Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-28 Cooperative journals: 《心理科学进展》
Abstract： Threats are stimuli that may cause disgust, harm, or loss to individuals. These stimuli have not yet occurred but are foreseeable. They can easily induce negative emotions, such as anxiety and fear, and affect an individual’s cognitive ability and creativity. Creativity is the ability that an individual can take initiative to create novel (i.e. original and unexpected) and useful products with social value for a certain purpose. The impact of threats on creativity is one of the concerned and controversial topics in the field of psychology. Currently, there are three viewpoints: threats can hinder creativity generally; threats can promote creativity; in some certain conditions, there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between threats and creativity to illustrate how different levels of threats affect creativity. There are plenty of theoretical and empirical studies supporting these three viewpoints respectively. However, why these three viewpoints exist and what their divergence and their underlying mechanisms are still unclear. Through scanning through a considerable amount of studies, it is found that a reasonable perspective for understanding the relationship between the two can be provided by studying the distinction and connection between cognition and emotion. The distinction and connection between cognition and emotion can provide a reasonable perspective for understanding the relationship between them. Therefore, based on comparing and summarizing previous studies, this review explored the reasons for the divergence and reviewed them from the perspectives of cognition and emotion. As a result, it is found that divergence comes from the differences in threat levels, creativity mechanisms, creativity task difficulties, and additional mediator/modulator variables between threat and creativity. Specifically, High-level and low-level threats can attract individual’s different levels of attention and take up different amounts of cognitive resources, thus have different impacts on other following tasks. The difference in creativity mechanisms reflects in the difference between divergent thinking and convergent thinking. Divergent thinking is that people produce as many solutions to the problems of vague definition as possible. Whereas convergent thinking is that people rely on quick identification of the clearly defined the problem to find the best solution. Divergent thinking depends on cognitive flexibility more, while convergent thinking prefers to depend on cognitive persistence. When Individuals are facing different tasks, the demands for working memory are different. Compared with simple tasks, complex tasks have higher requirements on the participation of the working memory system, and at the same time they take up more cognitive resources, Therefore, individuals faced with complex tasks may bring worse performance than those faced with simple tasks. In addition, the different mediating/moderating variables between threat and creativity may have different or even opposite effects on the creativity tasks. For future researches, they can focus on systematically verifying the reasons for the divergence from the perspectives of cognitive and emotional intervention. Specifically, future researchers can explore the impact of different levels of threats on individual’s divergent and convergent thinking. In addition, it is necessary to explore the possible mediating/modulating variables (such as emotion regulation, self-affirmation, etc.) and find out how these variables affect the relationship between threats and creativity. Furthermore, the research on the relationship between threat and creativity should pay attention to the inverted U-shaped model and they can start with studying the balance of motivation and emotion, and then explore the critical point in the inverted U-shaped curve. In addition, when exploring the above issues, the best way is to try to combine different brain imaging technologies to thoroughly investigate the role of many brain areas that are responsible for threat information processing and emotions, and the functional links between these brain areas to explore the impact of threats on creativity. Finally, the cognitive neuroscience can be combined with gene mechanisms to explore the relationship between threat and creativity and clarify the nature of the problem.
Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-28 Cooperative journals: 《心理科学进展》
Abstract： Dual process generally refers to intuitive processing and analytical processing. Given the progress in transformation and collaboration mechanisms of dual process, emotion has gradually become the key variable for influencing the dual process. It is clearly pointed out that emotion is closely related to intuitive processing (Type 1) in dual process theory, which does not need cognitive efforts, but many empirical findings have shown that emotion also has a significant impact on analytical processing (Type 2). However, how emotions affect intuitive and analytical processing remains controversial in related studies. Relevant researches mainly focus on the influence of emotion on the single pathway of Type 1 processing or Type 2 processing, while the comprehensive influences of emotion on dual processes are rarely studied, these researches only are carried out at the superficial level, less dig deep into the differences of cognitive processing mechanism. In addition, different perspectives have resulted in the obscurity of emotions' function. Therefore, it is important to clarify the mechanism of emotion influencing on dual-processing from the perspectives of emotional valence and emotional arousal. The results show that positive emotions and emotions with high arousal tend to promote intuitive processing, while negative emotions with low arousal prefer to adopt analytical processing, but it will be affected by knowledge and experience, surface information, task characteristics and processing conditions. Consequently, emotions with different valence and arousal also have different impacts on processing. Positive emotions or negative emotions with high arousal can promote Type 1 processing, while negative emotions with low arousal will lead to Type 