Evaluation of children's creativity: psychometric properties of Torrance's 'Thinking Creatively in Action and Movement' test

• Published in: Early child development and care 2009-04, Vol.179 (3), p.317-328
• Main Authors: Zachopoulou, Evridiki, Makri, Anastasia, Pollatou, Elisana
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: canonical correlation; Children; Comparative Analysis; Correlation; Correlation coefficients; Creativity Tests; Foreign Countries; Greece (Athens); Greece (Thessaloniki); Imagination; internal consistency; motor creativity assessment; Multivariate Analysis; Preschool Children; Psychometric properties; Psychometrics; Test Reliability; Test-Retest reliability; Testing
• ISSN: 0300-4430; 1476-8275
• DOI: 10.1080/03004430601078669

The purpose of this study was to examine the test-retest reliability of Torrance's 'Thinking Creatively in Action and Movement' (TCAM) test and the relationship between TCAM and the Divergent Movement Ability (DMA) test. The TCAM and DMA tests were used for a sample of 115 children, while the whole experimental procedure included three testing sessions: first and second testing sessions for the TCAM test and retest, and third testing session for the DMA test. The time interval between the two testing sessions was two weeks and each testing session lasted approximately 10 days. The results for the comparison between the test and the retest session for TCAM showed a high intra-class correlation coefficient, and also the paired simple t-test indicated that there were no statistically significant differences between the two testing sessions. Canonical correlation analysis revealed a high correlation between TCAM variables and DMA variables. A low value has been only reported concerning the variable of TCAM imagination. In conclusion, the present results are encouraging and seem to support the psychometric properties of TCAM for preschool-aged children, showing that TCAM is a valid and reliable instrument to measure creative movement in preschool children.