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p The influence of age on the peculiarities of the process of phantasy evokes both theoretical and practical interest. Investigators of this problem, above all, seek to answer the following questions: how does life experience and general development 208 of personality affect the process of phantasy? how does man’s age determine his creative capacities? what family peculiarities promote the development of personal faculties contributing to creativity? how does education influence the process of phantasy? how does one or another course of training affect the character of the products of phantasy?

p Proceeding from the main traditional theoretical conceptions of phantasy considered in Chapter II, two controversial answers to the first of these questions can logically be provided. According to the idealistic conception which interprets phantasy as a primordial creative power, certain philosophers and psychologists regard life and training as factors which either suppress or subdue this creative power. Plato is known to have asserted that experience takes away more than it adds, and that young people are “nearer” to ideas than old people. From the standpoint of this theoretical position a personality becomes less creative in the course of his development. This opinion was most consistently rendered by Harold Anderson who maintained that "creativity was in each of us as a small child. In children creativity is a universal. Among adults it is almost non-existent" (107, XII).

p The opinion that along with age and while accumulating knowledge and skills a person’s creativity decreases has even been supported by experimental data. Most striking results were described by V. Papanek. In his investigations he proceeded from finding out how many truly creative persons there were among 45-year-olds. He established that among the people who had undergone his tests, only two per cent could be considered as highly creative persons. Then he conducted tests with younger and younger people. Yet, his results revealed the same 2 per cent level. A marked augmentation of this percentage was recorded when he experimented with 7-year-old children of whom 10 per cent were characterized by creativity, while this percentage rose to the level of 90 per cent with 5-year-old children.

p The available experimental data, however, are often controversial. The experiments staged by N. Trowbridge and D. Charles were based on the evaluation of drawings made by the children from 3 to 18 years old. One of the main conclusions made by the investigators was as follows: technical competence of the subjects increases parallel with their age. However, the level of manifestation of creativity in children from 3 to 15 years old is practically the same, yet it increases dramatically beginning from the age of 15.

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p The extreme idealistic interpretation of phantasy as autonomous creative power is counterposed by the extreme mechanistic view according to which phantasy is a product of imitation. Lucien Arreat who conducted his studies in the 19th century was, for instance, absolutely convinced that creativity originated from imitation which he regarded as a school of creativity and as an exercise of phantasy (112, 121). At present, analogous views are expressed by certain French psychologists including Philippe Malrieu who regarded imitation as the indispensable prerequisite of imagination (211, 113).

p In Chapter II we demonstrated the impossibility of explaining phantasy by means of imitation. Now we will dwell on the genetic aspect of the role of imitation. There is no doubt that a person accumulates much knowledge and many skills through imitation: this holds for mastering speech and writing, and acquiring intellectual habits and social experience. Moreover, man uses everything he has acquired through imitation one way or another while accomplishing creative acts, too. However, would it be reasonable to assert that phantasy (which we interpret as productive mental activity) derives from imitation? In order to answer this question we have to address ourselves to the available data pertaining to manifestations of phantasy in very young children.

p The advocates of the conception of imitation usually refer to this commonly known observation: a child endows the object of his game with the properties of the objects which he has seen and which have impressed him. Thus, he “turns” a stick into a horse, chair into a locdtnotive, and he himself becomes a horseman, an engine-driver, etc. This allegedly suggests that the child’s phantasy is characterized by imitation [Jules Jean Biervliet (125, 129)]. Certainly, both the material used for the game and, to some extent, the game’s plot are borrowed from the reality with which a child is making acquaintance; yet the result of the process of phantasy in this case is not the game itself but its basic prerequisite: the identification of objects completely different both by their look and in essence. It is in the identification of multifarious objects that the child’s phantasy displays itself; yet in doing all that, a child is not imitating, for he has no one to imitate since no adult acts in this way: to them a stick never plays the role of a horse and a chair, the role of a locomotive.

p Characteristically, Biervliet himself, while describing the child’s imagination as imitative, ascribes to it another attribute logically incompatible with imitativeness, namely, “improbability”. 210 (125, 129); indeed, only real acts can be imitated while imitation is only possible in case we meet with a real corresponding object of imitation, so that neither imitative acts nor the products of imitation may seem improbable.  [210•* 

p We would like to offer several more facts attesting to the original, yet, undoubtedly, productive activities of children, which do not derive from imitation. In studying children’s speech, F. Markey compared the names which junior and senior children ascribe to objects, things, animals and constructions. She found out that the former were more apt to invent “fancy” names, while the latter showed disposition for more realistic terms, i.e., they were imitating adults in a greater degree. L. Ames and J. Learned, while summing up the data pertaining to “fancy” games, played by children of different ages had to note that in babyhood (up to 3 years) and in early childhood children tend to “animate” objects and a child often makes believe he is an animal or a different person; however, all these games disappear almost completely by the beginning of adolescence. Consequently, a child’s earliest games are distinguished by originality and “improbability”, while older children try to imitate adults in their games.

