Creativity in Context · Short

Creativityin context: From the Person to the Planet

Teresa Amabile · ESM · Global Creativity and Innovation Indexes
Workshop 2 of 2

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Where we left off

  • High-quality measurement = validity + reliability + cross-cultural equity + feasibility.
  • Four quadrants: I · IT · WE · ITS.
  • Tools so far: self-beliefs, TTCT, RAT, CAQ, Runco, ESM/EMA, CAT, SOQ.
  • Today: how context shapes creativity, and how we measure it at scale.
I
IT
WE
ITS
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Today

Theory

Amabile’s componential theory and the work environment.

Live ESM

Four short pings on ourselves.

Indexes

GII and GCI, and their limits.

Debrief

What our data shows, and what it can’t.

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ESM briefing

  1. You are both participants and researchers.
  2. Four short pings, same questions, about 60 seconds.
  3. Anonymous and voluntary. Your code: first two letters of a pet’s name + birth month.
  4. Notice your experience. Don’t try to be creative on purpose.

The room opens each ping for you.

0:05
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Scan · the room already knows which ping this is
Ping 1
0:05 · 90-second window
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Amabile I

Teresa Amabile

  • Social psychologist, Professor Emerita at Harvard Business School.
  • Founded the social psychology of creativity (1979 on); created CAT; co-developed KEYS.
  • Creative = novel and appropriate to a heuristic task. Creativity is the idea; innovation is its implementation (1988).
NovelAppropriate Creativeresponse
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The big claim

Context can change creativity

  • Before Amabile, creativity was treated as a trait or an ability.
  • The social environment can raise or lower creativity in the same person.
  • Expecting evaluation or reward reduced artistic and writing creativity (1979, 1985).
Context
↓
↓
Creative output
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Amabile, 1983 · 1996

The componential theory

Three components inside the person, one outside. Creativity is highest where they overlap.

Domain-relevant skillsKnowledge, technique, talent: the “performance space”. Monday: content validity.
Creativity-relevant processesFlexible thinking, tolerance of ambiguity, persistence. Trainable. Monday: TTCT, RAT.
Task motivationIntrinsic motivation principle. Controlling rewards undermine; enabling ones help (synergy, 1993).
Social environmentCulture, leaders, peers, resources, time. Acts through motivation. The easiest to change.
The social environment Domain-relevantskillsCreativity-relevantprocessesTaskmotivationCreativity ishighest wherethey overlap
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The creative process

  1. Problem or task identification
  2. Preparation
  3. Response generation
  4. Response validation
  5. Outcome assessment: loops back

Amabile & Pratt (2016) make it dynamic: progress and meaning feed motivation. A system, not a trait list.

1Identify2Prepare3Generate4Validate5Assess
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Preview of my point of view

Mapping to the quadrants

Amabile’s theory sits across three quadrants. The indexes sit in the fourth.

I
Subjective
  • Task motivation
IT
Objective
  • Skills and processes
WE
Intersubjective
  • Social environment
ITS
Interobjective
  • Indexes (later)
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Activity A · 15 min · pairs

Map the components

  • Pick a real creative project.
  • Fill in the four boxes.
  • Which component is weakest? What single change in the environment would help most?
  • Share one insight.
SkillsWhat do you know and can do?
ProcessesHow do you work and think?
MotivationWhy are you doing it?
EnvironmentWho and what is around it?
0:40
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Scan · the room already knows which ping this is
Ping 2
0:45 · 90-second window
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Break

Ten minutes

0:55 – 1:05
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Amabile II · measuring the work environment

KEYS

  • Amabile et al. (1996): a validated scale of the perceived environment for creativity.
  • Six stimulants, two obstacles.
  • Compare the SOQ from Monday: Freedom, Trust and Openness, Idea Time.

Stimulants

Organizational encouragementSupervisory encouragementWork-group supportFreedomSufficient resourcesChallenging work

Obstacles

Organizational impedimentsWorkload pressure
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Inner work life

Progress and pressure

The progress principle

Diaries of knowledge workers (Amabile & Kramer, 2011): making progress in meaningful work lifted inner work life the most. Good mood one day predicted creative thinking that day and the next (2005). A diary study is close kin to ESM.

Under the gun

High time-pressure days meant less creative thinking, with a hangover after (2002). People felt more creative under pressure but weren’t rated so: I and IT diverge, so measure both.

