The current study examines whether the Homophone Meaning Generation
Test (HMGT; Warrington, 2000) is correlated with
the phonemic and/or the semantic fluency tests and compares its
association with the number of switches and clusters and the mean cluster
size of these two tasks. One hundred healthy Hebrew speakers (18–35
years of age; mean = 24.9) generated meanings for 24 homophones and
provided words beginning in three different letters, as well as words
belonging to three semantic categories. Results show that the HMGT score
correlated significantly and similarly with the total score of both the
phonemic and the semantic fluency tests. There was a significant
correlation between the HMGT and the number of phonemic switches and
clusters, but not between the HMGT and the mean phonemic cluster size. The
HMGT correlated with the number of semantic switches and clusters, as well
as with the mean semantic cluster size. The findings suggest that the
relationship between these tests is mediated by a shared executive
component, attesting to the HMGT's utility in tapping into mechanisms
of shifting and mental flexibility. (JINS, 2007, 13,
424–432.)