Defining creativity
In beginning research into the relationship between creativity and fashion design mood boards, the initial complexity of this relationship is the various definitions of creativity offered across domains. As an example, the following definitions taken from four major researchers in creativity; J.P. Guilford, Theresa Amabile and Howard Gardner respectively, show the various components and layers of creativity definition:
“a creative pattern is a manifest in creative behavior, which includes such activities as inventing, designing, contriving, composing, and planning. People who exhibit these types of behavior to a marked degree are recognized as being creative” (Guilford 1950, p .444)
“a product or response will be judged creative to the extent that (a) it is both novel and appropriate, useful, correct, or valuable response to the task at hand and (b) the task is heuristic rather than algorithmic” (Amabile 1983a, p. 33)
“the creative individual is a person who regularly solves problems, fashion products, or defines new questions in a domain that is initially considered novel but that ultimately becomes accepted in a particular cultural setting” (Gardner 1993, p. 35).
As can be inferred from these various definitions, there are multiple levels of creativity definition, with a few recurring thematic concepts. Generally, a person or product is considered to be creative based on novelty to the domain or field of work. In addition to novelty, the creative process and output evaluation and acceptance are commonplace in creativity definitions. Since the early 1950s research in the area of creativity has led to acceptance of the following four areas of focus (Four P’s) in creativity studies: (1) person, (2) process, (3) product and (4) press (environment) (Kaufman and Baer 2012). Initially, much of the research completed focused on the person and personality, but contemporary theoretical models exhibited the influence of the other three major concepts and show the relevance of evaluation and assessment of the creative product in relation to fashion designers and the fashion design process.
Fashion mood boards
A powerful communication tool, the fashion mood board comprises incongruent and seemingly un-related images which when tactfully selected provide complementary support in creating a coherent visual message discussing a specified theme or idea (Boyes 1998). Yet, the currently available research specific to mood boards is lacking and limited to a few studies within the past few years. Mood boards are a tool used to visually communicate information in fashion-related and consumer product industries (Cassidy 2011). Primary uses include bringing together images and ideas into an aesthetically and creatively impactful workspace, for a specific purpose. From an academic standpoint the inclusion of mood boards on projects and within courses provides training for industry practice, while providing students with the opportunity to communicate their ideas visually. Within this space, designers select and arrange images, artifacts, colors, fabrics, etc. in a calculated and planned effort to link content to a particular theme or idea. However, there exists limited training or skill development related to mood boards in academia, especially in relation to mood board evaluation and improvement, as well as the role in their role in the design process (Cassidy 2011).
Categorically, Cassidy (2008) defined four types of mood boards and their specific uses as indicated following. The mood boards used are examples created within the past 5 years by students for a course project. While these boards may not score high on creativity assessment, boards were purposely selected as evidence specific to the various categories identified by Cassidy (2011).
Category 1 boards (Fig. 1) are focused on target market identification, including lifestyles, socio-cultural factors, demographics, personal and cultural values/norms, and links between company and target market values. These boards are often labeled as lifestyle, target, customer, or consumer profile boards.
Category 2 (Fig. 2) is more conceptual in comparison and utilized during the initial stages of the product design process. Often focused on a feeling or exploration of ideas, board content is typically non-specific and derived from target market lifestyles. Through visual communication, these boards provide clarity and vision for a thematic concept derived from design briefs. Most often these are referred to as concept, idea, inspiration, story or style boards. These boards are conceptual in content and interpretation and therefore will be the focus of this investigation.
Category 3 boards (Fig. 3) enhance and sharpen the concepts and ideas developed in category 2 boards. Specificity is more apparent at this level and includes a variety of boards with clearly defined purpose: color, fabric, style, trend, samples and forecasting. Much of the work utilizing boards at this stage are focused on refining the product identity and message, through visual representation and comparison.
Category 4 boards (Fig. 4) are the most refined and professional boards, as they represent the final product line carried to clients and consumers. Often used by marketing and merchandising teams, the presentation or usage boards in this stage connect the product with the overall brand image and identity.
