A science of positive subjective experience, positive individual traits, and positive institutions promises to improve quality of life and prevent the pathologies that arise when life is barren and meaningless, The exclusive focus on pathology that has dominated so much of our discipline results in a model of the human being lacking the positive features that make life worth living. Hope, wisdom, creativity, future mindedness, courage, spirituality, responsibility, and perseverance are ignored or explained as transformations of more authentic negative impulses. The 15 articles in this millennial issue of the American Psychologist discuss such issues as what enables happiness, the effects of autonomy and self-regulation, how optimism and hope affect health, what constitutes wisdom, and how talent and creativity come to fruition. The authors outline a framework for a science of positive psychology, point to gaps in our knowledge, and predict that the next century will see a science and profession that will come to understand and build the factors that allow individuals, communities, and societies to flourish.

https://psycnet.apa.org/journals/amp/55/1/5.pdf

Positive psychology: An introduction.

So far in this course we have dealt entirely with the evolution of characters that are controlled by simple Mendelian inheritance at a single locus. There are notes on the course website about gametic disequilibrium and how allele frequencies change at two loci simultaneously, but we didn’t discuss them. In every example we’ve considered we’ve imagined that we could understand something about evolution by examining the evolution of a single gene. That’s the domain of classical population genetics. For the next few weeks we’re going to be exploring a field that’s actually older than classical population genetics, although the approach we’ll be taking to it involves the use of population genetic machinery. If you know a little about the history of evolutionary biology, you may know that after the rediscovery of Mendel’s work in 1900 there was a heated debate between the “biometricians” (e.g., Galton and Pearson) and the “Mendelians” (e.g., de Vries, Correns, Bateson, and Morgan). Biometricians asserted that the really important variation in evolution didn’t follow Mendelian rules. Height, weight, skin color, and similar traits seemed to

Human biochemical genetics

because observed behavior is the result of interactions between environmental factors and genes during the extended period of development. Therefore, to better understand expert and exceptional performance, we must require that the account specify the different environmental factors that could selectively promote and facilitate the achievement of such performance. In addition, recent research on expert performance and expertise (Chi, Glaser, & Farr, 1988; Ericsson & Smith, 1991a) has shown that important characteristics of experts' superior performance are acquired through experience and that the effect of practice on performance is larger than earlier believed possible. For this reason, an account of exceptional performance must specify the environmental circumstances, such as the duration and structure of activities, and necessary minimal biological attributes that lead to the acquisition of such characteristics and a corresponding level of performance. An account that explains how a majority of individuals can attain a given level of expert performance might seem inherently unable to explain the exceptional performance of only a small number of individuals. However, if such an empirical account could be empirically supported, then the extreme characteristics of experts could be viewed as having been acquired through learning and adaptation, and studies of expert performance could provide unique insights into the possibilities and limits of change in cognitive capacities and bodily functions. In this article we propose a theoretical framework that explains expert performance in terms of acquired characteristics resulting from extended deliberate practice and that limits the role of innate (inherited) characteristics to general levels of activity and emotionality. We provide empirical support from two new studies and from already published evidence on expert performance in many different domains.

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The role of deliberate practice in the acquisition of expert performance.

Building Leadership Effectiveness This program encourages leaders to develop practices that transform values into action, vision into realities, obstacles into innovations, and risks into rewards. Participants will be introduced to the five practices of exemplary leadership: modeling the way, inspiring a shared vision, challenging the process, enabling others to act, and encouraging the heart Coaching & Communicating for Performance Coaching & Communicating for Performance is a highly interactive program that will give supervisors and managers the opportunity to build skills that will enable them to share expectations and set objectives for employees, provide constructive feedback, more effectively engage in learning conversations, and coaching opportunities. Skillful Conflict Management for Leaders As a leader, it is important to understand conflict and be effective at conflict management because the way conflict is resolved becomes an integral component of our university’s culture. This series of conflict management sessions help leaders learn and put into practice effective strategies for managing conflict.

기독교 사역과 Leadership

The importance of intellectual talent to achievement in all professional domains is well established, but less is known about other individual differences that predict success. The authors tested the importance of 1 noncognitive trait: grit. Defined as perseverance and passion for long-term goals, grit accounted for an average of 4% of the variance in success outcomes, including educational attainment among 2 samples of adults (N=1,545 and N=690), grade point average among Ivy League undergraduates (N=138), retention in 2 classes of United States Military Academy, West Point, cadets (N=1,218 and N=1,308), and ranking in the National Spelling Bee (N=175). Grit did not relate positively to IQ but was highly correlated with Big Five Conscientiousness. Grit nonetheless demonstrated incremental predictive validity of success measures over and beyond IQ and conscientiousness. Collectively, these findings suggest that the achievement of difficult goals entails not only talent but also the sustained and focused application of talent over time.

https://psycnet.apa.org/journals/psp/92/6/1087.pdf

Grit: Perseverance and Passion for Long-Term Goals

Although many psychologists have expressed an interest in the phenomenon of creativity, psychological research on this topic did not rapidly expand until after J. P. Guilford claimed, in his 1950 APA presidential address, that this topic deserved far more attention than it was then receiving. This article reviews the progress psychologists have made in understanding creativity since Guilford's call to arms. Research progress has taken place on 4 fronts: the cognitive processes involved in the creative act, the distinctive characteristics of the creative person, the development and manifestation of creativity across the individual life span, and the social environments most strongly associated with creative activity. Although some important questions remain unanswered, psychologists now know more than ever before about how individuals achieve this special and significant form of optimal human functioning.

