Nurturing child imagination in the contemporary world: Perspectives from different nations

Abstract

Imagination and creativity in today’s world are becoming increasingly relevant in the light of the fact that main human work products are innovations, knowledge, ideas and creative solutions. Nurturing child imagination is the most promising way of building up a creative personality and contributing to individual creative production in the future. This paper presents the results of evaluation of child imagination in Serbia and other European countries that participated in the World Values Survey. Child imagination is less valued than some other educational goals. The analysis of differences in the support of child imagination between nations pointed out to relevance of some cultural factors, while age and socioeconomic status were the most significant predictors of imagination preference on the individual level. The data show that different nations value imagination differently, which implies that chances for development of youth creative potentials depend on social setting in which children grow up.