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Brain flexibility associated with need for cognition contributes to creative achievement.
Li He1,2,3, Kaixiang Zhuang1,2, Yu Li1,2
1Key Laboratory of Cognition and Personality (SWU), Ministry of Education, Chongqing, China.
Psychophysiology
|August 28, 2019
Summary
Higher need for cognition (NFC) is linked to greater brain flexibility, particularly global flexibility. This enhanced brain flexibility may be key to achieving greater creative success.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Cognitive Science
- Network Science
Background:
- Brain flexibility, the dynamic switching of functional modules, correlates with higher cognitive functions.
- Need for cognition (NFC) is a personality trait associated with enjoying effortful thinking and positively impacting cognitive activities like creativity.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate if brain network flexibility, influenced by NFC, facilitates creative achievement.
- To explore the relationship between NFC, brain flexibility across different scales, and creative output.
Main Methods:
- Utilized graph-theoretic network models to analyze brain topology.
- Performed robust correlation analyses to link NFC with node-level and network-level brain flexibility.
- Employed mediation analysis to examine the role of global flexibility in the NFC-creativity relationship.
Main Results:
- NFC positively correlated with the flexibility of specific brain regions (insula, medial prefrontal cortex, putamen).
- Flexibility in large-scale networks (default mode, salience, subcortical, ventral attention, control) also correlated with NFC.
- Global brain flexibility, but not local flexibility, significantly mediated the relationship between NFC and creative achievement.
Conclusions:
- Individuals with higher NFC exhibit greater brain flexibility across multiple networks.
- Global brain flexibility is a crucial mediator linking NFC to enhanced creative achievement.
- Findings suggest that brain network dynamics play a significant role in cognitive traits like NFC and creative potential.
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