1. Sarnoff Mednick Remote Associative Test (RAT)

2. Sarnoff Mednick, Ph. D.

3. Biography Dr. Mednick received his Ph.D. at Northwestern University, began his teaching career at Harvard University, and went on to teach at The University of Michigan. His theorizing on creativity took place at the University of Michigan.

4. Biography Professor Sarnoff Mednick, Ph.D., Dr. Med (honorary) is actually most well-known for his work on the causes of psychopathology, and not his work in creativity.

5. Biography Mednick is currently a Professor Emeritus at the University of Southern California. Mednick received the Joseph Zubin Award in 1996. Mednick has more than 300 peer-reviewed publications (most of them concerning his work in psychopathology).

6. Personal Life Mednick was married to Dr. Martha Mednick, a professor, and then to Dr. Birgitte Mednick, also a professor. Mednick was widowed in 2008 Mednick had two children with each wife. Amy (writer) and Lisa (musician) with Martha; Sara (professor with expertise in sleeping and dreaming) and Thor (art historian and professor) with Birgitte.

7. Mednick’s Creativity Theory Mednick defined the process of creative thinking as

8. “the forming of associative elements into new combinations which either meet specific requirements or are in some way useful. The more mutually remote the elements of the new combination, the more creative the process or solution.” Mednick’s Creativity Theory

9. Mednick argued that creative people have flat associative hierarchies: they are better able to access distant, remote associations. Mednick’s Creativity Theory

10. For example, given the concept “table”, Mednick predicted that creative people would be more likely to retrieve more remote associations such as “leg” or “food”. Mednick’s Creativity Theory

11. In contrast, Mednick argued that less creative thinkers have a steep associative hierarchy, in which words with a higher associative strength (e.g., chair) would be more likely to enter their minds. Mednick’s Creativity Theory

12. Remote Associates Test Mednick Developed the Remote Associates Test (RAT) based on this theory.

13. The RAT presents you with three seemingly unrelated words and you have to find a fourth word that ties the other three words together. For example: fish mine rush What word ties these words together? Remote Associates Test

14. The answer: gold Remote Associates Test

15. Here’s another example. Remember, you are going to read three unrelated words. You are to come up with a fourth word that can be associated with the first three. notch flight spin Remote Associates Test

16. Did you say top If you were able to come up with the word, you have creative potential. Remote Associates Test

17. One more, just for fun. surprise line Democratic Remote Associates Test

18. Did you guess party Congratulations! You are pretty creative. Remote Associates Test

19. Using RAT in the classroom What good is a Remote Association Test? I have kids to teach… Baseline test Creative game Time filler

20. Using RAT to determine a baseline: Give all your students the same Remote Association Test, and rank the scores, you now know which students are highly creative and which are less creative. Using RAT in the classroom

21. This information will help you when determining groups for projects and other group assignments. Helps to determine pairs, one high and one low student will ensure that each student learns from the other. Using RAT in the classroom

22. A creative classroom game… Divide the class into teams, give each team a group of three words from the RAT, the team with the most associations wins the point. To increase difficulty, the team with the most uncommon associations wins the point. Using RAT in the classroom

23. Time filler… When the lesson ends but there are still 5-10 minutes of class, students can work individually or in groups, on paper or aloud, on remote associations, again with the goal of finding the highest number of uncommon associations. Using RAT in the classroom

24. Finally There are likely many other ways RAT can be used in the classroom. See how many you can think of, and comment on the discussion board.