James C. Kaufman, Ph.D.

Professor University of Connecticut

  • Storrs CT

Dr. Kaufman's research focuses on creativity and educational psychology.

Contact

University of Connecticut

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Biography

James C. Kaufman is a Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Connecticut. He is the author/editor of more than 45 books, including Creativity 101 (2nd Edition, 2016) and the Cambridge Handbook of Creativity (2nd Edition, with Robert Sternberg; 2019). Kaufman has also published books with his wife, Allison, on animal creativity and pseudoscience and a book about terrible baseball pitchers with his father, Alan.

He has published more than 400 papers, including the Four-C Model of Creativity (with Ron Beghetto) and the study that spawned the “Sylvia Plath Effect.” He is a past president of Division 10 (Society for Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, & the Arts) of the American Psychological Association (APA). James has won many awards, including Mensa’s research award, the Torrance Award from the National Association for Gifted Children, and APA’s Berlyne, Arnheim, and Farnsworth awards. He co-founded two major journals (Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts and Psychology of Popular Media Culture).

Kaufman has tested Dr. Sanjay Gupta’s creativity on CNN, appeared in the hit Australia show Redesign Your Brain, and narrated the comic book documentary Independents. His musical Discovering Magenta played NYC and its cast album is available on CD and most streaming services. Kaufman has blended his theatre and creativity interests in a forthcoming book with composer Dana Rowe, Creating Your Spotlight: Lessons from Harold Hill, Evita, and Hamilton.

Areas of Expertise

Creativity and Personality
Creativity and Equity
Creativity and Meaning
Creativity and Positive Psychology

Education

Yale University

Ph.D.

Cognitive Psychology

2001

Yale University

M.Phil.

Cognitive Psychology

1998

Yale University

M.S.

Cognitive Psychology

1997

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Accomplishments

Rudolf Arnheim Award for Outstanding Achievement in Psychology and the Arts

Awarded by the American Psychological Association, Division 10.

Paul Farnsworth Award for Service

Awarded by the American Psychological Association, Division 10.

Choice Outstanding Academic Title

Awarded by the American Library Association.

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Social

Media

Media Appearances

Top Innovators Are Never Too Old To Push The Envelope

Investor's Business Daily  online

2024-12-27

Older adults may not necessarily stay a step ahead of the latest fashion trends or youth culture. But they are well suited to find solutions to familiar problems.

"If you look at how our intelligence works, often the ability to deal with something that's brand new can decline as we age," said James C. Kaufman, a professor of educational psychology at the University of Connecticut. "But what stays strong is we have more experience, knowledge and context to apply what we've learned to problem-solve."

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Justin Timberlake's arrest, statement elicited a cruel response. Why?

USA Today  online

2024-06-24

"Some people will hate him, while others love him," says Maryanne Fisher, a psychology professor at St. Mary's University in Canada. "The reception to his statement during the concert in Chicago showed how his loyal fans will overlook his poor behavior, and how much they believe in him."

Though it's not difficult to see why some people are rolling their eyes at his actions, either. "He hasn't really been on the top of his game or doing stuff that most people have been actively loving recently, and so it's an easy morality play," says James C. Kaufman, professor of educational psychology at the University of Connecticut.

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Where does the idea of the tortured poet come from?

WNPR - The Colin McEnroe Show  radio

2024-04-17

Taylor Swift’s newest album, The Tortured Poets Department, comes out Friday. So this hour, we are taking a look at the idea of the actual tortured poet. We talk about where the idea of tortured poets came from, learn about the nature of creativity, and hear from a poet about where their inspiration comes from.

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Articles

How to nurture creativity in your kids

The Conversation

2021-10-18

Parents who want their kids to be more creative may be tempted to enroll them in arts classes or splurge on STEM-themed toys. Those things certainly can help, but as a professor of educational psychology who has written extensively about creativity, I can draw on more than 70 years of creativity research to make additional suggestions that are more likely to be effective – and won’t break your budget.

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Creativity in a Coronavirus World

Psychology Today

2020-04-09

These are grim and scary times. A tolerance for ambiguity is often considered to be a hallmark of a creative personality, but the complete uncertainty we are facing would daunt even the most open of people. Like many, I have been trying to seek out silver linings.

One of them, I believe, is that we are seeing an increase in everyday creativity. It is important to first note that this benefit is not enjoyed by everyone. The brave workers on the front line—from doctors to people in the supply chain—have less free time, not more. People whose jobs are at risk (or lost) are focused on more immediate needs. But many who are working from home, with no commutes or in-person meetings, find themselves with more time on their hands.

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Intelligence in Childhood and Creative Achievements in Middle-Age: The Necessary Condition Approach

Intelligence

2017

This paper explores longitudinal links between intelligence measured at age 11 (N = 1594) and 13 (N = 255) and creative achievement as tested forty years later (at age 52). Using a dataset from the most recent (fifth: 2015) follow-up to the Warsaw Study (Firkowska et al., 1978), we examined the hypothesis that intelligence forms a necessary-yet-not-sufficient condition for creative achievement. Although ...

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