An Experimental Study Of The Influence Of Forgiveness On Creativity

Although the cognitive mechanisms of creative thinking have been widely studied and discussed from different points of view, a consensus has not been reached stilly among the researches. The double channel model of creativity regards that by the flexible routes and perseverant ways, the individual can pave the way to creative ideas, solutions or products. Even under different environments or containing the individual differences, it can also influence the creativity through the interaction between one or two of the paths themselves. Previous studies have demonstrated that the conflict will suppress individual creativity. To the contrary, whether forgiveness can promote the creative thinking has been studied rarely. Therefore, according to the double channel model of creativity, we investigate the mechanism how the forgiveness can affect on the creative thinking.This research adopts the divergence thinking test, insight problem of Indiana University and classic insight problem treatments as the materials, combining two-stage paradigm "the start of the forgiveness environments-creativity tests" as well, to perform an-depth discussion on whether the forgiveness can influence and in what mode to be influenced. It includes three experiments:the validation of the effectiveness based on the narrative start paradigm, whether the emotion is the intermediary factor for the forgiveness to affect the creativity, whether the cognitive load acts as an intermediary role when the forgiveness influence the creativity, respectively.The first experiment has tested the impacts on the individual creativity under different forgiveness conditions (forgiveness, control, no forgiveness). The results showed that:1) the novelty of the individual divergent thinking test is higher than that under forgiveness condition; 2) there’s no obvious difference for the smoothness of the individual test for all the three situations; 3) the accuracy rate of the individual insight problem treatments under the forgiveness condition can be higher than that under no forgiveness condition, but there is no difference with under control condition.Based on the first experiment, the second experiment investigate whether the emotion can act as an intermediary factor for the forgiveness to influence the creativity. The results indicated that:1) under forgiveness condition, the novelty of the individual divergent thinking tests is higher than that under no forgiveness condition, but there is no difference under control condition; 2) there’s no obvious difference for the smoothness of the individual test for all of them; 3) the forgiveness condition has obvious effects on the positive emotions, in term of the forgiveness condition and control condition, the tests under the forgiveness condition have shown much less positive emotions. However, the positive emotion is irrelevant to the creativity fluency and novelty. Therefore, the emotion can be excluded from the intermediary role.A deeper study based on the aforementioned experiments, the third experiment has been performed to investigate whether the emotion and cognitive load can act as the intermediary factors for the forgiveness to influence the creativity. The results showed that:1) under the forgiveness condition, the correct solutions to Dunker candle task are higher than that under no forgiveness condition, but there is no difference comparing to the control condition; 2) the cognitive load has inhibitory effects on the creativity, it’s inhibited more under forgiveness condition than under control condition; 3) the emotion is excluded as the intermediary role.In conclusion, this study has demonstrated that forgiveness can affect the creativity positively with the flexible pathways, and cognitive load may play an intermediary role. Furthermore, cognitive load has inhibitory effects on the creativity, which is more obvious under control condition than the control condition.