Roger E. Beaty

Creative Cognition and Brain Network Dynamics

Creative thinking is central to the arts, sciences, and everyday life. How does the brain produce creative thought? A series of recently published papers has begun to provide insight into this question, reporting a strikingly similar pattern of brain activity and connectivity across a range of creative tasks and domains, from divergent thinking to poetry composition to musical improvisation. This research suggests that creative thought involves dynamic interactions of large-scale brain systems, with the most compelling finding being that the default and executive control networks, which can show an antagonistic relation, tend to cooperate during creative cognition and artistic performance. These findings have implications for understanding how brain networks interact to support complex cognitive processes, particularly those involving goal-directed, self-generated thought.

Creativity and the default network: A functional connectivity analysis of the creative brain at rest

The present research used resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine whether the ability to generate creative ideas corresponds to differences in the intrinsic organization of functional networks in the brain. We examined the functional connectivity between regions commonly implicated in neuroimaging studies of divergent thinking, including the inferior prefrontal cortex and the core hubs of the default network. Participants were prescreened on a battery of divergent thinking tests and assigned to high- and low-creative groups based on task performance. Seed-based functional connectivity analysis revealed greater connectivity between the left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and the entire default mode network in the high-creative group. The right IFG also showed greater functional connectivity with bilateral inferior parietal cortex and the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex in the high-creative group. The results suggest that the ability to generate creative ideas is characterized by increased functional connectivity between the inferior prefrontal cortex and the default network, pointing to a greater cooperation between brain regions associated with cognitive control and low-level imaginative processes.

Creating metaphors: The neural basis of figurative language production

Neuroscience research has thoroughly studied how nonliteral language is processed during metaphor comprehension. However, it is not clear how the brain actually creates nonliteral language. Therefore, the present study for the first time investigates the neural correlates of metaphor production. Participants completed sentences by generating novel metaphors or literal synonyms during functional imaging. Responses were spoken aloud in the scanner, recorded, and subsequently rated for their creative quality. We found that metaphor production was associated with focal activity in predominantly left-hemispheric brain regions, specifically the left angular gyrus, the left middle and superior frontal gyri—corresponding to the left dorsomedial prefrontal (DMPFC) cortex—and the posterior cingulate cortex. Moreover, brain activation in the left anterior DMPFC and the right middle temporal gyrus was found to linearly increase with the creative quality of metaphor responses. These findings are related to neuroscientific evidence on metaphor comprehension, creative idea generation and episodic future thought, suggesting that creating metaphors involves the flexible adaptation of semantic memory to imagine and construct novel figures of speech. Furthermore, the left DMPFC may exert executive control to maintain strategic search and selection, thus facilitating creativity of thought.

The roles of associative and executive processes in creative cognition

How does the mind produce creative ideas? Past research has pointed to important roles of both executive and associative processes in creative cognition. But such work has largely focused on the influence of one ability or the other—executive or associative—so the extent to which both abilities may jointly affect creative thought remains unclear. Using multivariate structural equation modeling, we conducted two studies to determine the relative influences of executive and associative processes in domain-general creative cognition (i.e., divergent thinking). Participants completed a series of verbal fluency tasks, and their responses were analyzed by means of latent semantic analysis (LSA) and scored for semantic distance as a measure of associative ability. Participants also completed several measures of executive function—including broad retrieval ability (Gr) and fluid intelligence (Gf). Across both studies, we found substantial effects of both associative and executive abilities: As the average semantic distance between verbal fluency responses and cues increased, so did the creative quality of divergent-thinking responses (Study 1 and Study 2). Moreover, the creative quality of divergent-thinking responses was predicted by the executive variables—Gr (Study 1) and Gf (Study 2). Importantly, the effects of semantic distance and the executive function variables remained robust in the same structural equation model predicting divergent thinking, suggesting unique contributions of both constructs. The present research extends recent applications of LSA in creativity research and provides support for the notion that both associative and executive processes underlie the production of novel ideas.

