Measuring Divergent Thinking in Youth and the impact of culture

研究的重点是理论上适合发散思维测验的心理测量学模型的基础性研究，新的客观评分指标的开发，以及这些指标与原创性主观评分的比较。第二个关注点是发散思维与文化变量的关系。发散思维是创造性思维和潜能的重要组成部分。因此，DT的测量是评价创造潜能的核心问题之一。通常，DT测试可以用三种不同的方式评分，结果是流利性、灵活性或独创性分数。流畅性仅仅是一个人在完成任务的过程中产生的想法的数量，灵活性是不同类别的数量，而原创性指的是创造性意义上的独特性。对于所有这些用于DT测试性能的指标，将考察几个研究问题。关于流利性分数，将应用一个心理测量学模型，该模型考虑到流利性分数自然是计数数据：Rasch-Poisson Counts模型(RPCM)。此外，该模型还具有Logistic Rasch模型的所有良好性质。这个模型还没有被应用于DT测试的流利性分数，关于这个模型的方法学问题也将被研究。RPCM也将适用于灵活性分数。此外，关于灵活性，我们将研究如何派生分配概念的类别系统是否重要。通常，这样的分类系统是由训练有素的评分员得出的，然后根据它分配想法。另一种可能性是要求参与者建立他们自己的类别，这种方法从未被与专家派生的类别进行比较。此外，我们还将研究有关原创性的问题。原创性分数受到以下方法学问题的影响：1)流利性和原创性的混淆；2)统计稀缺性的模棱两可；3)对样本量的依赖。拟议的客观指数都没有考虑到所有这些问题。此外，还将审查主观原创性评分出现的问题，例如由于评分者的个性变量造成的评分混淆，从而将不同的主观评分方法和客观评分方法进行比较。对于所有三个不同的DT分数(流利性、灵活性和独创性)，我们将检查它们与文化变量的关系，特别是对多种文化的接触，这是一个预计与DT测试中的表现正相关的维度。总而言之，将审查各种评估问题，并特别关注多元文化主义。法国和德国团队的互补技能对该项目的成功至关重要。描述了项目每一年的计划任务。

The focus of the work is fundamental research on theoretically appropriate psychometric models of divergent thinking tests, the development of new objective scoring indices and comparison of these indices with subjective scoring of originality. A secondary focus is the relations of divergent thinking to cultural variables. Divergent thinking (DT) is a crucial component of creative thinking and potential. Thus, the measurement of DT one of the core issues of assessment of creative potential. Typically, DT tests can be scored in three different ways, resulting in fluency, flexibility or originality scores. Fluency is simply the counted number of ideas a person generated during task fulfillment, flexibility is the number of different categories, whereas originality refers to the uniqueness in an inventive sense. For all of these indices for DT test performance, several research questions will be examined. With respect to fluency scores, a psychometric model will be applied that takes into account that fluency scores are naturally count data: the Rasch-Poisson counts model (RPCM). Moreover this model has all the favorable properties of the logistic Rasch model. This model has not yet been applied to fluency scores from DT tests and methodological issues regarding this model will be examined as well. The RPCM will be applicable to flexibility scores as well. Furthermore, with respect to flexibility we will examine if it matters how the category system for assigning the ideas is derived. Typically, such category systems are derived by trained raters and then ideas are assigned according to it. Another possibility is to ask participants to build up their own categories, an approach that has never yet been compared to expert derived categories. In addition, we will examine issues regarding originality. Originality scores suffer from the following methodological problems: 1) confounding of fluency and originality; 2) ambiguity of statistical rarity; and 3) dependence on sample size. None of the proposed objective indices take all of these problems into account. Moreover, problems occurring with subjective originality scoring, such as confounding of the ratings due to, for example, personality variables of the raters, will be examined too, whereby a comparison of different subjective and objective scoring methods will be included. For all three different DT scores (fluency, flexibility and originality) we will examine their relationships with cultural variables, in particular exposure to multiple cultures, which is a dimension that is expected to be positively related to performance in DT tests. To summarize, various assessment issues will be examined with the additional focus on multiculturalism. The complementary skills of the French and German teams are crucial for the success of the project. Planned tasks for each year of the project are described.