleri nasıl bir kuramsal çerçeve içerisinde kullanıldığı araştırmacı tarafından belirtilmemiş sadece bahsi geçen kaynaklar açıklanarak testin geliştirilme sürecinde onlardan faydalanıldığı belirtilmiştir. Daha sonra testin maddeleri tanıtılırken her bir test maddesinde ölçülmesi hedeflenen beceriler (bilimsel düşünme süreçleri ve yaratıcılık bağlamında)
açıklanmıştır.
Alandaki bir başka önemli bilimsel yaratıcılık için kavramsal çerçeve ve ölçme aracı geliştirme
denemesi ise Ayas ve Sak’ın (2013) çalışmasıdır. Geliştirdikleri Bilimsel Üretkenlik Testinde
üç farklı teoriyi merkeze alan araştırmacılar, bilimsel yaratıcılık potansiyelini belirmede temel
yaratıcılık becerilerinin belirlenmesi için Guilford’un Tekil ve Çoğul Düşünme Modelini, alana
özgü bilgi boyutunun geliştirilmesi için Amabile’nin Bileşensel Yaratıcılık Modelini ve bilimsel yaratıcılığa özgü becerilerin belirlenmesi için de Klahr ve Dunbar’ın Bilimsel Keşifte
Çift Arama Modelini sentezlemişlerdir (Özdemir & Sak, 2013).
Bilimsel yaratıcılık birçok düşünme ve problem çözme sürecini içinde barındırmaktadır. Bu
bağlamda ortaya koyulabilecek olan kavramsal modellerin ve ölçme araçlarının bütünsel bir
yapı olan bilimsel yaratıcılık kavramının ancak belirli süreçlerine odaklanabileceği öngörülebilir. Mevcut bilimsel yaratıcılık modelleri, fen bilimleri alanında hem alan bilgisi hem de
problem çözme, özellikle farklı bakış açılarını kullanarak yani yaratıcı şekilde problem çözmek
için çok ciddi önem arz eden analojik ve çağrışımsal düşünme süreçlerine yer vermemektedirler. Öte yandan, yaratıcılık ile ilgili çok sayıda kuram olduğu halde mevcut bilimsel
yaratıcılık testlerinin yalnızca birkaç kuramı temel alarak geliştirilmesi, alandaki çok önemli
kuramların uygulamaya hala aktarılamamış olması bilimsel yaratıcılık kavramının anlaşılmasında önemli sorunlar olarak görünmektedir. Alanyazında tespit edilmiş olan bu sınırlılığa
alternatif bir model önerisi sunmayı amaçlayan mevcut çalışmada kavramların daha iyi anlaşılabilmesi adına öncelikle yaratıcı sürecin çağrışımsal temellerinin açıklanmasının ve ortaya
konan yapının bilimsel yaratıcılık bağlamında yorumlanmasının alana katkı sağlayacağı
umulmaktadır.
Yaratıcı Sürecin Çağrışımsal Temelleri
Yaratıcı süreç Mednick (1962) tarafından şu şekilde tanımlanmaktadır, “Yaratıcılık çağrışımsal
elementlerin belirli gereklilikleri karşılayan veya bir şekilde kullanışlı olan yeni kombinasyonlara dönüştürülmesi sürecidir. Yeni kombinasyonun elementleri ne kadar uzaksa süreç
veya ortaya konulan ürün de o kadar yaratıcı olacaktır”. Mednick yaratıcı düşünme sürecini,
tanımladığı özgün düşünmeden ayırmıştır, zira bir şeyi özgün yaratıcı olarak nitelemek için
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
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Scientific Associations Model
onun faydalı olması gerektiğini ifade etmiştir (Fasko, 1999). Ayrıca yaratıcı süreci çağrışımsal
temelleri üzerinden açıklamaya çalıştığı teorisinde Mednick (1962), çağrışımsal teorinin bütün
yaratıcı düşünme süreçlerini kapsadığını ifade etmektedir. Mevcut çalışmada ise çağrışımsal
teori yaratıcılığın alana özgü bir beceri olduğu kabulü üzerinden modifiye edilmektedir.
Mednick’e (1962) göre yaratıcı bir çözüme ulaşmanın üç farklı yolu vardır. Bunlar; beklenmedik şeyleri tesadüfen bulma yeteneği-şans faktörü (serendipity), benzerlik (similiarity) ve
aracılık (mediation) olarak isimlendirilir.
Şans Faktörü: Bütünsel çevresel bileşenler ya da uyaranlar tarafından bütünlük içeren
yapının harekete geçirilmesidir.
Benzerlik: Çağrışımsal bileşenler yahut bu çağrışımsal bileşenleri ortaya çıkartan uyarıcılar
arasındaki benzerlik nedeniyle gerekli çağrışımsal bileşenlerin bütünlük içerisinde harekete
geçirilmesidir.
Aracılık: Ortak bileşenlerin aracılığı sayesinde gerekli çağrışımsal bileşenlerin bütünlük içerisinde harekete geçirilmesidir.
Mednick (1962), bireylerin sahip oldukları çağrışımsal havuzları ve bu havuzun niteliğini
ortaya koymak için çağrışımsal hiyerarşiler kavramını kullanmıştır. Mednick’e (1962) göre sürekli olarak sınırlı cevapları veren kişiler eğik hiyerarşilere sahiptir, fakat belirli bir alanda
daha fazla bilgi ve deneyim sahibi olan kimseler bu alanlar veya bağlantılı alanlar ile ilgili
fazla sayıda ve uzak elementler barındıran çağrışımlar kurabilirler, bu da onların düz
çağrışımsal hiyerarşilere sahip olduğunu göstermektedir. Bu durum; Mednick her ne kadar
çağrışımsal teorinin genel yaratıcı süreci açıklamak için oluşturulmuş olduğunu ifade etse de,
yapısı itibariyle alana özgü olarak yorumlanmasının daha sağlıklı ve işe koşulabilir sonuçlar
verebileceği şeklinde yorumlanabilir (Ochse, 2009).
Yaratıcı düşünme sürecini açıklamak için çağrışımsal hiyerarşilerden faydalanan bir başka
araştırmacı da Martindale’dir. Martindale (2009), yaratıcılığın biyolojik temellerini tartıştığı
çalışmasında yaratma eylemini, öncesinde aralarında var olan çağrışımların görül(e)mediği
zihinsel bileşenler arasındaki analojilerin farkına varılması olarak ifade etmektedir. Martindale (2009) yaratıcılık teorileri başlığına birincil süreç bilişi, odaksız dikkat ve çağrışımsal
hiyerarşileri dahil etmiştir.
Mendelsohn (1976), kişilerin dikkat odaklarındaki farklılıkların yaratıcılıklarını da etkilediğini
savunmuştur. Ona göre dikkat kapasitesi ne kadar geniş olursa yaratıcılığın işareti olan tümleşik sıçramanın (combinatorial leap) ortaya çıkma ihtimali de o kadar fazla olur. Yaratıcı bir
fikrin farkına varabilmek için kişinin dikkat odağındaki bileşenlerin aynı anda bir arada
bulunması ve bir kombinasyon oluşturması gerekir. Kişi aynı anda iki şeye dikkatini verebiliyorsa o anda sadece bir analoji keşfedilebilir, fakat eğer aynı anda 4 şeye dikkatini verebilirse
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Bilimsel Çağrışımlar Modeli
altı analojinin ortaya çıkma ihtimali vardır. Araştırmalar yaratıcılık düzeyleri sınırlı olan bireylerin daha dar bir odaklı dikkate sahip oldukları yönünde bulgular içermektedir (Martindale, 2009).
