Tests PISA students showed limited relationship between academic results ordinary subjects such as mathematics and creative thinkingwhich has a significant gender variation in favor of girls, although less pronounced in Latin America.

In its first assessment of these creative abilities, published Tuesday by the publication OECD, Singapore scored 41 points out of 50, the country with the best score to date, followed by South Korea (38), Canada (38), Australia (37), New Zealand (36), Estonia (36) and Finland (36).

Spain remains in the middle Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) with 33 points, like Germany, the Czech Republic and Lithuania.

These results were obtained in 2022 in PISA tests, which first rated That Creative skills 15-year-old schoolchildren were simultaneously tested their abilities in mathematics, Sciences And Reading Comprehension.

Testing was carried out on students 64 countries or economies that include OECD members. One of the surprises was that several Latin American countries they got some clearly higher creativity scores which was to be expected given their mediocre grades in other subjects, particularly mathematics.

Latinos are more creative

Chile (with 31 points out of 50) and Mexico (29) received five more points what in mathematics and they were the ones that showed the greatest difference out of 64 in the sample. The gap was also more than four points. Costa Rica (27) and Savior (23), as well as more than three for Uruguay (29), Panama (23) and Colombia (26).

At the other end of the scale are students from Chinese territories Macau And Hong Kongas well as those from Taiwanwho are among the most affluent in mathematicsdemonstrated relatively very mediocre abilities: 32 points for the Chinese and 33 points for the Taiwanese.

Overall, within the OECD there is only one 28% variations of notes in creative thinking may be directly related to competencies students in mathematics.

In all countries analyzed girls had better creativity than their peers, although these differences are almost were not significant From a statistical point of view, in Mexico, Peru And Chile. They were also cut in Costa Rica, El Salvador, Uruguay, Panama, Indonesia and Colombia.

Director of the OECD Education Department, Andreas Schleicherprovided two elements of clarification when presenting the report to the press.

The main one is that in Latin America almost they don’t exist That gender differences V reading ability which are confirmed in the rest of the world in favor of girls, and reading is an important factor in creativity.

The second is that aspirations from boys and girls to creativity Similar in Latin America.

This comparison contrasts with large gender differences in creativity in Jordan, Finland, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Iceland, Malta, Slovenia, Philippines or Brunei.

Creativity means flexibility

The authors of the study determine creative thinking as “the ability to participate productively in generation, grade And improvement from ideas it can lead to original and effective solutions, advances in knowledge and striking expressions of imagination.”

That is, this cognitive process the need to engage in creative work, a flexible approach that can develop with practice and this can be reasonably demonstrated in everyday contexts.