Periodic Reporting for period 1 - CreHack (Deciphering creativity: A neuro-computational approach to the investigation of creative abilities.)
Período documentado: 2022-01-01 hasta 2023-12-31
Creativity is an impressive cognitive ability that makes humans an extraordinary species. To face the timely challenges of our society, creativity is a critical and necessary skill that plays a game-changer role in innovation. Yet, the cognitive and neural mechanisms of creativity are still poorly understood. Formally, creativity is defined as the ability to produce an object/idea that is both original and efficient. Then, creativity should involve an evaluative process of efficiency and originality, interacting with a generative process that generates candidate ideas. Today, a unitary modelling approach is still lacking in the field of creative cognition, and the evaluative process has been poorly explored.
Through computational modelling, this proposal aims at investigating the specific role of the evaluative component in the creativity mechanisms. This approach allows untangling the different steps of the creative process. The project uses a novel experimental design to develop this model and investigates its neural validity through neuroimaging (fMRI).
The main output of this research program is a neurocomputational model of creativity. It has two major impacts: it establishes empirical foundations for a general theory of how humans produce creative ideas and provides open tools to assess creativity in individuals. This proposal provides a new framework for the investigation of creativity mechanisms. It combines the expertise of the experienced researcher on computational approaches linked to value-based decision-making with the host lab's strength in Neuroscience of Creativity, located in the Paris Brain Institute (ICM), the largest research institute for neuroscience in France.
Through computational modelling, this proposal aims at investigating the specific role of the evaluative component in the creativity mechanisms. This approach allows untangling the different steps of the creative process. The project uses a novel experimental design to develop this model and investigates its neural validity through neuroimaging (fMRI).
The main output of this research program is a neurocomputational model of creativity. It has two major impacts: it establishes empirical foundations for a general theory of how humans produce creative ideas and provides open tools to assess creativity in individuals. This proposal provides a new framework for the investigation of creativity mechanisms. It combines the expertise of the experienced researcher on computational approaches linked to value-based decision-making with the host lab's strength in Neuroscience of Creativity, located in the Paris Brain Institute (ICM), the largest research institute for neuroscience in France.
During the fellowship, we conducted two behavioral studies and one fMRI studies.
The first behavioral study has been published (Lopez-Persem et al, 2023) and introduces a new computational model to explain the production of creative ideas. Critically, this model includes a "valuator" component, that assigns subjective values to candidate ideas considered by an agent before producing their final response. We found that agents select their final idea based on the values of ideas. Subjective values can be understood as the quantification of how much we like/enjoy things. It is directly linked to subjective preferences. In this study, participants had to provide creative word associations in response to a cue word. Interestingly, we found that the more participants like their ideas, the faster they want to provide them, and the faster they type them on a keyboard. This study demonstrates for the first time the mechanistic role of preferences in semantic creativity.
The second behavioral study (Battistello et al, in prep) replicated and extended the results to two additional domains of creativity: drawings and alternative uses of objects. It demonstrates that preferences have a role in any domain of creativity.
The third study was conducted inside an MRI scanner (with the same design as the first behavioral study) and we discovered that the Brain Valuation System, an equivalent to the reward system, is proportionally activated with how much participants like their responses when generating them. This study confirms the crucial role of preferences in creativity, through a biological explanation. It demonstrates that the Brain Valuation System assigns values to any kind of items, including self-generated ideas, and that creativity partly relies on how we like our ideas. The manuscript is currently in preparation (Moreno-Rodriguez et al, in prep).
Those three studies have been presented by the first authors (Battistello and Moreno-Rodriguez), supervised by A. Lopez-Persem during international conferences on posters and by A. Lopez-Persem through invited talks in national and international seminars and international conferences.
General public outreach was also achieved during the project, with A. Lopez-Persem regularly participates to national and international interviews for diverse media (BBC, Le Monde, France Culture, Phosphore, etc) and general science events (Brain week).
The first behavioral study has been published (Lopez-Persem et al, 2023) and introduces a new computational model to explain the production of creative ideas. Critically, this model includes a "valuator" component, that assigns subjective values to candidate ideas considered by an agent before producing their final response. We found that agents select their final idea based on the values of ideas. Subjective values can be understood as the quantification of how much we like/enjoy things. It is directly linked to subjective preferences. In this study, participants had to provide creative word associations in response to a cue word. Interestingly, we found that the more participants like their ideas, the faster they want to provide them, and the faster they type them on a keyboard. This study demonstrates for the first time the mechanistic role of preferences in semantic creativity.
The second behavioral study (Battistello et al, in prep) replicated and extended the results to two additional domains of creativity: drawings and alternative uses of objects. It demonstrates that preferences have a role in any domain of creativity.
The third study was conducted inside an MRI scanner (with the same design as the first behavioral study) and we discovered that the Brain Valuation System, an equivalent to the reward system, is proportionally activated with how much participants like their responses when generating them. This study confirms the crucial role of preferences in creativity, through a biological explanation. It demonstrates that the Brain Valuation System assigns values to any kind of items, including self-generated ideas, and that creativity partly relies on how we like our ideas. The manuscript is currently in preparation (Moreno-Rodriguez et al, in prep).
Those three studies have been presented by the first authors (Battistello and Moreno-Rodriguez), supervised by A. Lopez-Persem during international conferences on posters and by A. Lopez-Persem through invited talks in national and international seminars and international conferences.
General public outreach was also achieved during the project, with A. Lopez-Persem regularly participates to national and international interviews for diverse media (BBC, Le Monde, France Culture, Phosphore, etc) and general science events (Brain week).
Overall, this project has provided a cognitive and neurocognitive mechanistic explanation of how humans generate ideas and how their individual preferences impact their creativity and their production of ideas. This project has allowed the development of multiple new projects that specifically address:
- the relationship between creativity and psychiatric disorders with the investigation of the preference profiles in psychiatric disorders (A. Lopez-Persem ANR project proposal)
- the role of bias in preferences in creativity (Sarah Moreno-Rodriguez's PhD project, founded by FIRE doctoral school)
- the development of a smartphone application that aims to assess creativity and creativity-related preferences, that would give advice to participants to improve their creativity (Carnot Tools funding obtained by A. Lopez-Persem)
- the role of emotions on creativity-related preferences (Gino Battistello's PhD project, founded by ED3C doctoral school).
- the relationship between creativity and psychiatric disorders with the investigation of the preference profiles in psychiatric disorders (A. Lopez-Persem ANR project proposal)
- the role of bias in preferences in creativity (Sarah Moreno-Rodriguez's PhD project, founded by FIRE doctoral school)
- the development of a smartphone application that aims to assess creativity and creativity-related preferences, that would give advice to participants to improve their creativity (Carnot Tools funding obtained by A. Lopez-Persem)
- the role of emotions on creativity-related preferences (Gino Battistello's PhD project, founded by ED3C doctoral school).