Executive Function
Design Fluency Test
Also called: five-point test, figural fluency, nonverbal fluency
Measure nonverbal fluency by how many different designs a person can make by joining five dots with straight lines.
4-5 minUntimed
Free to start: 10 free participants per account, then $0.99 per participant for academic research, or any yearly plan. Preview any test free after you sign up.
- Papers, 2021 to 2025
- 116
- Evidence grade
- B
- Registered clinical studies
- 45
What it measures
A nonverbal fluency measure in the five-point format. Each box holds five dots placed as on a die, and participants join them with straight lines to make as many different designs as they can in the time limit. Scores give the count of different designs, repeats, lines per design, pace across the time limit and turned or mirrored designs.
Constructs
- Nonverbal fluency
- Self-monitoring
- Cognitive flexibility
- Strategy use
Research uses
- Executive function research
- Comparison with verbal fluency
- Aging and neuropsychology research
How the paradigm works
The Design Fluency Test is the nonverbal counterpart of verbal fluency. Jones-Gotman and Milner (1977) asked people to invent as many drawings as they could. Regard and colleagues (1982) gave the task a simple form: boxes that each hold five dots, joined with straight lines to make different designs. This test is that five-point format, drawn by code for the screen.
More about the paradigm
Each box holds five dots placed as on a die, four corners and a center. Participants click or tap one dot and then another to draw a straight line, tap a line to remove it, and press Next to keep the design and get a new box. Every design needs at least one line, and a design does not have to use every dot. Lines run only between dots, so the rule breaks of the paper version cannot happen. A line from a corner to the opposite corner passes through the center dot and is stored as its two segments, so a design is a set of the 8 possible segments, and two designs are the same exactly when they look the same. There are 255 possible designs. Kept designs stay on screen as small pictures with a running count, and repeats are not pointed out.
Practice shows two example designs, as in the paper version, and then the participant draws one design of their own, with feedback on what counts. The standard time limit is 3 minutes (Fernandez et al., 2009). Published versions have also used 2 minutes (Tucha et al., 2012) and 5 minutes (Tessier et al., 2022), and researchers can set 60 to 300 seconds.
The primary score is the number of unique designs. Scores also give total designs, repeats, repeats as a percent of all designs, mean segments per design, designs per minute in each third of the time limit, and designs that are a turn or mirror image of the design just before, the spatial strategy that Tessier and colleagues (2022) describe. The segments of each design are saved on its own row. Scores support research and do not diagnose.
Scores
- Unique Designscount
- Number of different designs kept within the time limit.
- Higher means more different designs
- Total Designscount
- Every design kept, repeats included.
- Higher means more designs made
- Repeatscount
- Designs kept that had already been made.
- Lower means fewer repeated designs
- Repeat Percent%
- Repeats as a percent of all designs.
- Lower means fewer repeats for the designs made
- Mean Lines per Designcount
- Mean number of the 8 segments in each design; a corner to opposite corner line counts as two.
- Higher means more complex designs
- Pace, First Thirddesigns/min
- Designs per minute in the first third of the time limit.
- Compare across the three thirds
- Pace, Second Thirddesigns/min
- Designs per minute in the second third of the time limit.
- Compare across the three thirds
- Pace, Last Thirddesigns/min
- Designs per minute in the last third of the time limit.
- Compare across the three thirds
- Turned or Mirrored Designscount
- Designs that are a turn or mirror image of the design just before, a strategy measure.
- Higher means more use of this strategy
- Most Repeated Design%
- Share of all designs taken by the most common design.
- Used for the quality check
- Time Limit Reached0/1
- 1 when the run lasted to the time limit.
- Used for the quality check
- Time Limitseconds
- The time limit set for the session.
- Compare scores only at the same time limit
Use and evidence
116 papers from 2021 to 2025 name this task in their title or abstract, down 22% compared with 2016 to 2020. That ranks it 172 of 395 test families in our census. See the counts for every test.
Show the numbers
| Year | Papers |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 22 |
| 2024 | 28 |
| 2023 | 19 |
| 2022 | 20 |
| 2021 | 27 |
| 2020 | 29 |
| 2019 | 31 |
| 2018 | 24 |
| 2017 | 30 |
| 2016 | 34 |
| 2015 | 23 |
| 2014 | 25 |
| 2013 | 26 |
| 2012 | 28 |
| 2011 | 21 |
| 2010 | 25 |
| 2009 | 16 |
| 2008 | 15 |
| 2007 | 13 |
| 2006 | 13 |
| 2005 | 14 |
| 2004 | 12 |
| 2003 | 13 |
| 2002 | 8 |
| 2001 | 9 |
| 2000 | 10 |
Use grade C
100 to 299 papers from 2021 to 2025.
Evidence grade B
At least 8 test-retest papers, and either 5 registered clinical studies or 150 reliability or validity papers.
- Papers on test-retest reliability
- 22
- Papers on reliability or validity
- 97
- Registered clinical studies using it as an outcome
- 45
How the grades work
Use: A is 1,000 or more papers from 2021 to 2025, B 300 to 999, C 100 to 299, D 30 to 99 and E fewer than 30. Evidence: A means at least 25 papers report its test-retest reliability and at least 25 registered clinical studies use it as an outcome; B, at least 8 test-retest papers, and either 5 registered clinical studies or 150 reliability or validity papers; C, at least 2 test-retest papers, 30 reliability or validity papers or 3 registered clinical studies; D, little published measurement evidence found. The counts measure use. They include every paper that names the task in its title or abstract. Grades describe the published research on this task, not ConductCognition's version of it.
Source: ConductCognition test census 0.14.0, counted 31 October 2026 from OpenAlex and ClinicalTrials.gov.
Task design
The trial sequence as the test runs in ConductCognition.
