Associative processes play a major role in research on human thinking, especially creativity. One of the most influential models emphasizing associative processes in creative thinking was introduced by Mednick (Psychological Review, 69, 220-232, 1962), who developed the remote associates test (RAT) as a domain-general measure of individual differences in associative hierarchies. Although S. Mednick's theoretical framework has recently regained much attention, the fundamental psychometric assumptions and underlying cognitive processes involved in the RAT remain controversial. We carried out two studies to evaluate these issues. In the first, a confirmatory factor analysis showed that a single latent factor accounted for the ability to solve RAT problems, despite their psycholinguistic heterogeneity. Subsequent regression analyses indicated that cue-solution associative remoteness substantially determined the difficulty of RAT problems, accounting for about 80% of variance. In the second study we used a newly developed associative chain test (ACT), which assesses lexical-semantic and executive measures during associative processing. We found that performance on the RAT was related to lexical-semantic (higher response remoteness and lower response commonness) but not to executive (response inhibition and switching) ACT measures. Overall, our findings indicate that the RAT reflects a coherent ability to access and combine remote elements in lexical-semantic and associative networks without considerably engaging executive attention. Although the validity and utility of the RAT was supported, we propose that the ACT provides a more complex and fine-grained tool for the assessment of associative processing. Keywords Semantic memory. Executive functions. Creativity. Research methods. Psychometrics Although it is common in various research fields (e.g., memory, language, and problem solving), assessing word associations has played an especially major role in research on creative cognition (Campbell, 1960; Eysenck, 1995; Mednick, 1962). A particularly influential model relating associative processes and creative thinking was proposed by Mednick (1962). According to this model, creative ideas are achieved by forming mutually remote associative elements into new and useful combinations. These

Category and letter verbal fluency assessment is widely used in basic and clinical research. Yet, the nature of the processes measured by such means remains a matter of debate. To delineate automatic (free-associative) versus controlled (dissociative) retrieval processes involved in verbal fluency tasks, we carried out a psychometric study combining a novel lexical-semantic retrieval paradigm and structural equation modeling. We show that category fluency primarily engages a free-associative retrieval, whereas letter fluency exerts executive suppression of habitual semantic associates. Importantly, the models demonstrated that this dissociation is parametric rather than absolute, exhibiting a degree of unity as well as diversity among the retrieval measures. These findings and further exploratory analyses validate that category and letter fluency tasks reflect partially distinct forms of memory search and retrieval control, warranting different application in basic research and clinical assessment. Finally, we conclude that the novel associative-dissociative paradigm provides straightforward and useful behavioral measures for the assessment and differentiation of automatic versus controlled retrieval ability.

citeas). AcknowledgmentsWe thank Lucia Slezáková and Zuzana Mokrá for help with data collection and data preparation.