Çağrışımsal teori yaratıcılığı farklı bir açıdan incelemesi ve pek çok yaratıcı kişiye ait olan
biyografilerde (bkz. Poincare, Kekule) yoğun olarak yer alması nedeniyle uzun yıllardır
araştırmacıların ilgilisini çekmiştir. Lakin teori ilk ortaya koyulduğu günden bu yana ciddi
şekilde revize edilmemiş ve operasyonel tanımı için yeni çalışmalar gerçekleştirilmemiştir. Bu
durum geleneksel teorilerin neden yaratıcı kimselerin zihinsel problemlere mükemmel ve
yaratıcı çözümler getirebildiklerini ve bunu yaparken birincil düşünme süreçlerini (analojiler,
metaforlar ve çağrışımlar) (Ochse, 2009), nasıl kullandıklarını açıklamada yetersiz kaldığını
açıklayabilir. Tüm bu süreçler farklı teoriler de göz önünde bulundurularak yeniden
tanımlanmaya çalışılmalıdır.
Bilimsel Yaratıcılığın Çağrışımsal Temelleri ve Model Önerisi
Öğrenmenin temelinin çağrışımlar kurmaya dayalı olduğunu savunan yaklaşımlar Aristo’ya
kadar uzanır. Aristo şeylerin benzerlik, karşıtlık (ortak bir bileşene sahip olmaları esasına dayanır), ve bitişiklik (zaman veya uzamsal yakınlık içerek şekilde gerçekleşmeleri esasına dayanır) temellerinde birbirleriyle ilişkilendirildiklerini savunmuştur (Ochse, 2009). An itibariyle yaratıcılığın temellerinde çağrışımsal süreçlerin olduğuna dair kısmi bir fikir birliği
olduğundan söz edilebilir. Bu anlamda Nobel ödüllü Japon fizikçi Hideki Yukawa (1973)
tarafından yapılan tanım, bilimsel yaratıcılığın temellerini anlamaya çalışan araştırmacılar için
önem arz etmektedir.
“Bir insanın anlayamadığı bir şey olduğunu varsayın. Daha sonra anlayamadığı şeyle ilgili bir
şeyin çok iyi anladığı başka bir şeye bir noktada benzediğini fark ediyor. her ikisini
karşılaştırarak o ana kadar farkına varamadığı şeyi kavrayabilir. Ve eğer kavradığı şey o ana
kadar başkalarının farkına varmadığı bir şey ise, yaratıcı bir düşünme gerçekleştirdiğini iddia
edebilir.”
Yukawa’nın tanımının analojik düşünmeyi açıkladığını analiz etmek çok zor değildir. Nitekim
özellikle fen bilimleri ile ilgili tarihsel ve modern teorilerde (Spearman, 1931; Dunbar,1995)
analoji kurmanın ve analojik düşünmenin bilimsel yaratıcılık bağlamındaki önemine işaret
edilmiştir. Dunbar (1995), bilim insanlarını çalıştıkları ortamlarda uzun zaman dilimleri
boyunca gözlemlemiş, araştırmalarına katılmış, laboratuvar notlarını ve makalelerini
incelemiş ve tüm bunlardan yola çıkarak bilimsel yaratıcılık sürecinde büyük önem arz ettiğini
düşündüğü dört fikir ortaya koymuştur. Bunlar; analojiler, beklenmeyen buluşlar, doğrulama
yanlılığı ve yayılmış muhakemedir.
Uzun yıllardır analojilerin yaratıcı bilişin psikolojik süreçlerinde çok önemli bir rolü olduğu
düşünülmektedir ve bu sebepten birçok araştırmacı analojik nedensellemede işe koşulan
psikolojik süreçleri açıklamaya çalışan ayrıntılı modeller ortaya koymuşlardır (Holyoak &
44
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
Kanlı
Scientific Associations Model
Thagard, 1989, 1995). Analojilerde hedef ve temel (target & base) diye isimlendirilen iki önemli
yapı vardır. Hedef bilim insanının çözmek ya da açıklamak istediği kavram ya da problem
durumunu ifade ederken, temel bilim insanın hedefi anlamak veya başkalarına açıklamak için
kullandığı başka bir bilgi birimidir. Bilim insanının bir analoji kurarken yaptığı şey temelin
özelliklerini hedefin özelliklerine eşlemektir. Bu eşleşme yapılırken hedefin yeni özellikleri
keşfedilebilir, hedefin özellikleri yeniden düzenlenebilir ve neticede yeni bir kavrama ulaşılabilir yahut araştırmacı diğer kişiler için hedefin bir özelliğine dikkati çekebilir (Dunbar, 1997).
(Örn. Rutherford Atom Modeli :: Güneş Sistemi)
Dunbar’ın (1995) çalışmasının özellikle analojiler ile ilgili olan kısmı mevcut çalışma için
önemli sonuçlara sahiptir. Öncelikle analojilerin hem bilimsel düşünme sürecinde hem de fen
öğretimi etkinliklerinde sıklıkla başvurulan düşünme yöntemlerinden biri olduğu hatırlanmalıdır. Buna ek olarak analojiler alanyazında bu çalışmanın temelini oluşturan
çağrışımların bir çeşidi olarak kabul edilmektedirler. Bu durumda bilimsel düşünme ve
dolayısıyla bilimsel yaratıcılıkla ilgili çalışmaların içerisinde analojilere yer verilmesi
kaçınılmazdır. Analojik düşünme analojik nedenselleme ve analojik problem çözme başlıkları
altında incelenmektedir (Gick & Holyoak, 1983). Analojik nedenselleme daha basit bir
düzeyde A : B :: C : ? şeması ile ifade edilebilir. Burada kişinin problem durumunda belirgin
olarak sunulmuş iki yapı arasındaki ilişkileri analiz etmesi ve bunu ikinci duruma aktararak
problemin çözümüne ulaşması beklenmektedir. Araştırmacılar yaşamımızda karşılaştığımız
problemlerin ise bu kadar yapılandırılmamış olduğunu savunmaktadırlar. Bu sebeple analojik
nedensellemenin bir üst basamağı olarak nitelenebilecek olan analojik problem çözmenin öneminden bahsetmektedirler. Burada kişi karşılaştığı yeni bir problemi çözebilmek için, aynı
veya farklı bir alandan bir problemi analiz ederek aktarım yapmaktadır (bkz. Radyasyon
problemi; Gick & Holyoak, 1983).
Araştırmacılar birincil süreç bilişinin içerisinde yer alan ve çağrışımsal düşünme ile bağlantılı
olan içgörünün yapısı ve doğasının ne olduğu ile ilgili de uzun yıllardır çalışmalar yapmaktadırlar. Birçok bilimsel buluşun ve bilim insanları tarafından aktarılan anekdotların içerisinde
içgörüden sıklıkla bahsedildiği ve bu süreç bilimsel yaratıcılığın bir bileşeni olarak kabul
edildiği için bu durumun nedenlerini anlamak zor değildir. Mesela Copernicus’un Dünya’nın
değil de Güneş’in güneş sisteminin merkezi olduğunu anlaması, Galileo’nun aynı yükseklikten bırakılan nesnelerin ağırlıklarından bağımsız olarak aynı hızda düşeceklerinin farkına
varması, Poincare’in Fuchsian fonksiyonları ile Öklidyen geometri arasında kurduğu
bağlantılar ya da Kekule’nin benzen molekülünün yapısını keşfetmesi içgörünün kullanıldığı
buluşlara örnek olarak verilebilir. Alanyazında bahsi geçen bu buluşların hepsinin aynı zamanda çağrışımsal düşünmeyi içerdiği de ifade edilmektedir, yani bir bağlamda çağrışımsal
düşünme, analojik-metaforik düşünme ve içgörünün birbirini kapsayan kavramlar oldukları
iddia edilebilir. Ayrıca çağrışımsal teorinin operasyonel tanımı olan Uzak Çağrışımlar
Testinde kişilerin gösterdikleri performansın içgörü problemleri ile korelasyona sahip olması
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
45
Kanlı
Bilimsel Çağrışımlar Modeli
(Ansburg, 2000; Schooler & Melcher, 1995) önerilen modelde içgörüye yer verilmesi için anlamlı bir zemin oluşturmaktadır.
