Creative and Wise People: Similarities, Differences, and How They Develop
The authors compared personality correlates of creative achievement and wise performance in middle-age women of a longitudinal study. In Q-sort descriptions, originality and ambition were particularly salient in creative individuals, whereas meaning-making and benevolence were salient in wise individuals. Inventory measures of openness, unconventionality, ambition, and autonomy at age 21 predicted creative achievement, and measures of openness and tolerance predicted wisdom. Creative achievers increased over time in social integration and wise women in status-awareness. A behavioral commitment (creative activity soon after college or psychotherapeutic or spiritual careers) added significantly to age-21 openness and complexity to predict the criteria of creative achievement and wisdom.