Ai-Girl Tan

Refining the Attitudes toward Seeking Professional Psychological Help Scale: Factorial Invariance across Two Asian Samples.

Abstract This article describes the validation and refinement of the short. 10-item version of the Attitudes Toward Seeking Professional Psychological Help (E, H. Fischer & J. L. Turner. 1970) scale using 2 separate samples. Confirmatory factor analyses results provided evidence of factorial invariance across both samples, thus supporting the cross-validation of a revised 9-item measure.

Convergent Creativity: From Arthur Cropley (1935-) Onwards

Arthur Cropleys view on convergent thinking is reviewed, with reflections on the relations of divergent and convergent processes and the roles of knowledge and convergent creativity. While divergence is about considering and generating multiplicity, possibility, difference, originality, and so on; convergence is about relating, associating, combining, and synthesizing. Both convergence and divergence are important mechanisms of creativity. A. J. Cropleys (2006) call for praising convergent thinking was timely as it signified a determined move of converging of a spectrum of knowledge creatively for possibilities.

Psychology in Teacher Education: A Perspective from Singapore's Pre-Service Teachers.

This paper reports on Singaporean pre-service teachers’ views of psychology and knowledge and the skills of psychology which are important for them. A total of 353 teachers taking the core module of educational psychology participated in the study. They rated the degree of appropriateness of items that described the discipline of psychology and responded to statements that described the sub-disciplines of psychology. They also rated the degree of importance of the items related to knowledge and skills for teachers. In general, the pre-service teachers of our study did not rate highly items related to knowledge. They rated moderately low general descriptions of the discipline of psychology. Three quarters to two thirds of them answered correctly descriptions related to counseling and general psychology, but possessed limited knowledge of the founders of psychology. The implications of the findings of our study for teaching of psychology and integrating psychology to teacher education are discussed.

Convergence in Creativity Development for Mathematical Capacity

In this chapter, we highlight the role of convergence in developing creativity and mathematical capacity. We renew our understanding of creativity from the relations of three creativity mechanisms: Convergence in divergence for emergence, and three principles of experience: Continuity, interaction and complementarity. Convergence in the context of creativity development is an incidence of learning for capacity building and knowledge construction. Examples of convergent processes in learning are: setting a plan, having a structure, and possessing coordinated capacity to complete a task. To elaborate, we refer to theories of development and creativity on how people develop their capacity in convergence (e.g., collaboration), through mathematical learning (e.g., with coherence, congruence), and for creativity (e.g., imagination). We make reference to convergent creativity of an eminent mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan (1887–1920) for a reflection on developing creativity and building capacity for good life.

An Exploratory Study on Singaporean Secondary School Students' Perceptions of Choral Learning

This paper explores 122 secondary school students’ perceptions of the choral learning environment. A survey questionnaire was developed taking into consideration the responses of a pilot study in which students were requested to list what they liked and disliked about the choir. The participants rated their degree of agreement on a five-point scale on psychosocial and other perspectives of choral learning. Three research questions were posed: (1) What are Singaporean secondary school students’ perceptions of choral learning? (2) Are there any gender differences in their perceptions of choral learning? (3) Are there any across school differences in their perceptions of choral learning? The findings of the study were discussed from the perspective of Singapore’s education and learning environment research.

Psychology of Cultivating Creativity in Teaching and Learning

This chapter calls for reflection on contemporary knowledge of creativity and highlights the neglected aspects of understanding of creativity: being, life, ontology, and existence. This chapter reviews the existing theories of creativity which are multiplicity in orientations. It proposes a framework of cultivating creativity which includes the systems view, constructive processes, creativity for the common good, and creativity for life.

Knowing Creativity. Commentary on Glăveanu, V. (2014). The Psychology of Creativity: A Critical Reading

Abstract In this commentary an indispensable aspect of creativity, knowing creativity, is articulated as a response to Glăveanu’s (2014) inquiry into advancement of the field of the psychology of creativity. Connotations of knowing are presented such as perceiving and understanding ourselves within our environment. Accordingly, knowing creativity is about genuinely seeing, sensing, feeling, and relating creativity for self and the common good.

Creativity Self-Efficacy and Its Correlates

Five hundred and forty-five Chinese students participated in the study aimed to examine multidimensionality of creativity self-efficacy and its personal (e.g. personality) and contextual (e.g. classroom environment) correlates. Nearly all aspects in the Big Five model (openness, extraversion, conscientious and agreeableness) were found to have significant, positive correlations with creativity self-efficacy. It was inconclusive if mastery approach or performance approach was a good predictor of creativity self-efficacy. Individualistic value was better than collectivistic value as a predictor of various dimensions of creativity self-efficacy. Students high in creativity self-efficacy scored higher in after-school academic, group activities and entertainment than their low creativity self-efficacious counterparts did.

Cross-Disciplinary Creativity and Design Thinking

Cross-disciplinarity is a converging process of reinstating the human as the core focus of all scientific endeavour and cultural practices, and humanness. Creativity is a renewal of human experience for good life. Design thinking is a skill of the twenty-first century towards generating immediate solution for complex and practical problems. Our chapter presents three assumptions of cross-disciplinary creativity for nurturing design thinking. One assumption is related to mechanisms of creativity: convergence, divergence, and emergence, which embrace the assumption of humanistic values of design thinking: harmony, authoritative conversation, and respect. Another assumption concerns principles of creativity experiences: interaction, continuity, and complementarity. In experiencing learning the principle of interaction unites (converges) with the principle of continuity. The principle of complementarity embraces the unified interaction and continuity in experience for creative synthesis (convergence in divergence) or emergence. Design thinking searches for emergence of novelty within the designer(s) or within the community of designer(s) in the presence of harmonious and respectful conversations. Value-oriented boundary crossing creativity nurtures design thinking for ethical solutions for complex problems. To elaborate, we present our experiences with the community of practice in an action research project on cross-disciplinary creative design teaching. We conclude by presenting an account on Singapore’s narratives of its creative design development and transformation.

Creative Imagination in Memorization in Mathematics Learning

Creative imagination and memorization are complementary abilities in learning mathematics (Vygotsky, J Russian East Eur Psychol 42(1):7–97, 2004). These complementary abilities engage “movement” in learning mathematics among “realities” (e.g., personal and social experience, emotion, and cultural practices) (see also Dewey, Experience and education. Touchstone, New York, 1938/1997). Creative imagination in memorization “embraces” forces of contradictions (e.g., differentiation, convergence, and emergence) (see Tan, Creativity in cross-disciplinary research. In: Shiu E (ed) Creativity research: an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary research handbook. Routledge, London, pp 68–85, 2013; Tan, Teaching mathematics creatively. In: Wegerif R, Li L, Kaufman J (eds) The handbook of research on teaching thinking. Routledge, London, pp 411–423, 2015). Possibilities as the core of creative learning in mathematics unfold in purposeful, playful, non-structured, social, and ethical activities (see Craft, Curric J 10(1):135–150, 1999).