Reliability (say painting a still-life by number) goes near the low end.   Novelty (painting a still-life from life) is nearer to the high end.    Differences in variability levels occur between individuals on the same task and between tasks for the same individual.   The latter, intrapersonal differences led to the theory that habitual or learned variability levels, like skills, are learned.   The term habitual refers to a variability level that someone usually displays in a particular task or domain.  The idea is this, along with learning how to do something, you also learn how differently to continue doing it.  

Variability Papers

Creativity appears on our variability continuum under novelty.   This is because all creative responses are novel, but not all new ones are creative.    To be called creative, the new thing must also be useful or generative or influential.   Useful means that it solves a problem; generative, that it leads to other ideas or things; influential, that it changes the way other people do or think about things like it.     Our creativity model is based on constraints, and involves what we call solution by substitution.  We contend that creativity depends on two things:  one is expertise, which means mastering the constraints that define an existing domain (like painting); two is replacing existing constraints with novel ones   These substitutions are quite specific. For example, Impressionism began with Monet precluding differences in value and promoting differences in hue.    

Creativity Papers

High variability facilitates learning.  Older children are more functionally variable in problem solving than younger ones.   Children of the same age who use more strategies acquire new ones faster than those who use fewer.   Compared to their peers, gifted children are highly variable.   In the area of a gift (or talent), a gifted child will use more strategies (and better ones) than an average child.   In art, a gifted child will acquire skills more rapidly and produce more elaborate drawings and paintings than an average child.

Papers on Children