p Finally, in their earliest drawings, reflecting undoubtedly real objects, children are not imitating-in the exact sense of the word-what they perceive; they even are not imitating adults in their manner of drawing; all this comes later.  [210•** 

p Thus we have neither factual nor logical reasons to regard imitation as a “preparatory” stage of productive mental activity which, it seems, already manifests itself in early childhood, and independently of imitation at that.

p Therefore, the two extreme views-idealistic and mechanisticof the relationship between the process of phantasy on the one hand, and life impressions and age on the other, are equally unacceptable; we have to qualify as erratic both the opinion that age is detrimental to the process of phantasy, and the opinion that genuine productive activity emerges from imitation.

p We base ourselves on the methodological presumption according to which the objective laws of productive activity 211 are valid for any age; naturally, concrete peculiarities of different ages will influence differently the orientation of these laws, thus presupposing different results of the processes of phantasy. We would like to begin with the analysis of children’s phantasy. At the initial stages of life, when the child has scanty knowledge about the external world, he often devaluates the most essential distinctions in objects and phenomena (which he, generally speaking, is capable of differentiating), identifying them with each other (we discussed the typical examples above). He also is unrestrained in handling verbal material and he easily (by anaxiomatizing many linguistic rules and conventions) coins surprising and, at times, witty and unexpectedly successful neologisms, grammatical forms, word combinations and figures of speech. A great number of facts of the "play of children’s phantasy" in this sphere were recorded in Kornei Chukovsky’s most interesting book Frdm Two to Five. At the same time, the mechanism of hyperaxiomatization helps children produce highly original phenomena. It is well known that random features and moments often gain a heightened evaluation in the child’s psyche. He is likely to attach enormous significance to an infinitesimal, minute detail almost unnoticeable by adults, and it may become in his eyes a distinctive feature of a certain person ("the man who did not eat his pudding at dinner"). An incident which seems a trifle to everyone (say, damage of the favorite toy), assumes for the child the importance of a dramatic event.

p We have already pointed out that a number of psychologists and teachers associate the development in a child of more rational forms of behavior, in particular, of logical thinking with attenuation and even cessation of phantasy. This opinion is stipulated, first and foremost, by the traditional narrowing of the notion of phantasy (see Chapter I), and, as we have already shown, by the idealistic interpretation of the essence of creativity. In reality, the laws of phantasy are re-oriented by the family and the surrounding people, educational measures and training at school. Quite naturally, this results in both positive and negative effects.

p •One of the earliest systematic studies of the influence of the family on the development of personal traits contributing to creativity was made by Anne Roe. In her opinion, the freedom which a child enjoys in the family, alongside the treatment he receives, plays a great role for arousing cognitive interests and aspiration for creativity. Therefore, the overly exacting attitude towards a child effects his developing strong 212 protective responses, while excessive care builds up in him so-called narcissism, i.e. self-admiration and self-content. And if a child is brought up in the atmosphere of neglect, he grows more interested in ideas and things rather than in people.

p J. W. Getzels and Ph. W. Jackson based their analysis on questioning the mothers of students. They came to the conclusion that a child’s disposition for creativity will be mostly developed in families that are tolerant of "deviations and distinctions" in the views and customs, and that regard condescendingly "risky exploits". Albert Dreyer and M. B. Wells elucidated the influence of the psychological climate in the family on the "creative behavior" of four- and five-year-old children; in particular, they established the superiority of the children whose parents are less demanding in subduing them to their authority and will.

p We discussed above a number of socio-psychological factors detrimental to creativity. A number of authors noted that in capitalist countries such factors manifest themselves in the course of school training and education.  [212•* 

p Paul Torrance made a detailed analysis of various factors which suppress the creative orientation of schoolchildren. To these he attributed the students’ aspiration for success, hence a fear of risk; their desire to resemble their peers and a fear of defying the accepted standards so as not to seem “ anomalous”; the teachers’ insistence on the roles to be played by one or another sex; the students’ and the adults’ set that school procedures have to be taken seriously and that they completely exclude any play, including the play of thought (266, 80-102).

p The action of the factor "peer-group orientation" (essentially a striving for behavioral conformity), according to Torrance, is clearly noticeable by about the time the child reaches the fourth form when his need for consensual validation is intensified and when he becomes afraid that he might not resemble his peers (266, 99).

p The investigation based on extensive factual material (2,000 students’ essays) provided D. Delepine-Messe, who conducted it, with the conclusion that although the quality of the essays 213 improves along with the progress in education made by students (in particular, the students of senior forms revealed fewer digressions from the assigned themes), their written works (practised in Belgian schools) were highly artificial by nature and restrained students from expressing their ideas creatively and sincerely.

p The improvement of the quality of the essays of senior-form students in comparison with those of junior-form students had been noticed somewhat earlier by Soviet psychologist L. Nosova, when conducting investigations into the phantasy of fifth-seventh form students of a Soviet secondary school. However, in contrast to Delepine-Messe, Nosova characterized the essays of the seventh-form students as relatively independent works containing creative elements which serve to reveal the author with his own life experience and emotions (43).

