Concentration of thoughts hinders creativity. Free Technical Library News

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Concentration of thoughts hinders creativity

23.03.2013

Scientists from the University of Pennsylvania have found a way to increase the efficiency of creative work by stimulating the prefrontal cortex of the brain.

It is believed that the prefrontal cortex controls cognitive activity and is a kind of filter that does not allow extraneous thoughts, perceptions and memories to interfere with the current task. In experiments, scientists slowed down this natural filter and found that this increased productivity in work that requires creative thinking. Participants were shown pictures of everyday objects and asked to quickly come up with unusual ways to use them, such as using a baseball bat as a rolling pin. The subjects were shown a sequence of 60 objects, one every 9 seconds, and the scientists timed the time it took the subjects to come up with an answer.

The researchers suggested that a high level of cognitive control by the "filter" interferes with the creative task. In everyday life, the filter helps us to focus on the main properties of the object and "cut off" what is not essential. At the same time, when solving creative problems, in particular, the non-trivial use of ordinary objects, it is necessary to take into account the entire range of its properties.

It turned out that this is the case: with transcranial stimulation of cognitive control zones with direct current (when a weak electric current penetrates the brain right through the skull), creativity increased. Apparently, stimulation causes changes in the electrical potential of neuronal membranes.

In other words, scientists have limited the ability of neurons in a particular area of the brain to generate signals, which reduced the activity of this area. Subjects with "regular" prefrontal cortex activity, on average, could not come up with unusual uses for 15 out of 60 objects, while subjects with inhibited activity in this brain region missed only 8 objects. At the same time, the latter gave the correct answers, on average, a second faster. For the brain to work, a second is a huge amount of time, usually researchers work with milliseconds.

The study by scientists from the University of Pennsylvania not only provides an opportunity to develop technologies for stimulating creativity, but also explains some aspects of human development. For example, since the prefrontal cortex develops slowly, children find it difficult to focus on a particular task, but they excel at creativity.

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