The Creative Space Theory as a map to explore the mind

Abstract

Despite significant transformations in most domains of activities, there might still be some constancies in the creative spaces explored throughout history. This paper introduces the Creative Space Theory (CST), a conceptual framework delineating 10 distinct creative spaces, analogous to creative landscapes. These creative spaces are proposed as navigational terrains for an array of media, tools, activities, and domains. The 10 spaces of the theory are movement, sound, image, sensation, emotion, strategy, story, symbol, network, and system. Notably, these creative spaces transcend specific media, and cover artistic as well as intellectual domains. For example, the sound space would be relevant to music, poetry, filmmaking, and acting among others, whereas the system space may be relevant to engineering, medicine, science, and design among others. The proposed theory holds potential utility in three key areas: (1) nurturing individual’s creative potential, (2) helping creators adapt to continuously changing circumstances, and (3) fostering positive creative self-beliefs in overlooked domains of creation. The current paper is a theoretical elaboration. We describe the creative spaces and discuss the implications of the theory towards individuals, educational practices, and research within the fields of cognition and Artificial Intelligence.