The Miniscat: Its Development and Some Evidence of Its Validity

Abstract

The Miniscat designed as an elementary grade creativity test, includes word doublets (e.g., peanut and fly) to be responded to by a third word (e.g., butter). Items represent six different associative rule structures. Children in grades 1 and 3 were judged as high or low in creativity from their responses to a story completion test. High creativity examinees did have appreciably higher Miniscat scores than did low creativity examinees—an outcome supporting the validity of the test. Scores for grade 3 were higher than for grade 1 on one form of the test (form B) but not on another (form A). Girls scored higher than boys on form A but not on form B. Split-half reliability coefficients were high and consistent. Judges of creativity were themselves tested for creativity; their creativity scores were unrelated to their judgments of children's creativity—a finding that failed to support the notion that it takes a creative person to recognize one.

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