Mood boards encompass various aspects of the fashion industry and contribute significantly at each stage of the product development life cycle. Additionally, mood boards enhance creative thinking and fluency of ideas as well as exploration about the mode and content of the products’ visual message. Designers’ creative expression and experimentation during the mood board creation allows them to dive deeper into themes or concepts, providing a wealth of information for designers to pull inspiration from. Lastly, through the use of mood boards, designers may be able to communicate visually and effectively, what is a web of seemingly unconnected ideas, difficult to express verbally with similar impacts. In essence, the mood board serves to engage designers in deeper creative thinking, yet evidence is lacking regarding a formalized and reliable assessment instrument to provide critical feedback for mood board creation skill development in academia.
Consensual assessment technique
According to creativity researchers based in psychology and cognitive sciences, there are multiple levels of creativity, with a few recurring thematic ideas (Amabile 1996; Gardner 1993; Runco 2007; Simonton 2009). Generally, a person or product is considered to be creative based on novelty and usefulness to the domain or field of work. In addition to novelty, the creative process and output evaluation and acceptance are commonplace in creativity definitions (Amabile 1983a, 1996; Gardner 1983, 1993; Guilford 1950; Sawyer 2006; Torrance 1962). Early work conducted by Amabile (1983a, b, 1996) developing the Consensual Assessment Technique (CAT) is the foundation for numerous research studies and creativity theory development across domains. The original CAT contained sixteen items evaluating creativity and technical quality. The CAT is well validated in research studies and provides a reliable creativity assessment instrument using a range (expert to novice) of raters (Amabile 1983a, b, 1996; Baer 1997, 1998; Baer et al. 2004; Kaufman et al. 2005, 2007, 2008; Runco 1999). Studies conducted across domains using both adults and children as subjects, have yielded reliability results often exceeding .70 (see Amabile 1996). With early editions, a panel of expert raters independently evaluated parallel products on numerous measures of creativity and technical quality.
Condensed versions (single-item measures) of the CAT have offered similar reliability of creativity assessment, while facilitating the collection of assessment data. For instance, Kaufman et al. (2008) evaluated SciFaiku (Japanese variation on the haiku) poetry written by volunteers. In this study, both novice and expert raters conducted an assessment using a single-item measure asking them to rate the creativity of the poem on a scale of 1–6. Overall, reliability analyses for the separate groups were reported as good (>.80) and excellent (>.90). In a related and similar experiment, Kaufman et al. (2009) used a single question evaluation for creativity to assess short stories, with similar results. Expert and novice film ratings were evaluated using a single-item measure (rating scale 1–10) with success using students, online ratings, and expert film critics (Plucker et al. 2009). Successful results using the CAT are often defined as high levels of interrater reliability (>.80) within and between groups of expert and non-expert raters. This definition is used for the overall assessment of the CAT in the current study. In various domains, researchers using single-item measures of creativity have reported success using a condensed CAT, while reporting no administration issues, questions of reliability, nor validity concerns.
Expert vs. non-expert raters
In certain domains, would non-experts provide an equally accurate assessment of creativity than experts? While the cost and time of expert panels presents difficulties in creativity assessment, the use of non-experts may not provide a valid assessment of creativity, despite reliability measures (Kaufman and Baer 2012). Early research into the use of experts vs. non-experts indicates the incongruence in responses and creativity assessments; yet with sufficient interrater reliability within groups.
