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Article Title: Differences in Divergent Thinking among Secondary School Physics Students
by Joseph Achieng' Rabari; Francis Chisikwa Indoshi and Tony Okwach Omusonga

Abstract:
Viewed as the basis of creativity, divergent thinking is recognized for its role in improving quality of life generally and through scientific innovations, which involve creative application of principles of basic sciences, such as physics. However, besides its general neglect in curriculum implementation, differences in students' creative abilities appear to be another important challenge to address. The purpose of this study was to explore differences in divergent thinking abilities between various subgroups of physics students. Its objective was to determine if there were significant differences in mean divergent thinking scores when students were categorized by gender, grade level, participation in science congress, pre-school entry points, type of toys played with in childhood, socio-economic status and inclination for group work. The study targeted a population of 4,324 Form 4 (12th grade) and Form 3 (11th grade) secondary school physics students in Nairobi Province. The sample comprised 1019 respondents, consisting of 515 girls and 504 boys and these were obtained through stratified and simple random sampling techniques. Data were collected using a Test of Divergent Thinking (TDT), which was constructed by the researcher and validated by three experts in research methods from Maseno University. The instrument had a reliability of .846; while significance of observed differences was tested at p = 0.05 and p = 0.01 levels. Girls registered superiority over boys in problem finding (t = 3.180, p <.01) while boys outperformed them on spontaneous fluency (t = -3.782, p < .01) and cognitive flexibility (t = -2.062, p < .05); but there was no significant gender difference on overall divergent thinking. Other significant differences were registered between participants and non-participants in Students' Congress on Science and Technology on adaptive fluency (t = 3.197, p < .01) in favour of congress participants (but not on other components of divergent thinking), and between Form 3 and Form 4 on adaptive fluency (t = -2.004, p < .05) in favour of Form 4. However, no significant differences were observed when participants were grouped by types of toys they played with in childhood, pre-school entry points in education, or socio-economic class. The study recommends further research to investigate the influence of other scientific materials, types of toys, and childhood plays on divergent thinking.

Keywords: creativity, divergent thinking, gender, grade level, socio-economic status, differences

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