diagnostic vs probative

diagnostic

adj
  • Serving to indicate or specify a particular item or thing within a group of similar things. 

  • Characteristic of a particular disease. 

  • Of, or relating to diagnosis. 

  • Intended to assess a student's preexisting knowledge on the material being taught. 

noun
  • Any technique used in medical diagnosis. 

  • That by which anything is known; a symptom. 

  • Any tool or technique used to find the root of a problem. 

probative

adj
  • Tending to prove a particular proposition or to persuade someone of the truth of an allegation. 

How often have the words diagnostic and probative occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )