R. Keith Sawyer

About

R. Keith Sawyer is the Morgan Distinguished Professor of Educational Innovations at the University of North Carolina School of Education. His career is dedicated to the study of creativity and learning, with a focus on improvisation group performance, including jazz ensembles and Chicago improv theater groups. Sawyer's research explores how groups enter a state of group flow, how members interact moment-to-moment, and how collective efforts produce outcomes greater than the sum of individual contributions. His work applies rigorous qualitative methods to analyze the interactional dynamics of creative ensembles, identifying commonalities across different types of groups such as jazz, theater, and business teams. Sawyer has extended his research findings to practical applications in education and organizational settings. He demonstrates that effective teachers utilize guided improvisation to support individual student learning and has authored books such as 'Group Genius: The Creative Power of Collaboration' (2017) and 'The Creative Classroom: Innovative Teaching for 21st Century Learners' (2019). His research also informs advice for enhancing creativity in business teams, study groups, and professional development. Additionally, Sawyer hosts a podcast titled 'The Science of Creativity,' which discusses the latest psychological research on creativity. His scholarly work includes the development of the theory of collaborative emergence, presented in his book 'Social Emergence:…

Research topics

• Visual arts
• Art

Selected publications

• The iterative and improvisational nature of the creative process

  Journal of Creativity · 2021-10-04 · 86 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  The creative process has often been conceived as a linear process that begins with preparation; is followed by incubation, during which one or many insights occur; then a selection stage where one of the insights is chosen as most promising; followed by an elaboration or execution of the selected insight. This paper argues that this linear view is inconsistent with conceptions of creativity in a community of creators: Artists and designers who teach in professional schools of art and design. The…

  PublisherDOI

• Explaining Creativity

  2023-12-14 · 71 citations

  book1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract Given the heightened complexity and uncertainty of the world we live in, creativity, or the ability to develop new and effective ideas, products, or solutions, has grown in societal interest internationally. There is a recognition of the need for creative problem solving to address complex problems, and thus, new areas of creativity studies and applications have rapidly emerged. Creativity is increasingly recognized as a highly coveted and prized skill for the future of work and life. T…

  PublisherDOI

• Learning in and through the arts

  Journal of the Learning Sciences · 2022 · 48 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding
  DOI

• Teaching creative thinking: how design professors externalize their creative thinking in studio classroom talk

  Mind Culture and Activity · 2021-08-24 · 37 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  This paper reports on a study of professor talk in design studio classrooms. In design education, creative thinking is an important learning outcome, as demonstrated in previous observational studies of studio classrooms and interviews with design professors. I found that professors explicitly describe their concurrent and spontaneous thinking while they are analyzing student work and that this talk represents the features of creative thinking identified in prior research. But more significantly…

  PublisherDOI

• Introduction

  2023-12-14 · 5 citations

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract Chapter 1 introduces the reader to scientific research on creativity. The chapter begins by providing the rationale for studying creativity—the need for creative solutions to challenging problems, whether in business, personal life, or society. The chapter then provides the two definitions of creativity that will be used throughout the book: the individualist definition, associated with psychological research, and the sociocultural definition, associated with group dynamics, sociology,…

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Frequent coauthors

• Danah Henriksen

  Arizona State University

  31 shared

• John Gammack

  9 shared

• Mihály Csíkszentmihályi

  Science Club

  9 shared

• Vera John‐Steiner

  7 shared

• Robert J. Sternberg

  Cornell University

  6 shared

• Seana Moran

  Harvard University Press

  5 shared

• David Feldman

  5 shared

• Pierre Demeulenaere

  5 shared

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