Creativity and emotions: a descriptive study of the Relationships between creative attitudes and emotional competencies of primary school students

Abstract

This article presents the results of an exploratory study on the relationships between the emotional competencies and attitudes towards creativity in a sample of primary school students. This study is part of a wider project on the implementation of the curricular area “Emotional Education and Creativity,” a far-reaching innovation in the educational system of the Canary Islands, Spain. A validated questionnaire for the evaluation of emotional and creative variables from the teachers’ perspectives was used. The questionnaire was given to 230 primary school teachers, who used it to assess the emotional and creative competencies of 2540 schoolchildren. A bivariate correlation was carried out to establish the relationship between these competencies, and a multiple regression analysis was used to understand the influence of emotional skills on creativity. The results obtained confirmed the close relationship between the emotional dimension and the creative construct. Specifically, it was observed that emotional awareness was the competence with the closest relationship, together with the responsibility for one’s own emotions, and the one that had the greatest weight in explaining creative competences. This result emphasizes that emotional and creative competencies complement each other and highlights the importance of working on these competencies together. We are committed to continuing with this line of research that supports an emotional conception of creativity.