Interplay of Creativity and Giftedness in Science

Creativity is what separates good scientists from truly great scientists who can open up new avenues of investigation. Although the interaction of creativity with giftedness in the scientific arena is often overlooked, it is well established that successful scientists are intellectually gifted, and the idea that creativity is important to the successful scientist was eloquently described by Albert Einstein (1931). “Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution.” Thus, gifted learners must be taught how to create new postulates, to think logically, and to reason rather than to be taught strategies to memorize a set of potentially irrelevant facts. This work by a diverse field of international authors focuses discussion on the interplay of giftedness and creativity within the scientific enterprise and provides evidence and theoretical constructs which can be used to adjust learning environments to be conducive to the development of superior scientists. The book also explores the interplay of creativity and giftedness for scientists in a historical context, describes the importance of creativity in scientific advances, and examines the impact of the current educational system and various cultural expectations on diverse gifted and creative science students including those with special needs. Furthermore, the Interplay of Creativity and Giftedness in Science provides a mechanism for communicating exemplary examples of programs, which have successfully combined creativity, giftedness and science, across linguistic, cultural, racial, geographic, socioeconomic, and situational educational settings.