İçgörü ile ilgili klasik görüşler temel olarak iki bakış açısı üzerinden incelenebilir. Bunlardan
ilki içgörünün özel bir düşünme süreci olmadığını iddia ederken (Perkins, 1981), diğer görüş
bu fikre karşı çıkmaktadır (Sternberg & Davidson, 1995). İçgörünün özel bir düşünme süreci
olduğunu savunanlara göre, içgörü sıradan düşünme işlemlemesinden farklıdır. Bu fikri
savunanlar içgörü sürecinin içinde bilinçsiz düşünme adımlarının olduğunu, içgörünün
hızlandırılmış bir zihinsel işlemleme olduğunu ve sıradan düşünme süreçleri kapsamında
yapılan bir çeşit kısa devre olduğunu ifade etmektedirler (Sternberg & Davidson, 1995).
İçgörünün özel bir süreç olmadığını savunan teorilere göre, içgörü sıradan algılama, öğrenme
ve kavrama sürecinin bir uzantısı olarak işlemlemektedir. Bu fikir daha ziyade Perkins (1981),
Langley ve Jones (1988) ve Weisberg (2006) tarafından savunulmuştur. Bu araştırmacılara göre
içgörü sıradan düşünme süreçlerinin ürünlerinden ibarettir.
Davidson ve Sternberg (1984) içgörü ile ilgili triarşik bir model önermişlerdir. Bu bakış açısına
göre ise içgörü birbiriyle ilişki içerisinde olan üç psikolojik süreçten oluşmaktadır. Bunlar
seçici kodlama, seçici birleştirme ve seçici karşılaştırmadır. Sternberg, Kaufman ve Grigorenko
(2008), ortaya koyulan bu model üzerinden Perkins (1981) ile bir noktaya kadar hemfikir
olduklarını ifade etmektedirler. Şöyle ki, onlara göre içgörü sürecinde var olan süreçler sıradan bilişsel süreçlerdir fakat triarşik teoride ortaya koydukları üç adımın rutin bir şekilde
işlemlemediğini düşündükleri için, bilginin işlemlenmesi sürecinde içgörü sürecinin sıradan
düşünmeden farklılaştığını iddia etmekte ve bu bağlamda Perkins ve benzer görüşler
savunanlardan ayrılmaktadırlar. Bilginin işlemlenmesi, transferi, farklı durumlar arasında
bağlantılar kurulması gibi farklı bileşenler dikkate alındığında fen bilimlerindeki yaratıcılık
potansiyelini çağrışımsal teori üzerinden açıklamaya çalışan bu çalışmada içgörünün önemli
bir yere sahip olduğu görülmektedir.
Aktarılan alanyazındaki kuramsal çerçeve ve araştırma sonuçları bütünsel bir bakış açısıyla
analiz edildiğinde, bilimsel yaratıcı düşünme sürecinin çağrışımsal temellere sahip olduğu
düşünülmektedir. Bilimsel yaratıcılık çağrışımsal temelleri üzerinden analiz edildiğinde, alan
bilgisi temele alınarak çağrışımsal ve analojik düşünme ile içgörü süreçlerinin yeni ve uygun
fikirler ve/ya ürünler ortaya konulması sürecinde birlikte işe koşulması olarak tanımlanabilir.
Bu kavramsal yapıyı temele alarak oluşturulan ve bilimsel yaratıcılığın çağrışımsal temeller
üzerinden yorumlanmasını hedefleyen model önerisi ise çağrışımsal düşünme, analojik
düşünme (analojik nedenselleme & analojik problem çözme) ve içgörü süreçlerini içermektedir. Bahsi geçen bu dört kavramın tamamının zihinsel işlemlemesi sürecinde Mednick tarafından ortaya konulmuş olan aracılık ve benzerlik yoluyla düşünmenin işe koşulduğu
düşünülmekte ve bu yapıların birlikte işlemlemesi neticesinde bilimsel yaratıcılığın ortaya
çıktığı varsayılmaktadır. Burada vurgulanması önemli olan bir başka husus ise bahsi geçen
tüm kavramların fen bilimleri alan bilgisi içinde işlemlenerek bilimsel yaratıcılığı ortaya koyabileceğidir. Önerilen modelin şematik gösterimine aşağıda yer verilmiştir.
46
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
Kanlı
Scientific Associations Model
Bilimsel Çağrışımlar Modeli
YARATICILIK
ANALOJİK DÜŞÜNME = ANALOJİK
NEDENSELLEME +
ANALOJİK PROBLEM ÇÖZME
BİLİMSEL
BENZERLİK
ARABULUCULUK
ÇAĞRIŞIMSAL DÜŞÜNME
İÇGÖRÜ
Tartışma, Sonuç ve Öneriler
Mevcut çalışmada öncelikli olarak yaratıcılığın alana özgü yapısı tartışılmış daha sonra bilimsel yaratıcılığın kavramsal temelleri incelenmiş ve ardından çalışmanın amacını oluşturan
model önerisine temel oluşturması bağlamında yaratıcı sürecin çağrışımsal temelleri
irdelenmiştir. Yapılan alanyazın incelemeleri ve tartışmaları neticesinde bilimsel yaratıcılığı
çağrışımsal temelleri üzerinden inceleyen bir model önerisi ortaya konulmuştur. Bu model
önerisinin ilk kabulü alana dönük yaratıcılığın ortaya konulabilmesi için alan bilgisinin gerekli
olduğu savıdır. Bundan sebep önerilen bütün düşünsel süreçlerin fen bilimleri alan bilgisi
kümesinin içinde işlemlediği varsayılmıştır. Çalışmada Mednick (1962) tarafından ortaya
konulan çağrışımsal teori bilimsel yaratıcılık bakış açısı temele alınarak yeniden
yorumlanmıştır. Bu yorumlama yapılırken çağrışım kavramı geniş bir perspektiften ele
alınmış ve alanyazın incelemesi buna göre gerçekleştirilmiştir. Sonuç olarak çağrışımlar,
analojiler ve içgörü süreçlerinin tamamında Mednick’in yaratıcı sonuca ulaşmak için gerekli
gördüğü benzerlik ve arabuluculuğa dayalı düşünmenin işe koşulduğu görülmüş ve model
bu ilişki temele alınarak kurgulanmıştır.
Alanyazında mevcut olan ve bilimsel yaratıcılığa kavramsal bir çerçeve sunmaya çalışan modellerin sayısı oldukça sınırlıdır. Daha önce de tartışıldığı üzere yaratıcılık ve özelinde bilimsel
yaratıcılık birkaç model üzerinden açıklanamayacak kadar karmaşık bir kavramdır. Buna
bağlı olarak kavramın farklı yüzlerini açıklamaya çalışan kavramsal çerçevelere ihtiyaç duyulmaktadır. Önerilen model, var olan ve ağırlıklı olarak Guilford tarafından ortaya konulmuş
olan çoğul düşünmeyi merkeze alan modellerden farklı olarak bilimsel yaratıcılığın temelinde
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
47
Kanlı
Bilimsel Çağrışımlar Modeli
çağrışımlarla düşünmenin var olduğunu savunmaktadır. Ortaya konulan alternatif bakış açısı
sayesinde bilimsel yaratıcılık kavramının daha iyi anlaşılabileceği varsayılmaktadır. Mevcut
çalışmada kavramsal bir çerçeve olarak sunulmuş olan Bilimsel Çağrışımlar Modelinin
geçerliğinin sınanabilmesi için modeli merkeze alarak bir bilimsel yaratıcılık testinin
geliştirilmesi ve bu testin psikometrik özelliklerinin araştırılmasının gerekli olduğu
düşünülmektedir. Geliştirilebilecek olan bu testin alanda var olan diğer testlerle olan ilişkilerinin irdeleneceği kriter geçerliği çalışmalarının yapılmasının da ayrıca öneme sahip olduğu
düşünülmektedir.