Creativity. Cognitive, personal, developmental, and social aspects

Preface 1. Genius and Darwin 2. Cognition: What is the Creative Process? 3. Variation: How do Creators Differ from the Rest of Us? 4. Development: Is the Genius Born or Made? 5. Products: By What Works Shall We Know Them? 6. Groups: Creative Times, Places and Peoples? 7. Darwinian Genius Notes References Index

Origins of genius : Darwinian perspectives on creativity

Preface. Prologue: The Psychologist Confronts Greatness. Birthrights and Birthmarks: Psychobiological Explanations. Acts, Affects, and Thoughts: Learning?Based and Cognitive Theories. The Creative Quest. The Drive to Succeed. Infants, Children, and Teenagers: The Famous in Their Youth. Life's Prime and Death's Advance: A Life?Span Perspective. The Importance of Intelligence. The Importance of Personality. The Significance of Psychopathology. Violence as a Shaper of History. The Influence of Attitudes and Beliefs. Imitation, Affiliation, Group Dynamics, and Leadership. Epilogue: Has the Psychologist Succeeded? Notes. References. Subject Index.

Greatness: Who Makes History and Why

Psychologists have primarily investigated scientific creativity from 2 contrasting in vitro perspectives: correlational studies of the creative person and experimental studies of the creative process. Here the same phenomenon is scrutinized using a 3rd, in vivo perspective, namely, the actual creative products that emerge from individual scientific careers and communities of creative scientists. This behavioral analysis supports the inference that scientific creativity constitutes a form of constrained stochastic behavior. That is, it can be accurately modeled as a quasi-random combinatorial process. Key findings from both correlational and experimental research traditions corroborate this conclusion. The author closes the article by arguing that all 3 perspectives--regarding the product, person, and process--must be integrated into a unified view of scientific creativity.

Scientific creativity as constrained stochastic behavior: The integration of product, person, and process perspectives.

The author developed a model that explains and predicts both longitudinal and cross-sectional variation in the output of major and minor creative products. The model first yields a mathematical equation that accounts for the empirical age curves, including contrasts across creative domains in the expected career trajectories. The model is then extended to account for individual differences in career trajectories, such as the longitudinal stability of cross-sectional variation and the differential placement of career landmarks (the ages at first, best, and last contribution). The theory is parsimonious in that it requires only two individual-difference parameters (initial creative potential and age at career onset) and two information-processing parameters (ideation and elaboration rates), plus a single principle (the equal-odds rule), to derive several precise predictions that cannot be generated by any alternative theory. Albert Einstein had around 248 publications to his credit, Charles Darwin had 119, and Sigmund Freud had 330, while Thomas Edison held 1,093 patents—still the record granted to any one person by the U.S. Patent Office. Similarly, Pablo Picasso executed more than 20,000 paintings, drawings, and pieces of sculpture, while Johann Sebastian Bach composed over 1,000 works, enough to require a lifetime of 40-hr weeks for a copyist just to write out the parts by hand. One might conclude from facts like these that exceptional productivity is a hallmark of outstanding creative individuals. And yet this induction may be contradicted by some curious exceptions and complications. Gregor Mendel managed to secure an enduring reputation on the basis of only seven scientific papers—considerably less than the 883 items claimed by the far more obscure naturalist John Edward Gray. Also, not all of the products that emerge from illustrious creators contribute credit to their names. Ludwig van Beethoven produced many compositions that only embarrass his admirers, just as William Shakespeare could write "problem plays" that are rarely performed today. Even Edison invented useless contraptions: The developmental costs for one failed device alone equaled all the profits he had earned from the electric light bulb! Now turn to another facet of the phenomenon: how creative productivity is distributed across the life span. Wolfgang Goethe began writing poetry in his teens, wrote a best-selling novel in his mid-20s, composed a series of successful plays in his 30s and 40s, and completed Parts I and II of Faust at ages 59 and 83, respectively. Hence, perhaps creators have careers characterized by precocity and longevity. Not all creative individuals show this pattern, however. On the one hand, some creators may exhibit comparable precocious achievement only to burn out early. Pietro Mascagni became famous at age 26 with the pro

https://psycnet.apa.org/journals/rev/104/1/66.pdf

Dean Keith Simonton

Papers

Creativity. Cognitive, personal, developmental, and social aspects

Origins of genius : Darwinian perspectives on creativity

Greatness: Who Makes History and Why

Scientific creativity as constrained stochastic behavior: The integration of product, person, and process perspectives.

Creative productivity: A predictive and explanatory model of career trajectories and landmarks.