NotesFAQContact Us
Collection
Advanced
Search Tips
50 Years of ERIC
50 Years of ERIC
The Education Resources Information Center (ERIC) is celebrating its 50th Birthday! First opened on May 15th, 1964 ERIC continues the long tradition of ongoing innovation and enhancement.

Learn more about the history of ERIC here. PDF icon

Back to results
Peer reviewed Peer reviewed
Direct linkDirect link
ERIC Number: EJ1030353
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2014-Mar
Pages: 20
Abstractor: As Provided
Reference Count: 59
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0022-0175
Productive and Re-Productive Thinking in Solving Insight Problems
Cunningham, J. Barton; MacGregor, James N.
Journal of Creative Behavior, v48 n1 p44-63 Mar 2014
Many innovations in organizations result when people discover insightful solutions to problems. Insightful problem-solving was considered by Gestalt psychologists to be associated with productive, as opposed to re-productive, thinking. Productive thinking is characterized by shifts in perspective which allow the problem solver to consider new, sometimes transformational, approaches. Re-productive thinking, on the other hand, involves the application of familiar, routine, procedures. This article reports a study which investigated how self-reported productive and re-productive thinking are related to an individual's ability to solve insight problems. Our measures were tested against the Kirton Adaption-Innovation Inventory (KAI), and a battery of spatial insight problems. The results indicated that productive and re-productive thinking and the KAI were successful in predicting performance on spatial insight problems. Furthermore, the measures of productive and re-productive thinking accounted for spatial insight performance independently of scores on the KAI. In addition, the results suggested that re-productive thinking consists of two different components--one based on group conventions and the other on personal experience. Each contributed differently to solving insight problems.
Wiley-Blackwell. 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148. Tel: 800-835-6770; Tel: 781-388-8598; Fax: 781-388-8232; e-mail: cs-journals@wiley.com; Web site: http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers: Kirton Adaption Innovation Inventory