Jonna Kwiatkowski

Assistant Professor of Psychology
B.A., Saint Mary's College; Ph.D., University of Maine

Office hours:
MW 10-12
Other times by appointment

Office: St. James 105
Phone: 617-975-9362
Email: kwiatkjo@emmanuel.edu

My main research interest is creativity, which I have explored through cognitive, neurophysiological, as well as educational research. In graduate school, I focused on differences in neuropsychological response (EEG/ERP) to creative tasks. After graduate school, I began post-doctoral research at the Center for the Psychology of Abilities, Competencies, and Expertise (PACE) at Yale University. In my four years at PACE, I was involved in research on giftedness, alternative assessments of intelligence and assessments of basic cognitive skills and learning disabilities in Zambia.

Currently, I am interested in using a componential approach to understand creativity. There are various factors that have been independently linked with creativity, such as reward, novelty seeking, task-switching, and disinhibition, yet there is little known about how these factors might interact during creative thought. We can move towards understanding the interactions between these factors by using well-defined neurophysiological tasks that can be assessed for individual differences in creative potential.

In both my teaching a research, I am looking for opportunities to interact with students so as to learn from them as they are learning from me. I encourage students to contact me if they are interested in collaborating on research projects or in learning more about the courses that I teach.

Courses:
PSYCH2207 - Quantitative Methods
PSYCH2701 - Research Methods
PSYCH4100 - Experimental Psychology

Recent Publications & Professional Activity

Kwiatkowski, J., Vartanian, O., & Martindale, C. (2006, August 30). Creativity and speed of information processing: A double dissociation between simple and ambiguous tasks. XIX Congress of the International Association of Empirical Aesthetics, Avignon, France.

Kwiatkowski, J. & Sternberg, R. J. (2004). Getting practical about gifted education. In D. Boothe & J. Stanley, (Eds.), In the eyes of the beholder: Critical issues for diversity in gifted education. Waco, TX: Prufrock Press.

Kwiatkowski, J. (2004). Bridging the gap between theory and practice in introductory statistics. (Review of the book Data analysis for the behavioral sciences using SPSS). Contemporary Psychology: APA Review of Books, 49, 298-299. (now available in PsycCritiques)

Vartanian, O., Martindale, C., & Kwiatkowski, J. (2003). Creativity and inductive reasoning: The relationship between divergent thinking and performance on Wason's 2-4-6 task. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 56A, 641-655.

Kwiatkowski, J. (2002, June 8). In pursuit of the builder's profile: An investigation of visual-spatial skills. (session chair and discussant). American Psychological Society Annual Conference, New Orleans, LA.

Kwiatkowski, J. (August, 2002). Individual differences in the neurophysiology of creativity. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. The University of Maine.

Kwiatkowski, J. & Jarvin, L. (2002, December 2). Managing large-scale research projects. Annual Conference of the National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented, Washington, DC.

Kwiatkowski, J. (2001, Februrary). Transitions in the development of giftedness. Annual Javits Grantee Meeting, Orlando, FL.

Kwiatkowski, J. & Martindale, C. (2000, August 4). Creativity and event-related potentials during the word association task. American Psychological Association Annual Conference, Washington, DC.

Kwiatkowski, J. & Martindale, C. (2000, August 11). Beauty and the brain: Event-related potentials to paintings. International Association of Empirical Aesthetics Biannual Conference, New York, NY.

Kwiatkowski, J. & Martindale, C. (2000, August 11). Event-related potentials during a creative task. International Association of Empirical Aesthetics Biannual Conference, New York, NY.

Kwiatkowski, J., Vartanian, O. A., & Martindale, C. (1999). Creativity and speed of information processing, Empirical Studies of the Arts, 17(2), 187-196.

Kwiatkowski, J. & Martindale, C. (1999, August 21). Creativity and evoked potentials elicited by novel stimuli. American Psychological Association Annual Conference, Boston, MA.

Kwiatkowski, J. (1999, November 29). Authorship attribution through content analysis. Invited Address: Universite Catholique de Louvain, Belgium.

Kwiatkowski, J. & Martindale, C. (1999, December 3). As the century ends: The collapse of modern art. Hermitage State Museum conference "XX century art. Achievements, Traditions, and Innovations," Saint Petersburg, Russia.

Martindale, C. & Kwiatkowski, J. (1998). The aesthetic merit of academic art. In A. Fusco and R. Tomassoni (Eds.), General psychology and psychology of arts and literature at the beginning of the third era. Milan: Angeli.

Kwiatkowski, J. & Martindale, C. (1998, September 24). Academic art: It's time to draw the line in the sand. International Association of Empirical Aesthetics Biannual Conference, Rome, Italy.

Kwiatkowski, J., Martindale, C. & Vartanian, O. (1998, September 23). Influence of mental models on Golden Section preference. International Association of Empirical Aesthetics Biannual Conference, Rome, Italy.

Kwiatkowski, J., Vartanian, O. & Martindale, C. (1998, September 24). Creativity and reaction time. International Association of Empirical Aesthetics Biannual Conference, Rome, Italy.