Creative Individuals Have Unique Brain Connectivity Patterns: Study

A study being published in PNAS details research on brain activity patterns, specifically the patterns found in people who are creative and people who aren't. According to the research, creative individuals have unique brain activity patterns that differ from those of less creative people; this goes for creative individuals across various fields, everyone from artists to scientists.

The research comes from Harvard University psychologist Roger Beaty and colleagues who tasked individuals with thinking of creative uses for ordinary items like a sock and gum wrapper. The volunteers' brains were scanned during these brief creative thinking sessions and the results analyzed.

With this research came different, yet distinct, patterns of brain activity. For those who exhibited highly creative thinking, the brain scans showed heightened connectivity between a trio of brain networks: the executive control, default mode, and salience networks.

The executive control and default mode networks are often at odds, having a negative effect, while creative individuals show a different pattern: they are able to utilize these networks in a way that boosts creative thinking versus less creative people.

The team looked at the brain scans of volunteers from North Carolina, China, and Austria, ensuring some creative individuals were part of the group by targeting musicians, artists, and scientists. This is only the start of the research, though. According to The Guardian, the team plans to look at the brain activity of individuals in specific creative fields, such as the arts, and also study to determine whether creativity can be increased via training.

SOURCE: The Guardian