Kaufman et al. (2008) conducted a study involving experts and non-experts in a specified technical domain (poetry) and reported satisfactory to high interrater reliabilities (expert: α = .83; non-expert: α = .94). However, sample sizes of raters (expert: n = 10; non-expert: n = 106) effected interrater reliabilities of non-experts; when adjusted for size, non-expert interrater reliabilities dropped significantly to α = .58. With little correlation between the groups, conclusions do not support the use or substitution of non-experts in this particular poetry domain. In a less specialized and familiar domain (short-story writing), results using high numbers of non-experts (n = 100+) correlated significantly with those of experts (r = .71), yet when interrater reliabilities are adjusted for sample size non-expert ratings dropped significantly to α = .53 (Kaufman et al. 2009). In repeated studies, using both experts and novices; children and adults; verbal and visual products the CAT provided satisfactorily interrater reliabilities, which usually exceed .70, with some reported as high as the mid .90s. In a majority of these studies, interrater reliabilities typically ranged in the .80s (Amabile 1983a, b, 1996; Baer 1997, 1998; Baer et al. 2004; Kaufman et al. 2005, 2007, 2008; Runco 1999).
In early studies using the CAT to assess creativity levels in collages and drawings of children and adults, Amabile (1983a, 1996) reported inter-rater reliabilities from .70–.90. In subsequent studies focused on image and story creation in children, similar inter-rater reliabilities were reported (Hennessey and Amabile 1999; Runco 1999). In subsequent studies, Kaufman et al. (2005), found gifted novices provided reliable ratings, which were highly correlated with those of expert judges. Plucker et al. (2008) investigated the use of expert, quasi-expert (via professional and user-driven websites), and novice ratings of more than 600 movies. While novice and expert correlations were similar to earlier investigations cited on novice vs. expert ratings, results of the quasi-expert group bridged the gap with significant correlations with both novice (r = .65) and experts (r = .72). Results indicate a dichotomous classification of raters does not support the full range of options available to researchers for creativity evaluation (Plucker et al. 2008, 2009). Therefore the use of gifted novices or quasi-experts is supported in conjunction with, or as a suitable substitute for, expert ratings of creative products in technical and non-technical domains (Baer et al. 2004, 2009; Kaufman et al. 2005).
Domain specificity of evaluation
Creativity varies across domains, as does the expertise required for valid assessment using the CAT (Baer 1993, 1996). In previously cited studies, evaluation comparisons between experts, quasi-experts and novices indicated varied results within the domains of poetry, film, writing, etc. While examining the creativity of captions, Kaufman et al. (2007) indicated psychology students maintained adequate interrater reliability and sufficient ratings across writers. Therefore, the use of students evaluating written captions was acceptable.
In an area with no discernable training or apprenticeship, such as mood boards or image captions, can an amateur or a quasi-expert from a related field provide a reliable and valid assessment of creativity? Kaufman and Baer (2012) suggest the use of novice raters for expert-less domains may provide reliable creativity assessment, yet questions of validity would remain of concern. While results from creativity assessment in these domains will produce some validity, further support may be given by comparison between novice and quasi-experts from a related field. Additionally, the use of those involved in the creation or the projects as self and peer assessors may provide background knowledge of the project and increase validity of the creativity assessment. Based on an inversion of the hierarchy of domains (Simonton 2009), the potential or assessment of personal and/or everyday creativity is supported by the through the originality of the idea, even if only for the individual. Based on this premise, in assessing creativity in an expert domain, the use of participant artists/raters seems appropriate with sufficient validity.
Questions linger about the domain specificity of creativity assessment and methods of identifying and classifying experts. Plucker and Runco (1998) stated the uselessness of single predictive creativity measures (e.g. creativity tests), and agreed with Hennessey and Amabile (1988) of using an overall assessment of product output, measured using consensual assessment. In prior research on expert and non-expert creativity assessment, the domains were limited to those ranking higher on Simonton’s (2009) hierarchy of domains, such as poetry, and creative writing. Fashion, by its very purpose and use of materials, has hinged between utilitarian artifact with functional appeal to creative applied arts, with exhibitions in the finest museums around the world. With its multiple functions, there exists a deficit in understanding and evaluating creative outputs, starting with the concept mood board stage. In addition, much of the prior research using verbal stimuli resulted in effective creativity evaluation, however assessment of figural stimuli is limited when comparing expert and non-expert assessments of creativity.