Handbook of Creativity (Paperback)

~ Robert J. Sternberg PhD (Editor) "If one wanted to select the best novelist, artist, entrepreneur, or even chief executive officer, one would most likely want someone who is creative..." (more)
Key Phrases: divergent production tests, informational manipulations, preverbal processes, New York, Ness York, Chicago Press (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"His volume serves well as a handbook, containing chapters that are appropriately thorough and self-contained. Sternberg has put together and original, useful book that will be valuable in upper-division undergraduate collections and above." Choice

Product Description

The goal of this handbook is to provide the most comprehensive, definitive, and authoritative single-volume review available in the field of creativity. The book contains twenty-two chapters covering a wide range of issues and topics in the field of creativity, all written by distinguished leaders in the field. The volume is divided into six parts. The introduction sets out the major themes and reviews the history of thinking about creativity. Subsequent parts deal with methods, origins, self and environment, special topics and conclusions. All educated readers with an interest in creative thinking will find this volume to be accessible and engrossing.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 502 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press; 1 edition (October 28, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521576040
• ISBN-13: 978-0521576048
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #315,029 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thick and plentiful - worth it but not easy, August 27, 2005

By	T. McAlpine "Creator extraordinaire" (North America) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Sternberg's Handbook has an almost mythical reputation amongst the Creative Studies Students at Buffalo State College. While there are shortcomings to the Handbook, areas where key authors or subjects are missing (it is written from the behavioral scientist point of view, and there are other, equally valid viewpoints in creative studies), each chapter will have plenty of food for thought.

And, guaranteed, you will have the time to digest this food for thought, as each and every chapter requires slow and careful reading. If the writing were to be any denser, it would tear free from the pages and sink to the very center of the Earth! Yet, there is so much information that, in the end, the knowledge derived is more than worth the work needed to get at it.

One last note: This is a handbook for those interested in the deep research on creativity. It is NOT suitable a "first book" for anyone starting out to learn about creativity!

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wide ranging book, great advanced level introduction, June 13, 1999

By A Customer

Just reading the table of contents of this book will expand the ways you thought creativity could be studied. This is a cery broad book that gives representation to most of the approaches to studying creativity that have proven fruitful at all to date. Includes chapters on case study, historio-metrical, psychometrical, experimental, and many more research paradigms in creativity. Because the book is so wide ranging I'd say it's best as an intriduction for a college or graduate student interested in either perhaps entering this field of research, or one who is simply interested in a highly comprehensive and somewhat technical overview of inquiry into human creativity. Since it includes two chapters on the history of thought on creativity, it is even more comprehensive than one may expect!

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not for getting informed but to understand the subject!, April 9, 2000

By	Mehmet Yusuf YAHYAGIL "joseph5y" (Istanbul, Turkey) - See all my reviews

Dr.Sternberg's book on the evolution process of creativity research is a splendit source for anybody who deals with social sciences, a must for organizational behaviorists and a very satisfactory piece of reading for general reader.

The book does not give mere descriptions on the scope of creativity but it provides great amount of knowledge on the evolutionary process of creativity research from ancient times up to today! Furthermore, the subject of creativity has been examined both from theoretical and methodological perspective in such a creative manner which gives a very good knowledge about the major approaches, the outcomes of the previous researchs, main obstacles in the course of investigation, and finally the probable studies for further research on the creativity.

Consequently, the reader finds a good chance not only to have a detailed theoretical and practical information on the subject but also to learn the main approaches of outstanding social scientists towards the subject and not mentioning about the meticoulisly prepared bibliography.

I am amazed with the intensity of Dr.Sternberg's study the language of which is clear enough those of us whose Mother tongue is not English (like me!).