Developing creative thinking in a gifted sport enrichment program and the crucial role of attention processes

A six-month longitudinal study (N533) proved the influence of a diversified sport enrichment program on the development of creative thinking in team ball sports among gifted children. A contrast between a gifted control group and a non-gifted treatment group showed that the creative performance of the gifted children significantly improved (partial .26). To explain this surprising short-term effect, a second experiment chose the Inattentional Blindness paradigm to study the individual differences in the visual attention of gifted (n=54) and non-gifted children (n=58). The results of the monitor-task by Most et al. (2000) revealed significant differences between both samples in the ‘Near’ condition (delta=.37) but not in the ‘Very far’ condition. The results of both experiments are discussed in connection with further research.