Insightful problem solving and creative tool modification by captive nontool-using rooks.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Bird CD
PROVIDER: S-EPMC2700937 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
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Project description:The "aha" moment or the sudden arrival of the solution to a problem is a common human experience. Spontaneous problem solving without evident trial and error behavior in humans and other animals has been referred to as insight. Surprisingly, elephants, thought to be highly intelligent, have failed to exhibit insightful problem solving in previous cognitive studies. We tested whether three Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) would use sticks or other objects to obtain food items placed out-of-reach and overhead. Without prior trial and error behavior, a 7-year-old male Asian elephant showed spontaneous problem solving by moving a large plastic cube, on which he then stood, to acquire the food. In further testing he showed behavioral flexibility, using this technique to reach other items and retrieving the cube from various locations to use as a tool to acquire food. In the cube's absence, he generalized this tool utilization technique to other objects and, when given smaller objects, stacked them in an attempt to reach the food. The elephant's overall behavior was consistent with the definition of insightful problem solving. Previous failures to demonstrate this ability in elephants may have resulted not from a lack of cognitive ability but from the presentation of tasks requiring trunk-held sticks as potential tools, thereby interfering with the trunk's use as a sensory organ to locate the targeted food.
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Project description:BackgroundCognitive insight phenomenon lies at the core of numerous discoveries. Behavioral research indicates four salient features of insightful problem solving: (i) mental impasse, followed by (ii) restructuring of the problem representation, which leads to (iii) a deeper understanding of the problem, and finally culminates in (iv) an "Aha!" feeling of suddenness and obviousness of the solution. However, until now no efforts have been made to investigate the neural mechanisms of these constituent features of insight in a unified framework.Methodology/principal findingsIn an electroencephalographic study using verbal remote associate problems, we identified neural correlates of these four features of insightful problem solving. Hints were provided for unsolved problems or after mental impasse. Subjective ratings of the restructuring process and the feeling of suddenness were obtained on trial-by-trial basis. A negative correlation was found between these two ratings indicating that sudden insightful solutions, where restructuring is a key feature, involve automatic, subconscious recombination of information. Electroencephalogram signals were analyzed in the space x time x frequency domain with a nonparametric cluster randomization test. First, we found strong gamma band responses at parieto-occipital regions which we interpreted as (i) an adjustment of selective attention (leading to a mental impasse or to a correct solution depending on the gamma band power level) and (ii) encoding and retrieval processes for the emergence of spontaneous new solutions. Secondly, we observed an increased upper alpha band response in right temporal regions (suggesting active suppression of weakly activated solution relevant information) for initially unsuccessful trials that after hint presentation led to a correct solution. Finally, for trials with high restructuring, decreased alpha power (suggesting greater cortical excitation) was observed in right prefrontal area.Conclusions/significanceOur results provide a first account of cognitive insight by dissociating its constituent components and potential neural correlates.
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Project description:Abstraction allows us to discern regularities beyond the specific instances we encounter. It also promotes creative problem-solving by enabling us to consider unconventional problem solutions. However, the mechanisms by which this occurs are not well understood. Because it is often difficult to isolate human high-level cognitive processes, we utilized a nonhuman primate model, in which rhesus monkeys appear to use similar processes to consider an unconventional solution to the difficult reverse-reward problem: i.e., given the choice between a better and worse food option they must select the worse one to receive the better one. After solving this problem with only one specific example-one vs. four half-peanuts-three of four monkeys immediately transferred to novel cases: novel quantities, food items, non-food items, and to the choice between a larger, but inferior vegetable and a smaller, but superior food item (either grape or marshmallow), in which they selected the inferior vegetable to receive the superior option. Thus, we show that nonhuman animals have the capacity to comprehend abstract non-perceptual features, to infer them from one specific case, and to use them to override the natural preference to select the superior option. Critically, we also found that three monkeys had a large learning and performance advantage over the fourth monkey who showed less generalization from the original one and four half-peanuts. This difference suggests that abstraction promoted problem-solving via cascading activation from the two food item options to the relation between them, thus providing access to an initially nonapparent problem solution.
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Project description:A wealth of research indicates that emotions play an instrumental role in creative problem-solving. However, most of these studies have relied primarily on diary studies and self-report scales when measuring emotions during the creative processes. There has been a need to capture in-the-moment emotional experiences of individuals during the creative process using an automated emotion recognition tool. The experiment in this study examined the process-related difference between the creative problem solving (CPS) and simple problem solving (SPS) processes using protocol analysis and Markov's chains. Further, this experiment introduced a novel method for measuring in-the-moment emotional experiences of individuals during the CPS and SPS processes using facial expressions and machine learning algorithms. The experiment described in this study employed 64 participants to solve different tasks while wearing camera-mounted headgear. Using retrospective analysis, the participants verbally reported their thoughts using video-stimulated recall. Our results indicate differences in the cognitive efforts spent at different stages during the CPS and SPS processes. We also found that most of the creative stages were associated with ambivalent emotions whereas the stage of block was associated with negative emotions.
| S-EPMC9216609 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Creative cognition, defined as the generation of new yet appropriate ideas and solutions, serves important adaptive purposes. Here, we tested whether and how middle adolescence, characterized by transformations toward life independency and individuality, is a more profitable phase than adulthood for creative cognition. Behavioral and neural differences for creative problem solving in adolescents (15-17 years) and adults (25-30 years) were measured while performing a matchstick problem task (MPT) in the scanner and the creative ability test (CAT), a visuo-spatial divergent thinking task, outside the scanner. Overall performances were comparable, although MPT performance indicated an advantage for adolescents in creative problem solving. In addition, adolescents showed more activation in lateral prefrontal cortex (ventral and dorsal) during creative problem solving compared to adults. These areas correlated with performances on the MPT and the CAT performance. We discuss that extended prefrontal cortex activation in adolescence is important for exploration and aids in creative cognition.
