Creativity and acculturation: Psychological and cultural effects on the divergent thinking of Cuban preadolescent immigrants entering the United State

Timmel (2001) studied the psychological and cultural effects on divergent thinking of Cuban preadolescent immigrants entering the United States. Cuban immigrants arrive by raft on the Florida coast almost daily. Many of the "Balseros" (or "raft-fugees", as this author calls them) who arrived in 1994 and 1995 were preadolescent children. They would have been in what Torrance termed "the fourth grade slump" in creative thinking (Torrance, 1967). Yet, creativity was needed by these children to understand and be understood in their new surroundings. Did their travails ignite the sleepy creativity within them at this age? Or did the acculturating process accentuate the fourth grade slump? In response, forty-four children in Dade County, Florida were studied for two consecutive years. Half were newly arrived Cuban children in the third, fourth, and fifth grades, and half were American children of the same demographics. Each year, each child received three divergent thinking tests and one personal interview. The first test was visual, Torrance's Tests of Creative Thinking, Figural version, where the children completed figures, and titled drawings. The second test was an auditory exercise where the children responded to sounds. The third set of scores was determined from the interview test, where uses for objects presented were analyzed. These scores were compared by nationality and by other demographic indicators. Concurrently, interview responses were qualitatively analyzed to discern social factors that might have affected the children's divergent thinking. The data suggest that upon arrival, the Cuban children displayed lower fluency (number of ideas) and flexibility (categorical differentiation of ideas) scores than their American peers. However, the originality (uniqueness of ideas) observed of them was greater. After a year, when the same tests and another interview were conducted, the Cuban children had dramatically improved their scores, equaling or surpassing their American peers on one fluency and all flexibility measures. Their originality scores remained higher than those of American children, but had not improved further. The interviews signaled that the Cuban children had acculturated fairly well to American society by then. Acculturation clearly affected divergent thinking at this age.

Timmel, Jill Lissette. (2001). Creativity and acculturation: Psychological and cultural effects on the divergent thinking of Cuban preadolescent immigrants entering the United States. Dissertation Abstracts International Section A: Humanities and Social Sciences. Vol 61 (9-A): 3468