2 processing. In addition, a dual processing model which helps us make clear of thread about emotion influences, is used to explain the mechanism of emotional influence on dual processing. Type 1 and Type 2 are regarded as two relatively independent and successive processing stages in this model. In the startup phase of cognitive processing, positive emotions will broaden one’s attention, which means an increase in available information cues and enable individuals to retrieve information faster, thus facilitates Type 1 processing, individuals in high affective arousal will be directed attention by highly relevant information and reduce the attention to irrelevant information, thus tend to choose Type 1 processing, while negative emotions will narrow attention, which let the individuals pay more attention to the detailed information instead of the main information and let them consume more cognitive resources in Type 2 processing. In the Type 2 processing intervention stage, on the one hand, motivation is the individuals' subjective condition of whether to enter the Type 2 processing stage. The motivation to maintain positive emotions will trigger Type 1 processing that takes less cognitive effort, while the motivation to improve negative emotions will make the individual invest more cognitive resources in Type 2 processing. The individuals will choose the appropriate arousal level for the motivation of maintaining the current positive emotion and repairing negative emotion. On the other hand, cognitive resources are the individuals' objective condition of Type 2 processing, which are needed in Type 2 processing. Cognitive resources are also the core part of cognitive load theory, which includes intrinsic cognitive load, extraneous cognitive load and germane cognitive load. Emotions can be used as the three kinds of load to directly allocate cognitive resources and determine whether Type 2 processing can be involved. It is worth doing future exploration on verifying the effect of emotion on specific dual processing models by cognitive neuroscience techniques, the association between emotional arousal and dual processing, recent developments in emotion theory, and the strategies for optimizing dual processing under emotional load.
Subjects: Psychology >> Social Psychology submitted time 2023-03-28 Cooperative journals: 《心理科学进展》
Abstract： Creative thinking is the ability to generate novel and useful solutions to a problem, of which divergent and convergent thinking are two common types. Evidence shows that physical exercise may influence these two types differently. For divergent thinking, the beneficial effect on creative flexibility and originality is larger than fluency. Although there is no consistent conclusion yet regarding convergent thinking, most studies show that physical exercise is not related to or even detrimental to convergent thinking; however, some studies have found the exercise facilitation when the convergent thinking task is thought-directed. Many factors moderate the effect of physical exercise on creative thinking. (1) The optimum exercise intensity varies at different exercise frequencies; moderate intensity proves more beneficial in the case of acute exercise, while higher intensity is needed for long-term exercise. (2) Regarding exercise forms, free exercise such as free walking is more effective than restricted exercise such as treadmill walking. (3) In the simultaneous paradigm, the best exercise duration for creative thinking is 20-30 minutes, while in the relay paradigm, the exercise duration of 5 minutes to 1 hour is effective, which might include some time-delay effect. (4) Compared with children and older people, exercise effect on young adults is lower due to the ceiling effect; The effect is less likely to be seen in children aged 6-13 than in children of other ages who are undergoing physical and mental developmental changes. (5) Individuals who are physically fit and those with an exercise habit show stronger convergent thinking after exercise.There are theories that explain the effect of physical exercise on creativity: the mood hypothesis, the executive function hypothesis, and embodied metaphor theory. The mood hypothesis has two perspectives: the one which considers only emotion valance, suggesting that positive emotions triggered by exercise facilitate creative thinking and negative emotions undermine it; and the other which considers both mood activation, suggesting that both positive and negative emotions that are activated rather than deactivated can enhance creative thinking, but using different routes. Controversy remains in the executive function hypothesis, moreover, with some researchers arguing that physical exercise enhances creative thinking by depleting cognitive control resources. Nevertheless, in recent years an increasing number of studies have found beneficial effects of physical exercise on executive function, with some claims that improvements in creative thinking are dependent on improvements in some executive functions, such as working memory capacity and cognitive inhibition. Embodied metaphor theory suggests that abstract concepts are metaphorically grounded in concrete experience; creative thinking can be likened to free movement or specific gesture, thus inspiring divergent and convergent thinking.Further exploration of the relationship between exercise and creative thinking is demanded in the future. Above all, emphasize the normative and scientific aspects of research and expand the scope to include non-intellectual factors of creative thinking, such as emotional creativity and creative personality. Furthermore, more neuroscience research should be conducted further to reveal the mechanism underlying the complex effects of exercise on creativity. Additionally, pay attention to the mechanisms that influence creative thinking through exercise in different population groups, with a view to expanding the scope of research to include young children, older people, and special groups. Finally, the relationship between physical exercise and creative achievement will be explored, especially the long-term and even permanent effects of physical exercise on creative thinking, enabling us to provide scientific support for the exercise prescriptions to improve the public's creativity.
