Creativity must represent something different, new, or innovative. It has to be different and also be appropriate to the task at hand. The first chapter of the book deals with the Four-Criterion Construct of Creativity, which attempts to integrate both Western and Eastern conceptions of creativity. This is followed by a chapter which addresses how creativity operates on individual and social/environmental levels, and the effects and outcomes of the creative mind. Chapter 3 discusses the structure of creativity. A key work on creative domains is that of Carson, Peterson, and Higgins, who devised the creativity achievement questionnaire (CAQ) to assess 10 domains. The fourth chapter discusses measures of creativity and divergent thinking tests, Torrance Tests, Evaluation of Potential Creativity (EPOC) and Finke Creative Invention Task. Some popular personality measures use different theories, such as Eysenck’s Personality Questionnaire, which looks at extraversion, neuroticism and psychoticism. Chapter 6 focuses on a key issue, intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation and their relationship to creativity. While the seventh chapter deals with the relationship between creativity and intelligence, the eighth chapter describes three ’classic’ studies of creativity and mental illness which focus on the connection between bipolar disorder and creativity, usage of structured interviews and utilization of historiometric technique. One school admissions area that already uses creativity is gifted admissions—which students are chosen to enter gifted classes, programs, or after-school activities. The book also talks about creative perceptions and dwells upon the question whether creativity is good or bad.

A concise, reader-friendly introduction to an important but often underappreciated topic in modern psychology, this book explains the role of comedy, jokes, and wit in the sciences and discusses why they are so important to understand. The author draws from his personal experiences in stand-up comedy to focus on how humor can regulate emotion, reduce anxiety and defuse tense situations, expose pretensions, build personal relationships, and much more. He irreverently debunks the pseudoscience on the topic of humor and leaves readers not only funnier, but better informed. Chapter 1 provides some ways to classify jokes into categories, discusses some theories about what makes something funny, and gets into the caveats about why this work can be so difficult. Comedy alters mood, thought, stress, and pain. Jokes and laughter may play an important role in health, mental illness, marital bliss, education, and psychotherapy. The second chapter discusses the social psychology of humor, and looks at how the presence of other people can make things seem funnier. Folks in both education and business often turn to humor in an attempt to captivate, inform, and persuade. A close look at the research on immune function, allergies, erectile dysfunction, and longevity reveals some promise for laughter’s health benefits. Research offers more support for humor’s impact on psychological well-being than on physical health. Humor can have direct effects on physical health and psychological well-being; it can buffer folks against the slings and arrows of daily hassles.

This book for undergraduate courses teaches students to apply critical thinking skills across all academic disciplines by examining popular pseudoscientific claims through a multidisciplinary lens. It discusses the need for critical thinking, describes pseudoscience, and illustrates some of the common mistakes made in pseudoscientific thinking. Understanding the principles of critical thinking is an essential foundation for making rational decisions, and the basic principles are easy enough to remember and implement when possible. The book also focuses on how the human brain does not process information in a rational, logical fashion and instead is rife with natural biases, and exposes many of the social factors that come into play that prevent one from gaining an unbiased, critical perspective on information. Sensationalist stories gain traction via our confirmation bias, and our cognitive dissonance, not being able to reconcile the complicated version of events with the sensationalist one results in the backfire effect, in which people double down on existing beliefs. The book further discusses alien visitation and abduction and examines two areas where alternative medicine is prevalent—physical health (chiropractic treatment, acupuncture) and mental health (e.g., facilitated communication for autism and sensory integration therapy). Finally, the book takes a look at how religion and culture impact science and vice versa, using the narrative of the “culture wars” surrounding topics such as heliocentrism, the theory of evolution via natural selection, and climate change.