Creativity within a military setting: assessing the utility of an existing military visual aid to facilitate military deception amongst a civilian population

No significant differences emerged for the number of stratagems (<i>p</i> = 0.061, <i>r</i> = 0.238) or usefulness (<i>p</i> = 0.348, <i>r</i> = 0.116), originality (<i>p</i> = 0.558, <i>r</i> = 0.076), or snapshot scores (<i>p</i> = 0.603, <i>r</i> = 0.068). Results question whether deceptive thinking for a military context can be improved by a visual aid containing prompts about military deception principles. However, some task elements (e.g., same hypothetical scenario/only rating the best stratagem) may have reduced/nullified potential differences between groups. The use of an existing military deception visual aid may be limited to military samples. Future studies could employ mixed-method approaches or gamified designs to investigate the potential to enhance military deception planning.