The method is known as Divergent Association Task (DAT), which can be understood in Portuguese as a forked disintegration task. Its principle is to ask people to make a list of 10 items that differ from each other. In this way, the evaluation of one’s creativity level is measured by how different the word is in relation to others. This is how scientists can test creativity.
Read more: 9 tips to develop your creativity at work
How does the method work?
For example, when we include the words ‘cat’ and ‘lamp’ we have a much higher level of spacing than when we include ‘cat’ and ‘dog’. Thus, from the list created by the individual, scientists can determine their level of creativity using an algorithm present in their computational system as a basis.
The system measures the semantic distance of the ranked words and the results obtained in the testing phase generated a confidence interval higher than those already available to measure creativity.
The testing period included more than 8000 volunteers who responded to the challenge and whose responses were processed in the DAT algorithm.
A site to test your creativity: click here
In addition, there are still two other tests that were created before the DAT and can serve as a complement to the method. This is the task of the alternative uses and the task of the associative bridge.
Tests and explanations
In the first derivative method, you should consider as many uses of the object as possible. The Associative Bridge task requires you to try to connect two words with a third word related to the previous words. These are the two existing measures of creativity for which the DAT considers a major competitor and can be used to increase the efficiency of creativity assessment.
This is because the creativity measures in the DAT are also correlated with other outcomes as they can be used on their own, which means that this system is just as useful for assessing creativity as more complex tools. Take the quiz and see if you can list 10 words that are completely different from each other!
