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THE LATEST INTELLIGENCE
Struggling to get your creative juices flowing?
A team from Queen Mary University of London may
have a solution – zap your brain with a blast
of electricity.
The researchers found that temporarily
suppressing the activity of the left dorsolateral
prefrontal cor tex (DLPFC), an area of the brain
involved in most of our thinking and reasoning, can
boost our ability to “think outside the box”.
They used a technique called transcranial direct
current stimulation (tDCS), to pass a weak electrical
current through electrodes positioned on the head
to alter the function of the DLPFC. Depending on the
direction of the current flow, DLPFC was either
temporarily suppressed or activated. When it was
suppressed, the participants performed better at
‘matchstick problems’ – puzzles involving the
rearrangement of geometric patterns of matchsticks
designed to test lateral thinking.
“We solve problems by applying rules we learn
from experience, and the DLPFC plays a key role
in automating this process,” said researcher DrCaroline Di Bernardi Luft. “It works fine most of
the time, but fails spectacularly when we
encounter new problems which require a new
style of thinking – our past experience can indeed
block our creativity. To break this mental fixation,
we need to loosen up our learned rules.”
However, the boost in creativity came at a cost, as
the participants got worse at solving problems that
demanded a better use of memory.
“These results are important because they
show the potential of improving mental functions
relevant for creativity by non-invasive brain
stimulation methods,” said Luft. “However, our
results also suggest that potential applications of
this technique will have to consider the target
cognitive effects in more detail rather than just
assuming tDCS can improve cognition as claimed
by some companies which are starting to sell
tDCS machines for home users.
“I would say that we are not yet in a position to
wear an electrical hat and start stimulating our brain
hoping for a blanket cognitive gain.”CREATIVITY BOOSTED WITH
ELECTRIC BRAIN STIMULATION
To stimulate the
brain, electrodes
are soaked in
saline before
being attached to
the scalpNEUROSCIENCE