| S-EPMC6987824 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Animal cognitive abilities are frequently quantified in strictly controlled settings, with laboratory-reared subjects. Results from these studies have merit for clarifying proximate mechanisms of performance and the potential upper limits of certain cognitive abilities. Researchers often assume that performance on laboratory-based assessments accurately represents the abilities of wild conspecifics, but this is infrequently tested. In this experiment, we quantified the performance of wild and captive corvid subjects on an extractive foraging task. We found that performance was not equivalent, and wild subjects were faster at problem-solving to extract the food reward. By contrast, there was no difference in the time it took for captive and wild solvers to repeat the behaviour to get additional food rewards (learning speed). Our findings differ from the few other studies that have statistically compared wild and captive performance on assessments of problem-solving and learning. This indicates that without explicitly testing it, we cannot assume that captive animal performance on experimental tasks can be generalized to the species as a whole. To better understand the causes and consequences of a variety of animal cognitive abilities, we should measure performance in the social and physical environment in which the ability in question evolved.
| S-EPMC6366215 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Previous research has shown that mind wandering has both positive and negative effects. Mind wandering may improve creative problem solving; however, it could also lead to negative moods and poor mental health. It has also been shown that some forms of mental illness are positively related to creativity. However, the three factors of mind wandering, divergent thinking, and mental health have not been examined simultaneously, so it is possible that these relationships are manifested by spurious correlations. Therefore, we examined the relations among the three factors while controlling for each of their confounding effects. We asked 865 participants (458 men, 390 women, 17 unknown; Mage = 18.99 years, SD = 1.16) to complete a questionnaire measuring mind wandering traits, divergent thinking, and mental health measures including depressive symptoms and schizotypal personality. Multiple regression analysis showed that people who reported more depressive symptoms, schizotypal personality, and divergent thinking, were more likely to engage in mind-wandering. Our results indicated that frequency of mind wandering was linked to a risk of poorer mental health as well as to higher divergent thinking ability. In future research, we will examine the features of mind wandering related to divergent thinking and mental health by considering the contents of wandering thoughts and whether they are ruminative or not. We also need to examine whether the same results will be found when studying professionals in creative occupations, and when using different scoring methods in divergent thinking tests.
| S-EPMC7180068 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Problem-solving often requires creativity and is critical in everyday life. However, the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying creative problem-solving remain poorly understood. Two mechanisms have been highlighted: the formation of new connections among problem elements and insight solving, characterized by sudden realization of a solution. In this study, we investigated EEG activity during a modified version of the remote associates test, a classical insight problem task that requires finding a word connecting three unrelated words. This allowed us to explore the brain correlates associated with the semantic remoteness of connections (by varying the remoteness of the solution word across trials) and with insight solving (identified as a Eurêka moment reported by the participants). Semantic remoteness was associated with power increase in the alpha band (8-12 Hz) in a left parieto-temporal cluster, the beta band (13-30 Hz) in a right fronto-temporal cluster in the early phase of the task, and the theta band (3-7 Hz) in a bilateral frontal cluster just prior to participants' responses. Insight solving was associated with power increase preceding participants' responses in the alpha and gamma (31-60 Hz) bands in a left temporal cluster and the theta band in a frontal cluster. Source reconstructions revealed the brain regions associated with these clusters. Overall, our findings shed new light on some of the mechanisms involved in creative problem-solving.
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Project description:Behavioral traits can be determined from the consistency in an animal’s behaviors across time and situations. These behavioral traits may have been differentially selected in closely related species. Studying the structure of these traits across species within an order can inform a better understanding of the selection pressures under which behavior evolves. These adaptive traits are still expected to vary within individuals and might predict general cognitive capacities that facilitate survival, such as behavioral flexibility. We derived five facets (Flexible/Friendly, Fearful/Aggressive, Uninterested, Social/Playful, and Cautious) from behavioral trait assessments based on zookeeper surveys in 52 Felidae individuals representing thirteen species. We analyzed whether age, sex, species, and these facets predicted success in a multi access puzzle box–a measure of innovation. We found that Fearful/Aggressive and Cautious facets were negatively associated with success. This research provides the first test of the association between behavioral trait facets and innovation in a diverse group of captive felidae. Understanding the connection between behavioral traits and problem-solving can assist in ensuring the protection of diverse species in their natural habitats and ethical treatment in captivity.
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Project description:When confronted with novel problems, problem-solvers must decide whether to copy a modeled solution or to explore their own unique solutions. While past work has established that infants can learn to solve problems both through their own exploration and through imitation, little work has explored the factors that influence which of these approaches infants select to solve a given problem. Moreover, past work has treated imitation and exploration as qualitatively distinct, although these two possibilities may exist along a continuum. Here, we apply a program novel to developmental psychology (DeepLabCut) to archival data (Lucca et al., 2020) to investigate the influence of the effort and success of an adult's modeled solution, and infants' firsthand experience with failure, on infants' imitative versus exploratory problem-solving approaches. Our results reveal that tendencies toward exploration are relatively immune to the information from the adult model, but that exploration generally increased in response to firsthand experience with failure. In addition, we found that increases in maximum force and decreases in trying time were associated with greater exploration, and that exploration subsequently predicted problem-solving success on a new iteration of the task. Thus, our results demonstrate that infants increase exploration in response to failure and that exploration may operate in a larger motivational framework with force, trying time, and expectations of task success.
| S-EPMC8606407 | biostudies-literature