A Systematic Review of Creativity-Related Studies Applying the Remote Associates Test From 2000 to 2019

Abstract

The study examines how the remote associates test (RAT) has been used to examine theories of creativity through a review of recent studies on creativity. Creativity-related studies published between 2000 and 2019 were retrieved from the SCOPUS database. A total of 172 papers were chosen for further analysis. Content analysis shows that research on creativity using RAT mainly concerns remote association, insight problem-solving, general creative process, test development, individual difference, effect of treatment, clinical case, social interaction effect, and predictor or criterion. The study constructs a theoretical framework based on the 4P (Product-Person-Process-Place) model and demonstrates how empirical studies using the RAT explore the individual differences, internal processes, and external influences of creative thinking. In addition, the most commonly used version of the RAT is the Compound Remote Associates Problems (Bowden and Jung-Beeman, 2003a). Current research shows a trend whereby the creative thinking process has been receiving greater attention. In particular, a growing number of studies in this field have been carried out using cognitive neuroscience technologies. These findings suggest that the RAT provides researchers with a way to deepen their understanding of different levels of creativity.

Visual-Spatial and Verbal Remote Association: An fMRI Study

“…In recent years, a growing number of studies have explored the relationship between remote associations and human brains in the context of cognitive neuroscience (Wu et al, 2020). The pre-frontal and parietal lobes have been found to be correlated with remote associations (Bendetowicz et al, 2017(Bendetowicz et al, , 2018.…”

“…In conclusion, diverse types of creative problem-solving are associated with the activity of different brain regions (Wu et al, 2020 ), such as the frontal lobe, temporal lobe, parietal lobe, posterior cingulate cortex, precuneus, and caudate (Jauk et al, 2015 ; Shen et al, 2018 ; Wu et al, 2019 ; Wertz et al, 2020 ). These findings suggest that brain activity can reflect the performance of creative thinking.…”

“…Furthermore, its questions are relatively easy to compile, which facilitates the mass production of RAT questions to prevent respondents from knowing the test questions beforehand. Consequently, RAT has been widely used in creativity research on different dimensions (Wu et al, 2020). Moreover, it has been translated into diverse versions in different languages, such as Dutch (Akbari et al, 2012), Japanese (Terai et al, 2013;Orita et al, 2018), Italian (Salvi et al, 2016), and Chinese (Shen et al, 2016;Xiao et al, 2016;.…”

Cognitive Neuroscience and Entrepreneurship: cross-disciplinary review and future potential

“…(Shane et al, 2020) Attachment and bonding (Halko et al, 2017) Continue use of fMRI in multiple tasks which require them to engage cognitive control and produce novel actions. For example, in remote associations task (Wu, Huang, Chen, & Chen, 2020).…”

“…All of these require increased cognitive control and activity in the prefrontal lobe, which can be probed using classic cognitive neuroscience tasks, not yet employed to entrepreneurs. Moreover, many task-based assessments of creativity, such as the commonly used remote association tasks, test both the divergent and convergent nature of creativity and could be employed in future studies of entrepreneurs (Wu, Huang, Chen, & Chen, 2020). In the case of entrepreneurship, it is pivotal to understand not just how a creative thought is produced or an opportunity identified, but also how an individual came to arrive at that idea, then validates and values this idea.…”