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1, 51-70
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
2014, Volume 4, Issue 1, 51-70
______________________________________________________
Economic Creativity Development
Ekonomik Yaratıcılığın Gelişimi
Nasseroddin Kazemi Haghighi1 & Ahmad Reza Kazemi Haghighi2
Abstract
Öz
As a new concept in the literature, the authors
discuss the conception of “Economic Creativity” (EC). The authors explain psychological
characteristics of “Economic Creativity”: attitudes, motivation, personality traits, and abilities. They propose a design based on Emotion
of Thought Theory (Kazemi, 2007) for Economic
Creativity Development (ECD). This theory is
an affective-cognitive approach that tries to explain creativity. Emotion of Thought involves
“Poyaei” and “Bitabi” (in Persian) meaning Dynamism and Restlessness. According to this
theory, ECD relates to connections between
emotion and thought. The ECD includes promoting individual readiness, utilization of economic resources, attitude towards economic affairs development, enhancing the utilization of
economic experiences, conducting economic activity education, development of economic
thinking and development of emotion of
thought.
Key Words: creativity development, economic
creativity, emotion, thought
Yazarlar literatürde yeni bir kavram olan Ekonomik Yaratıcılığı (EY) tartışılmışlardır. Yazarlar ekonomik yaratıcılığın psikolojik özelliklerini açıklamışlardır: tutumlar, motivasyon, kişilik özellikleri ve yetenekler. Düşünme Duygusu
Teorisini (Kazemi, 2007) temel alan Ekonomik
Yaratıcılığın Gelişimi için bir tasarım önermişlerdir. Bu kuram yaratıcılığı açıklayan duyuşsal-bilişsel bir yaklaşımdır. Düşünme duygusu
dinamizm ve tez canlılık anlamlarına gelen
“Poyaei” ve Bitabi” (Farsça) bileşenlerini kapsamaktadır. Bu teoriye göre Ekonomik Yaratıcılığın Gelişimi duygular ve düşünceler arasındaki
bağlantılarla ilgilidir. Ekonomik Yaratıcılığın
Gelişimi bireysel hazır bulunuşluluğun desteklenmesi, ekonomik kaynakların kullanımı, ekonomik gelişmenin gidişatına yönelik tutum,
ekonomik tecrübelerin kullanımının arttırılması, ekonomik etkinlik eğitiminin verilmesi,
ekonomik düşünmenin geliştirilmesi ve düşünme duygusunun geliştirilmesini kapsamaktadır.
Anahtar Sözcükler: yaratıcılık gelişimi, ekonomi yaratıcılığı, duygu, düşünce
Introduction
The author has presented a comprehensive design for creative personality that consists fourteen categories (e.g., total motivation, openness to experience, emotional sensitivity) (Kazemi,
2007&2008) According to author, reviewing of the literature indicates that there is a “hexahedralparadigm” for creativity. Seemingly, this paradigm we consider as a new base for creativity identification and development. This “hexahedral paradigm” comprises individual readiness, resource orientation, attitude, utilization of experiences, active mobility, and special
thinking. As far as the author concludes a phenomenon with affective and cognitive nature,
he names this phenomenon in Persian, “Hayajan-e-Andisheh” (Emotion of Thought). Emotion
of Thought involves “Poyaei” and “Bitabi” (in Persian) that mean Poyaei and Bitabi. There are
PhD, Vice-president in Iranian Council Exceptional Children (I.C.E.C.), Iran; nkazemih@gmail.com
Faculty of Management and Economics, Semnan University, Iran
©Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi/Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education
ISSN 2146-3832, http://www.tuzed.org
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Kazemi Haghighi ve Kazemi Haghighi
Ekonomik Yaratıcılık
also six components for any eras. “Poyaei" involves motion and movement desire, curiosity,
feeling of extra ordinary power, great thought, humor and easily expression of emotions, and
tendency for experience. "Bitabi" involves agitation, captivity, somatic expressions of thinking,
misgiving, twirling of thought and loneliness sense.
Overall, it can be concluded that in next century, firstly understanding of creativity depends
on comprehension of relationship between emotion and thinking (especially developmentalemotional examination of creativity), secondly creativity identification concerned with emotional nature of creativity , and finally creativity development relates to connection between
affection and cognition (in other words, emotion and thought).
Figure 1.The Hexahedral Paradigm of Creative Personality (Kazemi, 2007)
Individual Readiness
Individual readiness refers to high ability (bio-psych readiness, high intelligence, and aptitude) and self- initiate (self-readiness, individuality, and internal incubation).
High ability. Bouchard & Hur (1998) discuss that there is a connection between genetics and
personality. Heritability of the continuum of introversion (as a creative personality trait) was
60%.The creativity is a whole brain process related to Walas' four process stages of creativity
and the four quadrants of the Whole-Brain Model (Herrmann, 1991). In addition, Dacey (1989)
discusses basic concepts of creativity included brain physiology. Seemingly, the creative personalities are more sensitive (Bachtold& Werner 1973). Lang &Ryba (1976) also indicatethat
there is higher sensory acuity across sensory modalities in creative persons. Goldsmith (1984)
also found that the KAI correlated positively with the sensation seeking. Besides, Parnes (1971)
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discusses sensitivity characterize the thought process of highly actualized individuals (as a
creative trait). On the other hand, there is connection between high intelligence and creativity
(e.g., Kazemi, 1992; Maker,1993; Runco,1993; Sternberg &Lubart, 1993;Hunsaker&Callahan,1995;Hoffman, 1995; Galbraith &Wentzel,2001;Naglieri & Kaufman,2001). In the vast majority of cases have been showed that linkage creativity and aptitude (e.g., Smith, 1970; Jensen,
1973; Gordon, 1989; Webster, 1990; Kazemi, 1997c; Clapham, 2004).
Self-initiate. It is widely accepted that creativity relates to self. Creativity and self-actualization have long been associated together (Bruhn et al., 1969; Ekvall, 1972; Conti &Amabile, 1999;
Runco, 1999b). Besides, Parnes (1971) discusses the three S's -sensitivity, synergy and serendipity- characterize the thought process of highly actualized individuals. The various coping
behaviors used in facing new problems is especially pertinent to self-actualized persons and
mental health.
The evidences show creativity and innovation relate to self-image (Smilansky&Halberstadt,
1986), self- concept (Schempp & Cheffers, 1982; Kazemi,1997a,1998), self-esteem (Keller & Holland,1978; Keller,1984;Helson,1999), self-determination (Sheldon,1995b) and self-sufficient
(Bachtold& Werner, 1973). Therefore, Sternberg (1988) presents "Mental self government" as a
theory of how things fit, and as support to the idea of matching style to task (person-environment fit). Creative processes may be seen as initiating from a general drive toward self-organization through the reduction of chaos (Sternberg &Tardif, 1989).
The evidences also show that problem solving and invention relate to field independence (Smilansky&Halberstadt, 1986). OHara & Sternberg (1999) also emphasize field independence.
Similarity, Runco (1999a) indicates that the exceptional talents depend on independence and
creativity. In addition, Feist (1999) discusses the relationship between autonomous behavior
(autonomy and independence) and creative personality traits. He also explains the other related personality traits such as self-confidence, arrogance, and solitude. Likewise, the findings
indicated that the committed artists demonstrated autonomy (Dudek& Royer, 1991). It is
seemingly autonomous behavior requires uniqueness. Therefore, Skinner (1996) discusses that
uniqueness seeking may be a result of innovativeness rather than a personality characteristic.
Consequently, Tucker (1991) concentrates on assertiveness and Huitt (1992) discusses relationship between problem solving and decision-making. Furthermore, teachers identify Students’
mannerism such as individuality as important indicators of creative students (Westby & Dawson, 1995).
