Indicators of verbal creative thinking: results of a Delphi panel

Introduction Creativity is a fundamental competence that manifests itself in various domains of knowledge, including verbal creativity. The main aim of this study was to identify indicators of verbal creativity for the assessment of three writing tasks.Methods Sixteen multidisciplinary and international creativity experts participated in a two-stage Delphi panel. The administered questionnaire asked about the measurement or non-measurement of eight indicators of verbal creative thinking in three tasks: problem posing, creative idea generation, and idea improvement. Originality is the most important indicator of creativity. The indicators identified in the first task were fluency, flexibility, originality, elaboration, and sensitivity to problems. The second task measures flexibility, originality, elaboration, opacity, and dynamic integration. In the third task, fluency, flexibility, originality, elaboration, dynamic integration, and refinement of ideas are considered.Results The results of this study are key to progress in the field of measuring verbal creative thinking.Discussion The identification of indicators of the construct called verbal creativity allows the determination of its components in order to be able to estimate the creative potential in this specific domain.