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Scan · the room already knows which ping this is
Ping 3
1:20 · 90-second window
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Discussion

  1. Where has an environment helped or blocked your creativity?
  2. Which KEYS scale would you measure in your own setting?
  3. How would you measure it without one person’s mood that day biasing it?
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Zooming out · ITS

Global Innovation Index

  • If environments shape creativity, can we measure them across countries?
  • WIPO, annual. GII 2026: 139 economies, about 80 indicators.
  • Score = average of an input and an output sub-index.
GII score

Innovation input

InstitutionsHuman capital and researchInfrastructureMarket sophisticationBusiness sophistication

Innovation output

Knowledge and technology outputsCreative outputs
1:30
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GII 2026

Headline results

  • No new economy in the top 15; Europe holds 14 of the top 25.
  • UAE enters the top 25 (25th, up from 30th).
  • 21 economies innovate above their development level, led by India and Viet Nam.
  1. Switzerland1st for a 16th year in a row
  2. Sweden
  3. United States
  4. Republic of Korea
  5. Singapore
1:34
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Florida, Mellander & King, 2015 · the “3 Ts”

GII vs Global Creativity Index

Global Innovation IndexGlobal Creativity Index
PurposeInnovation capability and outputConditions that attract and use creative talent
FocusInstitutions, R&D, patents, creative outputsTechnology, Talent, Tolerance
CadenceAnnual2015, not updated on a cycle
WeaknessBoth national-scale, composite and mostly objective data
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Are indexes valid measures?

Construct

Is a patent count creativity? Does “tolerance” capture inclusion?

Ecological

National averages hide cities, clusters, communities.

Equity

Formal, IP-protectable creativity counts. Everyday creativity is invisible.

Reliability

Rank changes can be methodology as much as real change.

Weighting

Composites need sensitivity analysis (Nardo et al., 2008).

Creative class

A critique of the thesis: Peck (2005).

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10 min · groups of 3–4

Small-group task

  1. Choose one country.
  2. Where is it on the GII? What would Amabile say about its environment?
  3. What can the index see, and what can it not?
  4. Report one blind spot.
What can the index see?
What can it not see?
1:46
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Scan · the room already knows which ping this is
Ping 4
1:50 · 90-second window
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Activity B

ESM debrief

Open the live debrief in the ping room.

  1. How did mood, energy and creative engagement change across the pings? (line chart)
  2. Was engagement higher when challenge and skill were both high (flow)?
  3. Was it higher when people felt free to share unusual ideas?
  4. Did the activity matter (listening, discussing, making)?

Expect noise: small n, four pings. Compare change within people with differences between them.

Live debrief
1:55
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What our ESM can and cannot tell us

Strengths

In the moment. Less recall bias. Variation within people.

Limits

Reactivity. Self-report only. Tiny sample. A classroom isn’t everyday life.

Better

Week-long signals in natural settings.

Triangulate

Pair it with CAT-rated products or sensor data.

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My point of view

Creativity is measured best in layers

Person, situation and society each tell part of the story. Pair an ITS index with WE climate and I experience data.

The quadrants are lenses, not silos.

I
Subjective
  • Self-beliefs
  • ESM mood and motivation
IT
Objective
  • TTCT, RAT, CAQ
  • Observed behavior
WE
Intersubjective
  • CAT, KEYS, SOQ
ITS
Interobjective
  • GII, GCI
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Takeaways

Next steps

  • Creativity = skills + processes + motivation, in an environment that helps or harms.
  • Meaningful progress beats pressure.
  • Indexes are maps: ask what they miss.
  • 7-day ESM in the ping room (5 pings a day) + 600-word reflection.
  • Read: Amabile & Pratt (2016); Hennessey & Amabile (2010).
Questions?
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References full list in the long version

  • Amabile (1979, 1982, 1983, 1985, 1988, 1993, 1996)
  • Amabile, Barsade, Mueller & Staw (2005). ASQ, 50(3)
  • Amabile, Conti, Coon, Lazenby & Herron (1996). AMJ, 39(5)
  • Amabile, Hadley & Kramer (2002). HBR, 80(8)
  • Amabile & Kramer (2011). The progress principle
  • Amabile & Pratt (2016). ROB, 36
  • Csikszentmihalyi & Larson (1987). JNMD, 175(9)
  • Florida (2002); Florida, Mellander & King (2015)
  • Glăveanu (2013). RGP, 17(1)
  • Hektner, Schmidt & Csikszentmihalyi (2007). ESM. Sage
  • Hennessey & Amabile (2010). ARP, 61
  • Isaksen, Lauer & Ekvall (1999). Psych. Reports, 85(2)
  • Nardo et al. (2008). Composite indicators. OECD
  • Peck (2005). IJURR, 29(4)
  • Runco & Jaeger (2012). CRJ, 24(1)
  • Shiffman, Stone & Hufford (2008). ARCP, 4
  • WIPO (2026). Global Innovation Index 2026. doi.org/10.34667/tind.60373
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