p The results of comparing the creative works performed by the children brought up in different social conditions would certainly have been more convincing if the matching data were obtained during a single investigation and evaluated according to strictly defined criteria. However, even the comparison of the results obtained by Nosova and Delepine-Messe indicates that the orientation of the laws of phantasy is not determined merely by the age or the very fact of training at school (it allegedly subdues the creative approach, sincerity, etc.), but it depends on the character of training and, even greater, on the social conditions in which a student lives and is brought up.

p Foreign psychologists are also extremely sceptical about the role of the higher school for the development of creativity. R. L. Bednar and C. A. Parker conducted tests to discover no essential changes in the achievements characterizing the creative abilities of college students throughout the first three years of studying (120). John Bentley found out that the creative abilities of college students (determined through tests) had little effect on their academic results; Bentley explains this by the fact that academic examinations impose demands only on students’ knowledge and memory rather than on their creative approach.

p At the same time, the creative orientation of students presupposes an obvious positive effect. Thus, according to Welch, the creative achievements of art students are markedly higher than those of the students concerned with other specialities. The only acceptable hypothesis which, according to Welch, may explain the result obtained by him lies in the concession 214 that "the art student is encouraged from the start to strive for the new, the original product" (273, 145).

p Consequently, the orientation and the results of the process of phantasy in both college and school students depend on the concrete relationship between the instructors and the instructed, on the demands which the former impose on the latter, and on the orientation imparted to them during a course of training. Thus, the development of creative abilities depends more on the peculiarities of training and education in secondary and higher schools than on age.

p However, does age as such influence creativity? The first non-systematical observations provided us with the conclusion that young people have a better disposition for creativity. Wilhelm Ostwald wrote in his book Inventors and Investigators: "A person achieves his greatest productivity at the age of about 25" (224, 71). Ostwald explains the advantages of young age by the fact that young people are more courageous.

p J. Bjorksten explains the drastic collapse of creative powers, which allegedly occurs soon after the age of thirty, by the overload and exhausting of internal reserves leading to the decrease of a creative potential. According to the data obtained by Joseph Brozek, the intellectual functions exercised by adults (such as speech, as well as the ability to comprehend and use words and expressions) showed no deterioration with age, but were likely to improve. However, the functions which are not specially exercised by adults in their daily life (for example, thinking by symbols) do deteriorate. Especially difficult for old people are the tests which have to be performed within a limited time, as well as those which imply finding new methods of solution.

p Harvey Lehman devoted to this problem his monograph Age and Achievement. He analyzed biographies of many talented scientists and people in the arts to conclude that the most creative age for a chemist ranges from 26 to 30 years, for a mathematician, from 30 to 34 years, for a musician, up to 30 years, for a writer, up to 45 years, and for a philosopher, from 35 to 39 years.

p A. F. Isaacs offers somewhat different figures. In compliance with his data, the greatest insight occurs in the artists at the age from 5 to 22 years, in musicians, from 4 to 23 years, and in writers, from 12 to 40 years.

p The physiological factors explaining the attenuation of a creative potential, according to Lehman, may include general weakening of the organism, reduction of its resistance to fatigue, 215 worsening of the sensory and motive functions, various body ailments, and endocrine (including sexual) changes. Yet, the explanation based on physiological factors meets with serious objections. First, most ailments mentioned by Lehman are not typical of the age which presupposes the beginning of creative withering; second, all possible physical defects (including difficulties in general) do not necessarily suppress creativity but in a number of cases may even stimulate it.

p We regard as more founded the psychological factors of reduction of creative potential proposed by Lehman, even though they are not specific for old age. According to Lehman, the persons who have achieved marked successes by the age of 30 or 40 do not strive for any new achievements any longer, while the people who have often been criticized and who have not gained due recognition succumb to apathy. That is to say that both easy successes and insurmountable difficulties and obstacles weaken the motivation for creativity in equal measure.

p It would be necessary to note that a number of facts disagree with Lehman’s conception. Many scientists and artists displayed great creativity right up to venerable age. Suffice to mention the names of Pavlov and Freud, Milton and Goethe, Lev Tolstoy and George Bernard Shaw, Toscanini and Picasso.

This means that it would be wrong to discuss the immediate dependence of creative rises and falls upon age. In our opinion, the peculiarities of manifestation of the intrinsic laws are mainly determined by such factors as motivation, knowledge, and personal features. Naturally, some of these factors may be, in one way or another, associated with various age characteristics. Thus, insufficient volume of knowledge is more typical of a young person than of an old person as a result of which children, for example, tend to generalize objects on the basis of random features. However, the same logical mistakes may be made by the adults if they lack the required knowledge or intellectual training. The same fully applies to the significance of motives. Naturally, the decrease of motivation as a result of failures will most probably take place after they have recurred many times, i.e. in comparatively jold age, and one would hardly expect a person to achieve such great successes at the onset of his creative activity that he would give up the desire to move forward. Nonetheless, a certain decline of motivation is also conceivable at a young age in the case of extremely unfavorable circumstances or as the result of extraordinary early successes.