Creative Thinking and the Balanced Brain
A new study suggests that creative ability involves balanced switching between brain networks.
There are a lot of misconceptions out there about creativity. For instance, there is this idea that you must be a bit mad to be creative. Yes, the research suggests that creative people are able to access divergent associations, but they are also tethered to reality. They have a rich imagination, but they can also contemplate the value of an idea and have a good sense of their audience.
The neuroscience of creativity over the past decade has confirmed this about creative people. Over a decade ago I wrote an article called “The Real Neuroscience of Creativity” where I reviewed the exciting new network approach to understanding the brains of creative thinkers. Instead of viewing creativity as exclusively a “right brain-left brain” phenomenon, I discussed how the interaction between three particular brain networks supports creative thinking: the Executive Attention Network, the Default Mode Network (which I called the “Imagination Network”), and the Salience Network.
The Executive Attention Network (EAN) is recruited when a task requires that the spotlight of attention is focused like a laser beam. This network is active when you're concentrating on a challenging lecture, or engaging in complex problem solving and reasoning that puts heavy demands on working memory. This neural architecture involves efficient and reliable communication between lateral (outer) regions of the prefrontal cortex and areas toward the back (posterior) of the parietal lobe.
The Imagination Network (IN) is involved in constructing mental simulations, mind wandering, thinking about the future, and imagining alternative perspectives and scenarios to the present. The Imagination Network involves areas deep inside the prefrontal cortex and temporal lobe (medial regions), along with communication with various outer and inner regions of the parietal cortex.
The Salience Network (SN) constantly monitors both external events and the internal stream of consciousness and flexibly passes the baton to either the Executive Attention or Imagination Network depending on whatever information is most salient to solving the task at hand. This network consists of the dorsal anterior cingulate cortices [dACC] and anterior insular [AI] and is important for dynamic switching between the Executive Attention and Imagination Networks.
A large number of studies conducted by the cognitive neuroscientist Roger Beaty and his colleagues (upon which I consider myself a colleague!) have confirmed that creative thinking recruits regions within all of these networks, especially the Executive Control Network and the Imagination Network.
However, what has been lacking is an understanding of the dynamic nature of these interactions, and how often creative people switch back and forth between them in both their everyday thinking and when thinking creatively.
Until now. A really exciting new study has just been published that took 5 years to conduct and is the largest and most ethnically diverse creativity neuroscience study to date. Let’s dive in.
The Creative Brain is a Balanced Brain
Research led by a large team of superstar cognitive neuroscientists, including Quentin Chen (lead author), Hakaru Takeuchi, Andreas Fink, Mathias Benedek, and Roger Beaty analyzed 10 large-scale datasets (comprising 2433 participants) from Austria, Canada, China, Japan, and the United States which included structural MRI, resting-state fMRI, and creative ability data (assessed by divergent thinking tests administered outside the scanner).
They calculated the “switching frequency” between the EAN and the IN by the number of transitions between segregated and integrated states across the time windows. I know that is a mouthful! In essence, the dynamic reconfiguration of brain network connections can be divided into two distinct patterns that the brain routinely shows: segregation and integration. When the brain shows a segregated pattern, you see independent processing within networks, and when you see the integrated pattern, you see greater cooperation between networks.
The researchers found that switching frequency at rest (when not engaging in a particular task) was significantly and positively associated with the performance of later creative ability. In particular, they found “moderate cooperation” (neither more nor less) between the DMN and the IN at rest was conducive to the ability to generate creative ideas. This suggests that generating creative ideas requires an optimal balance between imagination and controlled attention.
Interestingly, they found no relationship between switching frequency and intelligence, suggesting that the DMN-IN switching effect is specific to creative thinking. Also, similar neural patterns were found during creative thinking in the scanner. They found that a creative thinking task (thinking of many different uses for a common object) recruited a significantly higher switching frequency and more balanced interactions between these two brain networks compared to a task merely requiring the production of common object characteristics during fMRI scanning. This further suggests that switching frequency is not as important for more general cognitive processes, such as extracting concepts from existing knowledge.
Conclusion
The researchers argue that “studying creative cognition from a dynamic framework holds much promise for yielding an enhanced understanding of creativity and providing new insight.”
I agree and think this research has a number of important implications. For one, it dispels the mad genius stereotype and suggests that while original thinkers tend to have “on call” their rich imagination and divergent associations, they also have on call their ability to focus and evaluate the value of ideas.
I also believe there are deep implications for the mindfulness literature. As I’ve argued elsewhere, I don’t believe that mindfulness and imagination necessarily are at odds with each other. Sometimes when reading the science of meditation literature it seems like the Imagination Network is the enemy of mindful meditation, but I think this is really misguided (this is a bit of a pet peeve of mine).
Yes, if all you’re doing in life is returning your attention to the breath every time it wanders, maybe all you’ll see is the Executive Attention Network active. However, I believe creative people and experienced meditators can use their mindfulness practice to harness the power of cognitive flexibility, being able to engage in their rich imagination and positive constructive daydreaming to facilitate their creativity and to live a more balanced and meaningful life.
We can be intensely mindful of our daydreams, and as a result move one step closer to realizing our greatest creative potential.
Hi Scott, what would be DMN? Is it a typo for EAN?
"We can be intensely mindful of our daydreams, and as a result move one step closer to realizing our greatest creative potential."
Thank you for this, Scott. I've always thought of my "positive constructive daydreaming" as both an enemy and a friend to 'creative productivity'. Friend, because that is where the ideas bloom, and enemy, because we end up, as Montaigne said "both everywhere and nowhere". I really love the idea of using mindfulness to simply bring the daydreaming into the present, whilst at the same time not imposing limits upon it. Still, a rather tricky thing to do in practice.