On the other hand, the creativity requires being task-focused (Sternberg & Tardif, 1989).thus,
Maddi et al (1982) emphasize upon internal orientation as factor in creativity. According to"
the activation personality theory", the extent and unusualness of fantasy production will be
greater in persons having both a high customary level of activation and an internal orientation
than it will in persons having only one or neither of these characteristics. In the same way,
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Bachtold (1980) discusses that introversion and high powers of attentiveness are specific trademarks of the creative personality. Equally, Miller (1992) emphasizes upon the introspection.
Besides, Stohs (1991) found inner focused personality. It seems that internal orientation involves a period of incubation. As a result, Guilford (1979) overviewed and discussed incubation as a part of creative problem solving and cognitive thinking styles. In addition, Simonton
(1999) discusses relationship between creativity and unconscious incubation. Thus, McClelland (1987) suggests characteristics of successful entrepreneurs include initiative.
Utilization of Economic Resources
Utilization of environmental resources refers to making use of persons or things that means
achieving a person-environment fit. In general, Creativity relates to family, educational, ecological, cultural, and socio-economic conditions (MacKinnon, 1975; Khire, 1979; Amabile&Gryskiewicz, 1988; Amabile, 1988; Dacey, 1989; Runco& Albert, 1990; Meyer, 1991; Bull
et al., 1995; Kazemi, 1994, 1996; Amabile, 1997; Powers, 1998; Dunbar, 1999; Cramond, 2001;
Fonseca, 2002; Md-Yunus, 2007).
As self-determination theory describes, the relatedness need desire have been identified as
being essential for social development and personal well-being (Ryan &Deci, 2000).In addition, Mudd (1986) reviewed the KAI literature produced between 1976 and 1986. He emphasizes on the environment-styles fit. Moreover, extraverts scored higher on tests measuring verbal flexibility, fluency, and originality (White, 1968). Besides, the author discusses the influences of economic advantages on creativity (Kazemi, 1996)
Instead, Jurcoviç&Zelina (1993) explored climate, which may act as barrier to becoming more
creative. Besides, Bachtold& Werner (1973) found that creative female authors and artists were
more aloof than the general population. Feist (1999) also discusses related personality traits to
creativity such as non-conformity, associability, and antisociability. In addition, Sheldon
(1999) discusses how external constraints and interpersonal climate can promote conformity,
thus influencing creativity in a negative way. Sheldon (1995a) also found those personal goals
could create a poor working environment and promote feelings of conflict within the group.
In addition, James (1995) investigated the effect that conflict has on an individual's creativity.
He found that goal conflict had a positive effect on creativity when task orientation matched
up with individual orientation. Thus, the teachers define a creative personality as undesirable
(Dettmer, 1981). Above all, Hinton (1971) showed the relationship between certain personality
variables and resistance to the effects of frustration on creativity; and there are the combined
effects of personality and emotional stress on creative productivity. He collected initially under neutral circumstances and again with a high amount of environmental frustration. Certain
personality factors, which are not of primary importance in the determination of creative potential, are definitely important in their interaction with environmental variables, and that
these have a significant effect on the determination of creative productivity.
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On the other hand, Puccio&Chimento (2001) suggest a social bias wherein attributing creativity to personality traits and innovation is a valued cultural status; further, that innovators successfully promote themselves as highly creative. Nemiro (1997) also investigated the creative
process of actors by examining different aspects of an actor's life. He found social influences
that affected an actor's creativity. Results indicated that certain social influences (trust, freedom, respect) enhanced an actor's creativity while other influences (distrust, poor direction)
inhibited performance. The individualistic advertising cultures differ in creative personalities,
creative process, and use and type of agency philosophy compared to collective cultures
(Ewing et al., 2001). The personalized 'space' can demonstrate creativity in the workplace
(York, 2000). Besides, the author discusses disadvantages of the formal education for creativity
and taking advantage of the creative peer environment (Kazemi, 1994). In addition, Helson"
studied the literary works and personalities of women authors. She found non-neurotic relationships with parents. Then in a longitudinal study of these women (over the course of 25
years), she obtained family satisfaction and self esteem effect motivation, (Helson, 1973, 1999).
Some evidences emphasize on the effect of group (Street, 1974).Similarly; some evidences focus on the synergy (Parnes, 1971; Kurtzberg&Amabile, 2001). Further, Smith & Knight (1959)
showed personalized feedback improved group problem solving efficiency and under certain
conditions improved self-insight. Results of researches indicate that the larger the group (up
to 12), the larger total productivity in terms of quantity, quality-originality of answers and new
categories. As group size increased per person, contribution tended to lessen (Renzulli et al.,
1974).
Attitude to Economic Affairs Development
Attitude refers to cognition (and intuition), idea, and affection (motivation and emotion). Davis (1999) discusses the barriers to creativity and creative attitudes.
Cognition and intuition. The author discusses cognitive origins of creativity that inclusive
attention, perception and thinking (Kazemi, 1994). The knowledge base contributes to the development of the creative person (Stein, 1983; Feldhusen, 1995; Sternberg &Lubart, 1995).
However, knowledge can be a double-edged sword (Sternberg &Lubart, 1993). Feldhusen
(1995) also describes the metacognitive processing necessary for creativity to be recognized.
On the other hand, the authors emphasizes upon the intuition (Sternberg & Tardif, 1989; Miller, 1992). Besides, Sternberg &Lubart (1995) suggest that the creative person relies upon intuition to guide behaviors. Moreover, Goldsmith (1985) found that intuitive would have a positive correlation with sensation seeking. Hence, Bouchard &Hur (1998) found heritability of
sensing/intuition was 40%. As Dudek & Royer (1991) state committed artists demonstrate inspiration. The author emphasizes that developing visual skills and insight can underlie discovering truths about exist and promoting creativity (kazemi, 1996).
Idea. Creative individual's believes include try to think of new ideas, and commonly try to
add ideas to existing idea (Masten, 1989) idea finding (Renner, & Renner, 1971), ideational
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fluency (Isakson, 1977) negative correlation with the dogmatism (Goldsmith, 1984)paranormal
belief (Thalbourne, 2000)and masculinity attitudes in among women authors (Helson,1973).
Treffinger (2004) proposed courage to explore ideas. A creative person moves into generating
ideas or being divergent, and then ends with a convergence on a practical path or idea in which
he/she develops a plan of action (Carson, 1999). Meadow &Parnes (1959) examined if adhering
to the brainstorming principle would result in significant increments of quality and quantity
of ideas. Results suggest that the course produced significant increments on the two measures
of idea quantity and three of the five measures of idea quality.
Affection Russ (1999) examined the relationship between affect and creativity through a review of the current thinking in the field. She states an integrative model of affect and creativity,
which links cognitive abilities, affective processes, and global personality traits.
Motivation Results of researches indicate a relationship between motivation and creativity
(Halpin&Halpin, 1973; Hurst et al., 1991; Sternberg & Lubart, 1993, 1995; Mehr & Shaver, 1996;
Gedo, 1997).
The creative motivation includes innovative orientation (Keller & Holland, 1978), questioning,
curiosity (Walberg et al., 1979), preference for complexity (Renner & Renner, 1971; Nicholls,
1972), motivation for uniqueness (Skinner, 1996), and aesthetics need desire (Miller, 1992).
The creative people need to discover (Kawenski, 1991), clarity (Keller & Holland, 1978), and
spontaneity in a performance (Nemiro, 1997), and enjoy the process of creation and innovation
(Torrance, 1972; Keller & Holland, 1978; Goldsmith, 1984; Csikszentmihalyi, 1996).
The creative person is presenting an intrinsic motivation or intrinsic task commitment
(Nicholls 1972; Sternberg & Tardif, 1989; Csikszentmihalyi, 1990; Amabile, 1997; Stafford, 1998;
Conti & Amabile, 1999; Feist, 1999). Hence, Graves, et al (1967) suggests a Motivation Index is
as a predictor of supportive value to the creativity score and Torrance (1971) suggests, “Creative Motivation Scale “is valid for its purpose as brief and coarse screening devices for identifying creative individuals.