- Box
- Five dots placed as on a die, four corners and a center.
- Drawing
- A click or tap on one dot and then another draws a straight line. A tap on a line removes it.
- Designs
- Each design is a set of the 8 possible segments, 4 sides and 4 spokes, so there are 255 possible designs.
- Time limit
- 180 seconds across all the boxes.
- During the test
- Kept designs stay on screen as small pictures with a running count. Repeats are not pointed out.
- Practice
- 2 example designs, then 1 design of the participant's own with feedback.
Quality checks
Each session is marked valid, needs review or invalid, with the reason, before you see its scores.
Scored rows: design_fluency_design from the scored run, one per box. A session with no design, or one that stopped before the time limit with fewer than 5 designs, is invalid. A run that stopped early with more designs is flagged for review, and so is a run of at least 4 designs where one design makes up more than 50% of them.
Why these rules
There is no correct option to compare with chance, so accuracy is not judged against chance. The count of designs means little unless the full time was used, so a short run needs enough designs to read. Making one design again and again is not an attempt at different designs, so it is flagged.
No percentile. Scores and quality flags only.
Running this test
Settings you can change
| Setting | Standard | Allowed |
|---|---|---|
| Time limit (seconds) | 180 | 60 to 300 |
Yearly plans can change settings within these limits. Free and pay-as-you-go studies use the standard settings.
Need a setting this test does not have?
Devices and languages
- Untimed test: runs on desktops, laptops, tablets and phones. Participant devices
- Languages: English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil), Chinese (Simplified) and Japanese.
- Available on: Every plan, including the free plan.
- No percentile. Scores and quality flags only. How norms work
- Recruiting online? See the setup guides for Prolific, Sona Systems, CloudResearch Connect and Qualtrics.
Cite and describe
Participants completed the Design Fluency Test in a web browser (ConductCognition task version 1.0.0, scoring version 1.0.0; Regard et al., 1982), with the standard settings (time limit (seconds): 180). The main score was unique designs (number of different designs kept within the time limit).
ConductCognition versions: task version 1.0.0, scoring version 1.0.0. Every export records the versions each session used, for a methods section.
- Jones-Gotman, M., & Milner, B. (1977). Design fluency: The invention of nonsense drawings after focal cortical lesions. Neuropsychologia, 15(4-5), 653-674. https://doi.org/10.1016/0028-3932(77)90070-7
- Regard, M., Strauss, E., & Knapp, P. (1982). Children's production on verbal and non-verbal fluency tasks. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 55(3), 839-844. https://doi.org/10.2466/pms.1982.55.3.839
- Fernandez, A. L., Moroni, M. A., Carranza, J. M., Fabbro, N., & Lebowitz, B. K. (2009). Reliability of the Five-Point Test. The Clinical Neuropsychologist, 23(3), 501-509. https://doi.org/10.1080/13854040802279675
- Goebel, S., Fischer, R., Ferstl, R., & Mehdorn, H. M. (2009). Normative data and psychometric properties for qualitative and quantitative scoring criteria of the Five-point Test. The Clinical Neuropsychologist, 23(4), 675-690. https://doi.org/10.1080/13854040802389185
- Tucha, L., Aschenbrenner, S., Koerts, J., & Lange, K. W. (2012). The Five-Point Test: Reliability, validity and normative data for children and adults. PLoS ONE, 7(9), e46080. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0046080
- Tessier, M., Desmarais, A., Leclerc, J., Lavoie, M., O'Connor, K., & Gauthier, B. (2022). Capturing subtle neurocognitive differences in children with and without Tourette syndrome through a fine-grained analysis of design fluency profiles. Journal of Clinical Medicine, 11(7), 1946. https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm11071946
Source papers
- Regard M, Strauss E, Knapp P (1982). Children's production on verbal and non-verbal fluency tasks. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 55(3):839-844.Paradigm source, Children
- Goebel S, Fischer R, Ferstl R, Mehdorn HM (2009). Normative data and psychometric properties for qualitative and quantitative scoring criteria of the Five-point Test. The Clinical Neuropsychologist, 23(4):675-690.Paradigm source, Adults 18 to 80
Questions
How long does the Design Fluency Test take?
About 4 to 5 minutes, as listed in the test library.
What device does a participant need?
Untimed test: runs on desktops, laptops, tablets and phones. The browser must be Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari.
What scores does it produce?
Unique Designs, Total Designs, Repeats, Repeat Percent, Mean Lines per Design, Pace, First Third, Pace, Second Third, Pace, Last Third, Turned or Mirrored Designs, Most Repeated Design, Time Limit Reached and Time Limit. Each session is also marked valid, needs review or invalid, with the reason.
How widely is the Design Fluency Test used in research?
116 papers from 2021 to 2025 name it in their title or abstract, down 22% compared with 2016 to 2020. That ranks it 172 of 395 test families in the ConductCognition test census (use grade C). Source: ConductCognition test census 0.14.0, counted 31 October 2026 from OpenAlex and ClinicalTrials.gov.
How much reliability evidence does the Design Fluency Test have?
In the published research, 22 papers report its test-retest reliability and 45 registered clinical studies use it as an outcome (evidence grade B in the ConductCognition test census).
Does it report a percentile?
No. Scores and quality flags only.
Which settings can a researcher change?
Time limit (seconds) (60 to 300). Settings can be changed on yearly plans; free and pay-as-you-go studies use the standard settings.
Which languages can participants use?
Participants can take this test in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil), Chinese (Simplified) and Japanese. English is on every plan, and the other languages come with yearly plans. Have a native speaker read the machine-translated text before launch.
Is this a clinical test?
No. ConductCognition is for research use only. It runs, scores and exports the test; clinical interpretation is outside the platform.
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