Metaphorically speaking: cognitive abilities and the production of figurative language

Figurative language is one of the most common expressions of creative behavior in everyday life. However, the cognitive mechanisms behind figures of speech such as metaphors remain largely unexplained. Recent evidence suggests that fluid and executive abilities are important to the generation of conventional and creative metaphors. The present study investigated whether several factors of the Cattell–Horn–Carroll model of intelligence contribute to generating these different types of metaphors. Specifically, the roles of fluid intelligence (Gf), crystallized intelligence (Gc), and broad retrieval ability (Gr) were explored. Participants completed a series of intelligence tests and were asked to produce conventional and creative metaphors. Structural equation modeling was used to assess the contribution of the different factors of intelligence to metaphor production. For creative metaphor, there were large effects of Gf (β = .45) and Gr (β = .52); for conventional metaphor, there was a moderate effect of Gc (β = .30). Creative and conventional metaphors thus appear to be anchored in different patterns of abilities: Creative metaphors rely more on executive processes, whereas conventional metaphors primarily draw from acquired vocabulary knowledge.

Personality and complex brain networks: The role of openness to experience in default network efficiency.

The brains default network (DN) has been a topic of considerable empirical interest. In fMRI research, DN activity is associated with spontaneous and self‐generated cognition, such as mind‐wandering, episodic memory retrieval, future thinking, mental simulation, theory of mind reasoning, and creative cognition. Despite large literatures on developmental and disease‐related influences on the DN, surprisingly little is known about the factors that impact normal variation in DN functioning. Using structural equation modeling and graph theoretical analysis of resting‐state fMRI data, we provide evidence that Openness to Experience—a normally distributed personality trait reflecting a tendency to engage in imaginative, creative, and abstract cognitive processes—underlies efficiency of information processing within the DN. Across two studies, Openness predicted the global efficiency of a functional network comprised of DN nodes and corresponding edges. In Study 2, Openness remained a robust predictor—even after controlling for intelligence, age, gender, and other personality variables—explaining 18% of the variance in DN functioning. These findings point to a biological basis of Openness to Experience, and suggest that normally distributed personality traits affect the intrinsic architecture of large‐scale brain systems. Hum Brain Mapp 37:773–779, 2016.

Individual differences in verbal creative thinking are reflected in the precuneus.

There have been many structural and functional imaging studies of creative thinking, but combining structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) investigations with respect to creative thinking is still lacking. Thus, the aim of the present study was to explore the associations among inter-individual verbal creative thinking and both regional homogeneity and cortical morphology of the brain surface. We related the local functional homogeneity of spontaneous brain activity to verbal creative thinking and its dimensions--fluency, originality, and flexibility--by examining these inter-individual differences in a large sample of 268 healthy college students. Results revealed that people with high verbal creative ability and high scores for the three dimensions of creativity exhibited lower regional functional homogeneity in the right precuneus. Both cortical volume and thickness of the right precuneus were positively associated with individual verbal creativity and its dimensions. Moreover, originality was negatively correlated with functional homogeneity in the left superior frontal gyrus and positively correlated with functional homogeneity in the right occipito-temporal gyrus. In contrast, flexibility was positively correlated with functional homogeneity in the left superior and middle occipital gyrus. These findings provide additional evidence of a link between verbal creative thinking and brain structure in the right precuneus--a region involved in internally--focused attention and effective semantic retrieval-and further suggest that local functional homogeneity of verbal creative thinking has neurobiological relevance that is likely based on anatomical substrates.