Emotion. Creativity relates to emotional (sensitivity, involvement, and stress), humor, personal conflict, inner freedom, openness, and full expression.
Levy (1983) suggests that right hemisphere processes add emotional and humorous overtones
important for understanding the full meaning of oral and written communication. The two
hemispheres differ in their perceptual roles but both sides are involved in the creation and
appreciation of art and music. According to Herr (1981), guided imagery engages the right
brain processes such as imagination, emotion, creative, and intuitive activities. It has been suggested that relationship between humor and creativity. Ziv (1984) discussed relationship between humor and creativity, in terms of personality and the creation of humor, as well as the
role of humor in divergent thinking and problem solving. The fact that humor can produce
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intense emotional reactions demonstrates how sensitive the individual is to the fundamental
meanings of humor (Levine & Redlich, 1955, 1960; Burma, 1946). In addition, Van hook and
Tegano (2002) suggest that freedom of expression maybe as an important personality trait in
the identification and nurturance of creative potential and problem solving in young children.
Moreover, Parnes (1971) offers that a creative person posses full expression. On the other hand,
Radford (2004) argues when the creative act challenges the boundaries of sense, a higher level
of emotional consonance takes place. The authors emphasize on experiencing deep emotions
(Sternberg & Tardif, 1989). In addition, Spotts (1972) states the "hot" divergent cognitive style
was a freer, more impulsive response to stimuli involving more emotion. According to Bachtold (1980), the emotional sensitivity is a specific trademark of the creative personality. Likewise, Helson's findings indicate a correlation exists between creativity and emotional involvement (Helson, 1973). Hinton (1971) also showed the relationship between certain personality
variables and resistance to the effects of frustration on creativity; and there are the combined
effects of personality and emotional stress on creative productivity. Besides, Walker et al (1995)
found that the creative group would score higher on the neurotic and depressive factors. In
addition, Richards & Kinney (1990) attempted to make connections between creativity and
bipolar mood disorders. They suggest that mood states may enhance ones creativity. Hence,
the problem-solving therapy (PST) may contribute to a greater degree than problem-focused
therapy (PFT), toward a significant decrease in depression (Nezu 1986). Furthermore, Schubert
(1977) discusses the relationship between boredom and creativity, through intelligence, thrillseeking personalities, identity diffusion, and the pressure and awareness for creativity. Sternberg & Tardif (1989) state the processes involved in creation requires tension. Nemiro (1997)
investigated the creative process of actors by examining three different aspects of an actor's
life. A tension often arose between an actor's personal and character identity. The actor
achieved balance between their personal and character identities by developing an objective
'third' eye to monitor the tension. Similarly, Hinton (1971) reminds the combined effects of
personality and emotional stress on creative productivity. Likewise, Smith & Carlsson (1987)
discuss the ability of creative individuals to use stress and anxiety as a motivational driving
factor of their creativity. Above all, the investigators found emotional overexcitability (OE)
that seemed to be related to creative personality characteristics (Schiever, 1985). Moreover,
Diamond (1996) insists the central role of repressed anger and rage in violence and psychopathology connect to creativity. He ascertains that constructiveness and destructiveness have
the same source in personality/human potential. Further, Redfearn & Storr (1992) assert that
all energy is potentially explosive as well as potentially creative. They offer an historical background of personal conflict in effort to encourage a creative outcome. Gelade (1997) also revealed that commercial creative have considerably higher levels of neuroticism. In review of
creativity and disease, Sandblom (1997) discusses the relationship between illness and creativity: illness affects literature, art, and music. He also goes into the psychological side with a
look at neuroses, psychosomatic disorder, and mental diseases. Therefore, Bachtold's study
(1980) supports the relationship of psychoticism and creativity.
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On the contrary, People with low levels of anxiety scored higher in creative thinking than those
with high levels (White 1968). For this reason, Parnes (1971) offers that a creative person must
be have psychologically healthy. A person realizes higher potential for feeling, inner freedom,
openness, full expression, and sensitivity. Therefore, it is not surprising that Csikszentmihalyi
(1996) lists 10 pairs of opposite traits that creative people possess.
Enhancing the Utilization of Economic Experiences
Curious individuals need to experience their curiosity. Furthermore, utilization of experiences
involves openness to experience, sensation seeking, tolerance to ambiguity, and risk taking.
Child (1965) found that Variables of art background correlates with esthetic judgment and
preference. The authors emphasize on being open to new experiences (Sternberg & Tardif,
1989). Gelade (1997) conducted a study to determine the personality of the commercial creative. The results revealed that commercially creative people had considerably higher levels of
openness to experience than the non-creative did. Similarly, the committed artists demonstrate
ability to experiment (Dudek & Royer, 1991). Likewise, Knox &Glover (1978) present a study
of the effects of preschool experience on creativity among 60 black and 60 white first grade
boys and girls in a rural area. Goldsmith (1985) obtained that intuitive would have a positive
correlation with sensation seeking. In addition, Yuk & Cramond (2006) present a Program for
Enlightened and Productive Creativity (PEPC). The PEPC describes stages through which a
student is guided to solve a problem using increasingly complex observation, inquiry, and
experimentation. Moreover, measures of creativity, openness to experience, and sensation
seeking intercorrelate among female and male college students. Male creativity correlated
most strongly with openness to theoretical and aesthetic experiences and creative thoughts.
For females, creativity, openness to inner experiences, and sensation seeking moderately intercorrelate (Schaeffer et al 1976). Above all, Sandblom (1997) discusses how the theme of art
depends on experience and one cannot create from nothing.
On the other hands, Keller (1984) found high performance in research and development organization concentrate with a tolerance for ambiguity. It is agreed upon, as important to creative giftedness is tolerance of ambiguity (Sternberg &Lubart, 1993; Kazemi, 1997b).
Experience often involves risk taking (Sternberg & Tardif, 1989; Sternberg &Lubart, 1993),
which relates to special type of personality. Goldsmith (1984) found Kirton Adaption-Innovation Inventory (KAI) correlated positively with the risk taking.
Conducting Economic Activity Education
Active mobility refers to movement, motor, physical skills, impulsiveness, hard work, high
activation, and perseverance.
Niaz et al (2000) found that the mobility-fixity dimension was the most consistent predictor of
academic performance with creativity scores. Niaz et al (1991) also indicated that the most
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mobile students performed best on creativity tests. Moreover, Bloomberg (1971) suggests that
horizontal mobility may be essential in creativity.
Some of the evidences show that as increase positive attitude toward human movement and
motor skill enhance creative thinking. Encouraging children to participate in meaningful decision making will increase positive attitudes toward human movement, enhance creative
thinking and self- concept, and improve motor skills (Schempp&Cheffers, 1982). It has been
suggested that relationship between movement and creativity (Dodds, 1978; Gowan, 1978;
MacKinnon , 1985; Brockmeyer, 1987). Ewing et al (1975) indicated correlation between perceived movement and Creative Thinking. It would appear that improving creativity often
caused by movement, motor skills, or hard work. Zachopoulou et al (2006) showed that physical education promotes preschool children's creativity in the early years. Physical education
lessons in order to provide children with opportunities to develop their creative thinking using
movement elements, motor skills, and movement exploration. The children improved their
creative fluency and imagination. Besides, Waelsch (1994) discussed the notion that adversity
and hard work might assist a person in achieving acts of creativity. She insisted other people
who have had similar experiences where adversity nurtured their creativity.
Cramond (1994b) describes the similarities between the behavioral manifestations of ADHD
and creativity, some speculations about their common etiology, and some illustrative case
studies. In addition, Cramond (1994a) examined the incidence of ADHD among individuals
who are highly creative. Besides, Cramond (1995) examines the fact that the defining characteristics of ADHD are also key descriptors in biographies of highly creative individuals.