submitted time 2023-03-25 Cooperative journals: 《心理科学进展》
Abstract： Dual process generally refers to intuitive processing and analytical processing. Given the progress in transformation and collaboration mechanisms of dual process, emotion has gradually become the key variable for influencing the dual process. It is clearly pointed out that emotion is closely related to intuitive processing (Type 1) in dual process theory, which does not need cognitive efforts, but many empirical findings have shown that emotion also has a significant impact on analytical processing (Type 2). However, how emotions affect intuitive and analytical processing remains controversial in related studies. Relevant researches mainly focus on the influence of emotion on the single pathway of Type 1 processing or Type 2 processing, while the comprehensive influences of emotion on dual processes are rarely studied, these researches only are carried out at the superficial level, less dig deep into the differences of cognitive processing mechanism. In addition, different perspectives have resulted in the obscurity of emotions' function. Therefore, it is important to clarify the mechanism of emotion influencing on dual-processing from the perspectives of emotional valence and emotional arousal. The results show that positive emotions and emotions with high arousal tend to promote intuitive processing, while negative emotions with low arousal prefer to adopt analytical processing, but it will be affected by knowledge and experience, surface information, task characteristics and processing conditions. Consequently, emotions with different valence and arousal also have different impacts on processing. Positive emotions or negative emotions with high arousal can promote Type 1 processing, while negative emotions with low arousal will lead to Type 2 processing. In addition, a dual processing model which helps us make clear of thread about emotion influences, is used to explain the mechanism of emotional influence on dual processing. Type 1 and Type 2 are regarded as two relatively independent and successive processing stages in this model. In the startup phase of cognitive processing, positive emotions will broaden one’s attention, which means an increase in available information cues and enable individuals to retrieve information faster, thus facilitates Type 1 processing, individuals in high affective arousal will be directed attention by highly relevant information and reduce the attention to irrelevant information, thus tend to choose Type 1 processing, while negative emotions will narrow attention, which let the individuals pay more attention to the detailed information instead of the main information and let them consume more cognitive resources in Type 2 processing. In the Type 2 processing intervention stage, on the one hand, motivation is the individuals' subjective condition of whether to enter the Type 2 processing stage. The motivation to maintain positive emotions will trigger Type 1 processing that takes less cognitive effort, while the motivation to improve negative emotions will make the individual invest more cognitive resources in Type 2 processing. The individuals will choose the appropriate arousal level for the motivation of maintaining the current positive emotion and repairing negative emotion. On the other hand, cognitive resources are the individuals' objective condition of Type 2 processing, which are needed in Type 2 processing. Cognitive resources are also the core part of cognitive load theory, which includes intrinsic cognitive load, extraneous cognitive load and germane cognitive load. Emotions can be used as the three kinds of load to directly allocate cognitive resources and determine whether Type 2 processing can be involved. It is worth doing future exploration on verifying the effect of emotion on specific dual processing models by cognitive neuroscience techniques, the association between emotional arousal and dual processing, recent developments in emotion theory, and the strategies for optimizing dual processing under emotional load.
Subjects: Psychology >> Cognitive Psychology submitted time 2022-09-21
Abstract：
Creative thinking is the ability to generate novel and useful solutions to a problem, of which divergent and convergent thinking are two common types. Evidence shows that physical exercise may influence these two types differently, and the effects are moderated by exercise intensity, forms, duration, and individual differences. The mood hypothesis, executive function hypothesis, and embodied metaphor theory are proposed to explain the effect of exercise on creativity. Future explorations should pay more attention to experimental standardization, broaden the research to the neuroscience field, expand the research subjects to all age groups and increase focus on the relationship between physical exercise and creative achievement to provide compelling evidence for exercise pre
Peer Review Status:
Awaiting Review
Subjects: Psychology >> Cognitive Psychology submitted time 2021-02-07
Abstract： The impact of threats on creativity is one of the concerned and controversial topic in the field of psychology. Currently, there are three viewpoints: threats can hinder creativity generally; threats can promote creativity, under some certain conditions; there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between threats and creativity. However, the reasons for the divergence of these three viewpoints and the underlying mechanism are still unclear. This article review them from the perspectives of cognition and emotion and conclude that the divergence comes from differences in threat levels, creativity mechanisms and additional mediator/modulator variables. Therefore, future research can focus on systematically verifying the reasons for the divergence from the perspectives of cognitive and emotional intervention and exploring the cognitive neuroscience and genes mechanisms of the relationship between threat and creativity.
Peer Review Status:Awaiting Review
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