Research protocol
Prompt Specificity vs. Creative Diversity: A Controlled Image Test
Measure how increasing prompt specificity affects instruction adherence, creative diversity, usefulness, and contradiction across matched batches.
The central idea
Specificity can improve adherence while reducing useful exploration or creating conflict. The goal is not maximum detail; it is the smallest set of instructions needed to protect the brief and expose the decision under review.
A repeatable workflow
Build specificity levels
Create subject-only, directed, constrained, and densely specified versions from the same underlying brief.
Generate matched batches
Hold model, format, count, timing, and review conditions stable across each level.
Score four outcomes
Review adherence, diversity, aesthetic coherence, and practical decision value as separate dimensions.
Analyze interactions
Note which instruction types help, conflict, disappear, or suppress stronger model choices.
Worked example
A sustainable transit brief can add audience and message, then composition and light, then many props, materials, colors, and stylistic constraints. Blind review may reveal where added instructions stop improving the communication goal.
Review checklist
- Specificity levels share one brief
- Conditions remain matched
- Outcome dimensions stay separate
- Interactions are documented
Limitations
- Prompt detail is not measured well by word count alone
- Findings remain model- and task-specific