Today's youth less creative?

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It may sound like the complaint of a jaded adult, but the youth today are less creative and imaginative as they used to be, scientists have found. In a study of about 300,000 creativity tests going back to the 1970s, researchers at the College of William and Mary in the US found that creativity has decreased among children in recent years.

Kyung Hee Kim, who led the study, said children have become less able to produce unique and unusual ideas since 1990. They are also less humorous, less imaginative and less able to elaborate on ideas, she said.

In her study, Kim analysed results from the Torrance test -- an exam that measures an aspect of creativity called divergent thinking. In this test, kids might be shown two circles and asked to draw something out of these shapes, LiveScience reported.

Interestingly, scores on the Torrance test have been decreasing while SAT scores are increasing. However, better test scores don't necessarily translate to improved creativity, Kim said. She said the policy that requires schools to conduct annual standardised tests as a way to assess whether they are meeting state education standards, may be partly responsible for the drop in creativity scores in the US.

Other culprits may be the rise in TV watching, a passive activity that doesn't need interactions with others, she said. The research has also shown creativity declines in adulthood as we become more aware of the notions of right and wrong answers, Kim said.

But just because we are doomed to become less imaginative as adults does not mean society shouldn't work to salvage creativity in children. After all, ideas in childhood may lead to future career pursuits.

"If this trend continues, students who look different, nonconformists, will suffer, because they are not accepted," Kim said, adding that research has shown that if creative personalities don't adjust to the school system, they can become underachievers and drop out of school.

However, experts said creativity is innate, so it can't really be lost but it needs to be nurtured. "It's not that creativity can necessarily disappear," said Ron Beghetto, an education psychologist at the University of Oregon. "But it can be suppressed in particular contexts."

The current focus on testing in schools, and the idea that there is only one right answer to a question, may be hampering development of creativity among kids, Beghetto said. "There's not much room for unexpected, novel, divergent thought," he said.

But the situation is not hopeless, Beghetto said. In fact, there's evidence to suggest that, worldwide, youngsters are very creative, particularly with their use of digital media, Beghetto said. And a recent study found that, at least in their playtime, kids are becoming more imaginative.

Experts, however, agreed that changes can be made in the classroom to cultivate creativity. "I think there should be a variety of ways to assess what students know and how they know it," Beghetto added.