The different role of cognitive inhibition in early versus late creative problem finding.

Abstract

Previous research has suggested that ideas generated late in the creative process might require more executive control than those generated earlier. This in turn leads to the prediction that cognitive inhibition might play one role early in the process but a different role late in the process. The present investigation tested this prediction using a test of creative problem finding. Low cognitive inhibition was expected to facilitate an associative mode of processing, whereas high cognitive inhibition was expected to enable a deliberate, systematic mode of processing. An experiment involving 70 undergraduate students indicated that individuals' cognitive inhibition was correlated with fluency and flexibility, but not originality, on the problem-finding tasks. An interaction indicated that low cognitive inhibition enhanced originality initially, but later in the process, high cognitive inhibition was beneficial. Limitations of this investigation and future directions are explored.

Implicit Theories, Working Memory, and Cognitive Load: Impacts on Creative Thinking

“…The dual process of generating a large number of divergent ideas (fluency), followed by an inductive process of selecting high-quality ideas (i.e., providing responses high in originality) draws upon WM (Gilhooly, Fioratou, Anthony, & Wynn, 2007;Lee & Therriault, 2013;. This notion is also supported by evidence that early in the creative process, cognitive disinhibition is predominant, whereas later, high inhibition is more common (Cheng, Hu, Jia, & Runco, 2016). However, some forms of creativity, such as fluency, may not benefit from controlled processing (Barr, Pennycook, Stolz, & Fugelsang, 2015).…”

“…Given the impacts of cognitive load and WM on complex tasks and the similarity of the demands of creative thinking tasks to other complex tasks Benedek et al, 2012;Benedek et al, 2014;Nusbaum & Silvia, 2011;Lee & Therriault, 2013;Silvia, 2015), links among WM, cognitive load, and creative thinking are likely. Although disinhibition may benefit creative thinking initially (Cheng et al, 2016), as the process of ideation progresses, disinhibition can allow task-irrelevant material to increase cognitive load (Cheng et al, 2016;Cools, 2008;Dreisbach & Goschke, 2004). Here, WM can serve as a control mechanism to focus attention and resources toward systematically selecting highquality ideas (Nijstad & Stroebe, 2006).…”

Creativity is associated with a characteristic U-shaped function of alpha power changes accompanied by an early increase in functional coupling

“…Rather, considering existing behavioral research, it seems reasonable to assume that they are implicated in different stages of the creative ideation process (e.g., generative and exploratory processes, Finke, Ward, & Smith, 1996; see also Beaty, Benedek, Kaufman, & Silvia, 2015; Benedek & Jauk, 2018; Ellamil, Dobson, Beeman, & Christoff, 2012; Fink, Rominger, et al, 2018; Kleinmintz et al, 2018; Pringle & Sowden, 2017; Rominger, Papousek, Perchtold, et al, 2018; Sowden, Pringle, & Gabora, 2015). For instance, Gilhooly, Fioratou, Anthony, and Wynn (2007) found by means of an overt verbal Alternate Uses (AU; Guilford, 1967) task that initial ideas were more often based on memory retrieval, while later ideas were typically based on more complex processes such as imagination and inhibition (see also Cheng, Hu, Jia, & Runco, 2016; Silvia, Nusbaum, & Beaty, 2017). This is congruent with the assumption that at later stages of the creative thinking process, prepotent, obvious, and common ideas are inhibited and memory content is integrated in the generation of new ideas, which presumably leads to more creative outcomes (Beaty & Silvia, 2012; Benedek, Jauk, et al, 2014; Benedek et al, 2018; Cheng et al, 2016; Rominger, Papousek, Weiss, et al, 2018; Wang, Hao, Ku, Grabner, & Fink, 2017; Zabelina, Robinson, Council, & Bresin, 2012).…”

High Schizotypal Individuals Are More Creative? The Mediation Roles of Overinclusive Thinking and Cognitive Inhibition

“…The results lend support for the dual process of creative thinking that highlights the important roles of these two processes in creative cognition ( Allen and Thomas, 2011 ; Beaty et al, 2014 , 2016 ). However, these two underlying processes may perform differently in specific stages and contexts of creative thinking ( Allen and Thomas, 2011 ; Cheng et al, 2016 ). The automatic/associative process may drive response generation and problem searching, while effortful/controlled process may work on response evaluation and solution refining ( Allen and Thomas, 2011 ; Beaty et al, 2016 ).…”