It seems that high activation and perseverance are specific trademarks of the creative person
(Sternberg & Tardif, 1989). Bachtold (1980) examined the biographies of women who were
eminent in the arts and sciences. Specific trademarks of the creative personality were high
activity levels and perseverance. Stokes (1999) obtained in her empirical study to link perseverance with effective creative behavior. Therefore, teachers as important indicators of creative students identify students’ mannerisms such as spontaneity and impulsiveness (Westby
& Dawson, 1995). Consequently, Maddi et al (1982) emphasize upon high activation and internal orientation as factors in creativity. Hence, Torrance has provided “Thinking Creatively
in Action and Movement scale.”
On the other hand, some investigators concentrate on "motor creativity"( Lubin & Sherrill;
1980).The motor creativity is often due to creative movement. Wang (2003) investigated the
effects of a creative movement program on the motor creativity of Taiwanese preschool children using Torrance's Thinking Creatively in Action and Movement scale. Results indicated
that the experimental group had significantly higher levels of motor creativity than did the
control group, suggesting that the creative movement program was essential to the development of the total child.
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Development of Economic Thinking
Special thinking consists firstly problem examination, secondly internal freedom to cognitive
style and imagination, thirdly inner verbal spontaneity, fourthly divergent thinking, and finally ability to regress more deeply and a greater facility to return to secondary process
thought with ease.
The author discusses the relationship between problem examination and creativity. Creating
and developing of the “problemology” is unavoidable for promoting creativity (Kazemi, 1996).
In addition, Reiter-Palmon, et al. (1998) investigated whether problem construction plays a
role in how individuals interpret ill-defined, ambiguous problems in a way that fits their personality. Results suggest a positive relationship between problem construction ability and fit
of the solution to personality type.
Parnes (1971) offers that a creative person posses inner freedom and openness. Treffinger
(2004) proposed openness and courage to explore ideas. The innovation correlates negatively
with the dogmatism (Goldsmith1984). Forisha (1978, 1983) studied and reviewed the research
in creativity, imagery, cognitive styles and their inter relationship. She concludes that imagery
and creativity are interrelated with other personality factors and that the relationship between
creativity and imagery is central to some subjects and not to others. In addition, relationship
between scientific field and imagery has been emphasized (Roe, 1951; kazemi, 1996).
Gough (1976) focuses on word association. In addition, the author emphasizes on word fluency, verbal capacity, and writing skill. According to the author, the “problemology” relates
to word conceptualization (Kazemi, 1995, 1996). Renner & Renner (1971) found that creativitytraining programs increase verbal fluency and flexibility should influence a person's cognitive
style preferences toward complexity. Thurston & Runco (1999) focuses on the importance of
flexibility in four areas. Flexibility as a cognitive processes described using divergent thinking
models. Flexibility in insight problems shows the importance of not having mental blocks in
problem solving. Flexibility in personality theories shows how important it is to flex in being
a productive citizen, which leads to the fourth area- the importance of flexibility and human
development.
Thinking styles is included one of resources that support creativity (Gautschi, 2001).The investigators emphasize upon relationship between divergent thinking and creativity (White, 1968;
Nicholls, 1972; Ziv, 1984; Davis, 1989; Kabanoff & Bottger, 1991; Kazemi, 1994, 1997c; Thurston
&Runco, 1999; Carson, 1999). It is seemingly that the convergent thinking, abstraction, and
deduction jointly can lead to creative thinking (kazemi, 1994). The special thinking involves
mannerisms such as spontaneity. Furthermore, the teachers identify spontaneity as important
indicator of creative students (Westby & Dawson, 1995).Creative actors place an enormous
value on spontaneity in performance (Nemiro, 1997). Treffinger (2004) proposed listening to
one's inner voice. As the author describes it, there is an inner verbal spontaneity.
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A creative person moves into generating ideas ,digging into ideas or being divergent, and then
ends with a convergence on a practical path or idea in which he/she develops a plan of action
(Carson, 1999; Treffinger, 2004). Furthermore, Dudek & Chamberland-Bouhadana, (1984) suggests that mature artists have a greater ability to produce a better creative product because of
the greater ability to regress more deeply and a greater facility to return to secondary process
thought with ease. Similarly, Sternberg & Lubart (1995) present the creative process from the
perspective of the creative person who develops unusual or initially misunderstood solutions
to problems. The creative processes involve an active search for gaps in knowledge, problem
finding, consciously attempting to break through the existing boundaries and limitations in
one s field (Sternberg & Tardif, 1989).
Development of Emotion of Thought
On his long experiences, the author made an instrument. Analyzing the instrument indicated
that there is an integrative paradigm that involves affective and cognitive domains. As far as
the author concludes, he names this phenomenon in Persian, “Hayajan-e-Andisheh” (Emotion
of Thought). Emotion of Thought involves “Poyaei” and “Bitabi” (in Persian) There are also
six components for any eras.
Generally, thinking relates to emotion. Lagattuta et al (1997) and Lagattuta& Wellman (2001)
found that even 3-year-olds demonstrated knowledge about connections between past events
and present emotions. In addition, 4 and 6 years-olds understand the influence of mental activity on emotions. In addition, Gratton (2001) proposes one way of partly meeting them: the
application of critical thinking skills to beliefs responsible for emotions.
On the other hands, kuo& Paschal (1974) explore the relationship between emotional disturbance in children and the creative thinking factors suggested by the Torrance Tests of Creative
Thinking. Findings suggest that emotionally disturbed children do not use their creative energy to produce a large number of ideas with words. Besides, Elder (1997) states that we must
be understand the relationships between the cognitive function and the affective dimension.
Developing critical-thinking skills relates to this understanding. In this regard, Cole & Sarnoff
(1980) emphasize the balance between thought and emotion is important for personal effectiveness as well as for creative productivity. Therefore, Vernon (1989) presents a comprehensive curriculum to help youngsters learn positive mental health concepts that contains activities are grouped into five topic areas: (1) self-acceptance; (2) feelings; (3) beliefs and behavior;
(4) problem solving and decision-making; and (5) interpersonal relationships.
According to “hexahedral paradigm,” the creativity relates to individual readiness, resource
orientation, attitude, utilization of experiences, active mobility, and special thinking. “Emotion
of thought” gradually integrates the factors .Therefore, emotion of thought is seventh factor to
create creativity. In other words, creation of the creativity depends on emotion of thought.
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Encouraging the Poyaei "Poyaei" involves motion and movement desire, curiosity, feeling
of extra ordinary power, great thought, humor and easily expression of emotions, and tendency for experience
Promotion motion and movement desire means adventurously emotive and thrill motion
desire.
Encouraging curiosity
It refers to: (1) stimulating any ambiguous problem to exploration, (2) pertinacity for adventure risk taking, and (3) inconvenience curiosity thinking.
Giving confidence feeling of extra ordinary power
Supporting great thought
It means thinking about a significant and original action for truth discovery conjugate to express emotion easily.
Preparing conditions for humor and easily expression of emotions
Encouraging tendency for experience
It means sensible disquiet for experiencing information and knowledge.
Programming for counseling interventions for Bitabi
"Bitabi" involves agitation, captivity, somatic expressions of thinking, misgiving, twirling of
thought and loneliness sense. Agitation refers to erosive agitation, continuous worry, body
tremor, and less activity. Captivity refers to continuous mental involvement, to be worry about
of problem solving, and inner rigorous speech. Somatic expressions of thinking mean thirst and
hunger sense, headache, heartthrob, and thirsty sense in mouth. Misgiving means forgetfulness, amazement, and exhaustion. Twirling of thought (and body tremor). Loneliness sense refers
to worrying, uneasiness, and feeling of pressure for activity (Kazemi, 2007, 2008).
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi
2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1, 71-73
Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
2014, Volume 4, Issue 1, 71-73
______________________________________________________
An Interview with Buket Yakmaci-Guzel
Michael F. Shaughnessy1
MFS: Professor, first of all, could you tell us a bit about what you are currently doing and a bit
about your education and experience?