Creative constraints: Brain activity and network dynamics underlying semantic interference during idea production☆

Abstract Functional neuroimaging research has recently revealed brain network interactions during performance on creative thinking tasks—particularly among regions of the default and executive control networks—but the cognitive mechanisms related to these interactions remain poorly understood. Here we test the hypothesis that the executive control network can interact with the default network to inhibit salient conceptual knowledge (i.e., pre‐potent responses) elicited from memory during creative idea production. Participants studied common noun‐verb pairs and were given a cued‐recall test with corrective feedback to strengthen the paired association in memory. They then completed a verb generation task that presented either a previously studied noun (high‐constraint) or an unstudied noun (low‐constraint), and were asked to “think creatively” while searching for a novel verb to relate to the presented noun. Latent Semantic Analysis of verbal responses showed decreased semantic distance values in the high‐constraint (i.e., interference) condition, which corresponded to increased neural activity within regions of the default (posterior cingulate cortex and bilateral angular gyri), salience (right anterior insula), and executive control (left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex) networks. Independent component analysis of intrinsic functional connectivity networks extended this finding by revealing differential interactions among these large‐scale networks across the task conditions. The results suggest that interactions between the default and executive control networks underlie response inhibition during constrained idea production, providing insight into specific neurocognitive mechanisms supporting creative cognition.

Brain mechanisms associated with internally directed attention and self-generated thought

Internal cognition like imagination and prospection require sustained internally directed attention and involve self-generated thought. This fMRI study aimed to disentangle the brain mechanisms associated with attention-specific and task-specific processes during internally directed cognition. The direction of attention was manipulated by either keeping a relevant stimulus visible throughout the task, or by masking it, so that the task had to be performed “in the mind’s eye”. The level of self-directed thought was additionally varied between a convergent and a divergent thinking task. Internally directed attention was associated with increased activation in the right anterior inferior parietal lobe (aIPL), bilateral lingual gyrus and the cuneus, as well as with extended deactivations of superior parietal and occipital regions representing parts of the dorsal attention network. The right aIPL further showed increased connectivity with occipital regions suggesting an active top-down mechanism for shielding ongoing internal processes from potentially distracting sensory stimulation in terms of perceptual decoupling. Activation of the default network was not related to internally directed attention per se, but rather to a higher level of self-generated thought. The findings hence shed further light on the roles of inferior and superior parietal cortex for internally directed cognition.

Robust prediction of individual creative ability from brain functional connectivity

Significance People’s capacity to generate creative ideas is central to technological and cultural progress. Despite advances in the neuroscience of creativity, the field lacks clarity on whether a specific neural architecture distinguishes the highly creative brain. Using methods in network neuroscience, we modeled individual creative thinking ability as a function of variation in whole-brain functional connectivity. We identified a brain network associated with creative ability comprised of regions within default, salience, and executive systems—neural circuits that often work in opposition. Across four independent datasets, we show that a person’s capacity to generate original ideas can be reliably predicted from the strength of functional connectivity within this network, indicating that creative thinking ability is characterized by a distinct brain connectivity profile. People’s ability to think creatively is a primary means of technological and cultural progress, yet the neural architecture of the highly creative brain remains largely undefined. Here, we employed a recently developed method in functional brain imaging analysis—connectome-based predictive modeling—to identify a brain network associated with high-creative ability, using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data acquired from 163 participants engaged in a classic divergent thinking task. At the behavioral level, we found a strong correlation between creative thinking ability and self-reported creative behavior and accomplishment in the arts and sciences (r = 0.54). At the neural level, we found a pattern of functional brain connectivity related to high-creative thinking ability consisting of frontal and parietal regions within default, salience, and executive brain systems. In a leave-one-out cross-validation analysis, we show that this neural model can reliably predict the creative quality of ideas generated by novel participants within the sample. Furthermore, in a series of external validation analyses using data from two independent task fMRI samples and a large task-free resting-state fMRI sample, we demonstrate robust prediction of individual creative thinking ability from the same pattern of brain connectivity. The findings thus reveal a whole-brain network associated with high-creative ability comprised of cortical hubs within default, salience, and executive systems—intrinsic functional networks that tend to work in opposition—suggesting that highly creative people are characterized by the ability to simultaneously engage these large-scale brain networks.