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Abstract
The study was conducted to determine if physically fit subjects would outperform their non-physically fit control counterparts on various measures of creativity. The model employed was that of pretest and posttest with treatment and control groups present. The physically fit subjects failed to outperform the control group when exercise was not conducted prior to testing. When exercise, immediately prior to testing, became a factor in the treatment group it showed very fair gains in creativity, whereas the control group did not. The study concludes that vigorous exercise did interact with the creative process and also raises additional research questions that should be examined.
It has long been suspected that a positive relationship exists between creative thought processes and exercise. The early studies concerned themselves with relationships between basic cognitive functioning and various degrees of physical exercise and concluded a wide range of results (Tomporowski & Ellis, 1986). Thereafter, attention turned more specifically towards creativity and possible relationships to bouts of exercise and levels of personal fitness. Towards this end Gondola and Tuckman (1985) demonstrated positive relationships between exercise and capacity to perform creative tasks; furthermore, the effects were shown to hold over both short and long term exercise programs (Gondola, 1986). Gondola (1987) went on to assess that even a single session of aerobic dancing increased three measures of creative performance relative to a control group. A complex part of the puzzle is the degree to which mood elevations and depressions may influence creativity through hypomania or cyclothymia (Richards & Kinney, 1990). A fairly recent study that included mood effects in its hypotheses was forced to conclude that physical exercise enhanced creative thinking independently of any accompanying mood changes that occurred. In this experiment creativity was only measured post-exercise and subjects were limited to structured aerobic workouts of about twenty minutes. The authors suggest that introducing pretest measures of creativity and allowing subjects freedom to choose their own workouts may reflect more of the "stream of consciousness" which is facilitated by the exercise process (Steinberg et al., 1997).
The Study
The study, intending to explore further the effects found by Steinberg et al., was designed to determine if highly physically fit students would outperform a control group of non-physically fit students on...