BYG: I’m a researcher and teacher educator from Istanbul, Turkey. I’m working at the
Department of Secondary School Science and Mathematics Education in Bogazici University
in which top 1-3% students are admitted as a result of a very competitive central university
entrance examination . I received my B.S. degree on “Teaching Chemistry” from Bogazici University. During my graduate education in “Educational Sciences”, I had studied on giftedness.
I carried out a research study on Dabrowski’s overexcitabilities. After completing my graduate education, since 1998, I have been working as a chemistry teacher educator. My current
research interests are; identifying and improving conceptual understanding in science/chemistry, science/chemistry teacher education, professional development in science/chemistry
teaching. During my career, I offered many undergraduate and graduate courses such as Applied Research in Science Education, Text Analysis in Science and Mathematics Education,
Teaching Methods in Science and Mathematics, Teaching Methods in Chemistry, Practice
Teaching in Chemistry, etc.
MFS: Now, what first got you excited in the topic of overexcitables, and the theory of
Dabrowski?
BYG: I first encountered with the concepts of “OEs” and “TPD” while I was doing my
Ph.D. coursework. When I read the article “Identifying gifted adolescents using personality
characteristics: Dabrowski’s overexcitabilities” by C. M. Ackerman (1997), I was so excited and
found it so interesting. Then I read more and more on this “personality theory” and I was
influenced with the idea that “conflict and inner suffering were necessary for advanced development”. It was very similar to the ideas from well-known learning theories which emphasize
the importance of “conflict” and “disequilibrium” as a prerequisite for further learning. When
I was first interested in “OEs”, there was no study carried out in Turkey about the issue, so it
was another driving force for me to choose that topic to study further in my dissertation and
contribute to the existing literature by collecting and analyzing data from my country.
MFS: In your study, you identified students according to the Raven’s Progressive Matrices.
Why this test?
PhD, School of Education, Eastern New Mexico University, Portales, NM 88130, USA.
Email: Michael.Shaughnessy@enmu.edu
©Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi/Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education
ISSN 2146-3832, http://www.tuzed.org
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Shaughnessy
An Interview with Buket Yakmacı-Güzel
BYG: I chose this test, because it was easy to administer to a larger sample and easy to
score (practicality). It was one of the most widely-known, and valid tests measuring “general
intellectual ability” (quality). Also, since it consisted of items with figures (non-verbal), it’s one
of the tests free from cultural bias (culture-fair).
MFS: You also looked at students with high motivation, high creativity and high leadership
scores. What did you find?
BYG: I didn’t want only to rely on “general intellectual ability” but also other variables
(like motivation, leadership, creativity as suggested by Renzulli (978) and Marland (1972)
which might be related to giftedness. I thought that instead of administering some tests to
measure these variables, asking teachers rating their students on these might be more practical
and more informative. So I wanted home room teachers to evaluate and classify their students
in terms of these variables. I explained teachers what I mean by each variable and asked them
to group their students accordingly. According to these classifications, I compared different
groups of students in terms of their OE scores.
As a result of analysis I found that:




In all OE dimensions, high intellectual ability students scored higher than low intellectual ability students and in Imaginational and Intellectual OEs these high intellectual
ability students scored significantly higher than low intellectual ability students,
Imaginational and Intellectual OE scores of students who have labeled as “highly motivated students” by their teachers are significantly higher than the scores of those who
labeled as “low motivated students”,
Imaginational and Intellectual OE scores of students who are categorized as leaders by
their home room teachers are significantly higher than those who are classified as nonleaders.
All five types of OE scores (Psychomotor, Sensual, Imaginational, Intellectual, Emotional) of students who have high creativity are significantly greater than those of low
creativity.
MFS: What did you find in terms of boys and girls in this research?
BYG: There is no difference in terms of any OE scores of male and female students
according to the analysis of my study.
MFS: I have been to Turkey, and am by no means an expert on your culture. But in terms of
cultural issues- what are the important issues in this regard?
BYG: When intellectual ability is concerned, the elevated OE scores on Imaginational
and Intellectual areas are frequently seen for highly intelligent individuals in many research
studies in the literature. My findings are very similar to those and so provided additional support to the literature. In my study, when the data were analyzed also in terms of motivation
and leadership, it was again observed that Imaginational and Intellectual OE scores of high
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi, 2014, 4/1
Shaughnessy
An Interview with Buket Yakmacı-Güzel
and low groups differed in favor of high groups. This implies that high intellectual ability
group students quite coincide with high motivation and leadership groups in my sample.
On the other hand, in the literature, high intellectual ability group is frequently found to display high Emotional OE whereas it was not the case in my study. This is also similar for motivation and leadership variables in my study in terms of Emotional OE score. This shows that
Emotional OE doesn’t differentiate high intellectual, highly motivated and leader individuals
from their lower counterparts. It was one of the interesting findings of my study and it was
difficult to explain. The Emotional OE scores of whole sample in my study was relatively low
when compared with Ackerman’s study (1997). This difference shows that Turkish students
have either lower Emotional OE or cannot reflect their Emotional OE in their responses to the
Overexcitability Questionnaire.
A possible explanation for this might be that in Turkish culture, from earlier ages children
learn to hide their feelings because exhibiting them might be considered as a sign of weakness.
Additionally there is no formal training integrated in school curricula about increasing emotional awareness, making empathic relationships with others or overcoming negative and positive feelings. These might be factors for Turkish population for not being able to express OE
in emotional dimension.
MFS: What do you see, in retrospect in terms of the importance of your study?
BYG: I think, my study was important for being the first study on this issue carried out
in Turkey. There were studies comparing OEs of gifted and non-gifted individuals by mainly
taking account the intellectual ability factor and sometimes creativity factor. In my study, besides these two factors, I also tried to add the variables of motivation and leadership and I
found similar results with intellectual ability factor on OE scores. So, this might imply a positive relationship between high intellectual ability, and motivation and leadership.
I know that OEs caught the attention of different researchers from around the world in later
years and some comparisons across countries and cultures in terms of OEs were done as well
later.
MFS: Thank you for your interest in my research.
Turkish Journal of Giftedness & Education, 2014, 4/1
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Türk Üstün Zekâ ve Eğitim Dergisi…….Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education
Haziran 2014, Cilt 4, Sayı 1
June 2014, Volume 4, Issue 1
Editör Notu/Editorial
1
The Nuremberg Music-Ecological Approach: Why are some musicians internationally
successful and others not?
Nürnberg Müzik Ekolojik Yaklaşımı: Neden Bazı Müzisyenler uluslararası
başarılı, diğerleri değil?
Albert Ziegler, Sabrina Straßer, Wolfgang Pfeiffer & Catherine Wormald
2
A Cross-National Comparison of School Students’ Perceptions Regarding High
Performing Peers
Öğrencilerin Üst Düzey Performans Sergileyen Akranlarına Yönelik Algılarının Ülkeler Arası
Karşılaştırması
Hyerim Oh, Margaret Sutherland, Niamh Stack, Maria del Mar Badia, Sheyla Blumen,
Anh-Thu Nguyen Quoc, Catherine Wormald, Julie Maakrun, Barbara Baier, Martha
Schmidt & Albert Ziegler
10
Chances and Limitations of Implementing Measures of Differentiation for Gifted
Children in Primary Schools: The Teachers’ Part
İlkokuldaki Üstün Zekâlı Öğrencilere Yönelik Program Farklılaştırma Uygulamalarındaki
Şanslar ve Sınırlılıklar: Öğretmen Kısmı
Martina Endepohls-Ulpe & Natascha Thömmes
24
The Associative Basis of Scientific Creativity: A Model Proposal
Bilimsel Yaratıcılığın Çağrışımsal Temelleri: Model Önerisi
Esra Kanlı
37
Economic Creativity Development
Ekonomik Yaratıcılığın Gelişimi
Nasseroddin Kazemi Haghighi & Ahmad Reza Kazemi Haghighi
51
An Interview with Buket Yakmaci-Guzel
Buket Yakmacı-Güzel ile Röportaj
Michael F. Shaughnessy
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