Neuroscience of Creativity in Children

Creativity, commonly referred to as “the ability to produce work that is both novel (i.e., original, unexpected) and appropriate (i.e., useful, adaptive concerning task constraints)” (Sternberg & Lubart, 1999, p. 3) allows indivduals to work with limitations, boundaries, divergent processes. It is the source behind the light and the mind behind the brain. Advances in cognitive neuroscience have identified distinct brain circuits that are involved in specific higher brain functions. Findings show basic types of creative insights are each mediated by a distinctive neural circuit.

As creative insights occur in consciousness, working memory describes the ability to process information online and is the critical pathway to one’s creative ability. Utilized as a monitoring system of ongoing events that temporarily keeps information in mind, working memory is essential and relevant to a situation, so that one can essentially utilize, manipulate, and work with it. As an executive function, it makes sense that working memory has a lot to do with an individual accessing their personal store of creative outlets. As executive processes occur in the prefrontal cortex, it also makes sense that the frontal lobe is the primary region of creativity in the brain. However, how does this model account for highly creative youngsters who have immature and undeveloped frontal lobes?

I believe there is more involved with the gifted and talented youth. It is my intention to investigate the Working memory, temporal integration, sustained and directed attention levels that may provide the infrastructure necessary to hold information in space and time for these individuals. All of these processes occur within the prefrontal cortex and involve inhibitory control over inappropriate or maladaptive emotional and cognitive behaviors. So, do young gifted minds have better developed prefrontal cortices? Creativity is the epitome of cognitive flexibility and, therefore, a well-developed prefrontal cortex essentially leads to better control over the behaviors produce it and enhance it in the first place.

An individual’s ability to break conventional and/or obvious patterns of thinking, adopt new and/or higher order rules, and think conceptually and abstractly is at the heart of any theory of creativity such as Guilford’s (1950, 1967) concept of divergent thinking. Essentially, convergent thought brings more of the same and divergent thinking brings innovation and progressive ideas. Creativity is generally comes from two modes of thought, deliberate and spontaneous and for two types of information, cognitive and emotional.

So, my proposal to investigate the fMRIs of gifted, creative and talented youth stands. No one to this day has gone there and I don’t particularly know why not, other than exposure to fMRIs with child populations warrants sometimes difficult parental consent. All the more interesting is that, if in fact, there are outlying anomolies or functional features that are present in the scanned brains of gifted and/or savant syndrome children, how do we account for the traditional model of the frontal lobes developing by the early 20s.

Lucidity

I’ve been very interested in lucid dreaming and practicing it whenever I get the chance. Lately, I’ve attempted to fall into lucid dreams nightly as I’ve had great success with some of the messages and experiences I’ve encountered. 

 

Two nights ago on New Years Eve, I dreamt I was flying through a wooded forest trees. I remember thinking that I was dreaming as I was fully present in my surroundings. The dream fully symbolized where I was in the moment, as if my unconscious and conscious met for a friendly moment of bliss.

 

Even now, I’m listening to patterns and sound waves of frequencies designed to elicit the right range suitable for optimal Theta waves and, hence, lucid dreams. I have deduced that we spend at least one-third of our lives sleeping, so we might as well take full advantage of the experience while learning even more about ourselves.

01.01.twentytwelve

On the first day of the New Year, I am at peace in a world that seems oddly imbalanced. But, this is not to acknowledge an imbalance that hasn’t occurred before. Instead, I am witnessing an abundance of insecurities in the poor job market, a powerless economy, and an over-populated world population that feels more pessimistic than not.

My main resolution this year is to DO MORE and think less. I plan on following my intentions more based on my feelings and not purely on analysis of thought. Most of my life, I’ve been guilty of an over-analysis of my thoughts which I’m fairly certain has kept me inline to make less mistakes, but also feel neurotic at times.

My intention is to follow my bliss by following what I feel is right, in the moment and as part of a great lexicon of unconscious thought. This is what I feel will help me to remain more in the moment and not on the sidelines of life. Best to you and yours in the New Year.

Egoless

Observing oneself, a human examines many layers, but may not want to see past that which protects their ego. It is essential to true existence to accept past flaws, missed opportunities, and errors. To learn how to be at peace in the moment is one of the hardest skills to truly learn. This is not the same practice as ignoring the past. However, it’s more a matter of acknowledging your previous life in order to move forward with all the proper utilities in balance.

Being egoless may, in fact, be impossible. But, becoming aware of what awakens your ego is mandatory. Perhaps, a more attainable goal is to protect your ego less. If you choose to proceed into your future with hundreds of layers still protecting your ego, you will not find the depth of the self and subsequent work required to move forward. If, in fact, you feel you do not need to heal, you are either inhuman, ignorant, or content. Everyone has events and feelings they have protected over their lifetimes. It’s your job to find them, invite the process, and create a new response to old mechanisms.

Psycho Cybernetics calls this the servo-mechanism. I choose to call it yield: time to reflect and repair. No human truly lives in the present if they are stuck in the past. The conundrum is that it is also impossible to progress as a whole being if there is no present.

The Mind Behind the Behavior

In college, B. F. Skinner started writing about the stream of consciousness and attempted to become a novelist and expert in this area of psychology. When his ambition failed, he reacted with a radical rejection of the conscious life; although his conflicts with consciousness were not just a personal idiosyncracy.

Skinner went on to become one of the most reknowned behaviorists and his rejection of personal experience became a major theme of the behavioral movement and a major theme of the twentieth century until today. It is a paradox for conscious humans to deny consciousness. Yet, behaviorism claimed to study perception and attention without consciousness. Skinner further claimed that consciousness was not a matter of reality, but of words.

Hence, presents the predicament of today’s researchers in the mind and consciousness of humanity. If a father of a highly influential movement in psychology and culture such as behaviorism states your work is not based in reality, then you’ll likely take one of two paths: you prove them right or you prove them wrong. In my case, and in my current research, I find the person behind the behavior to be the root, the passion, and the underlying impetus of the observable behavior.

Behavior is simply behavior and, although behaviorism may explain a great deal of task-oriented or perpetual and historic characteristics, scientists and resarchers today are awaiting the jury’s decision: should we bow down to scrutiny of all theoreteical orientations or allow the masses to familiarize themselves to this type of behavior and beyond into the consciousness.

Evolution of Experience

I remember the day a massive crate containing my moped landed at my front door in downtown Charleston. It had traveled from Bombay, India on a ship for 10 days and I had purchases her from an auction on eBay. I recall breaking down the nearly five foot cubed wooden box in less than a minute to find what was later known as Katrina, my 49 ccs of mad fun appropriately named after the hurricane due to her fierce ‘pop’ and ‘crackle’ while riding.

So, the last time I had been on a motorcycle was when I was living in the mountains just outside of Los Angeles. I’d ride hundreds of miles up the coast on my chromed out masterpiece I had bought from a pawn shop in San Bernadino. I’d try to catch whatever band or show I was into at the time. I remember pulling up to my first Parliament show in LA, a series of Grateful Dead shows in Vegas, Sonic Youth in San Francisco, and Fugazi in some bar off the Mexican border to name a few. Before then, it was all about riding along the cornfields on my neighbor’s moped smack dab in the heartland of the Land of Lincoln. The skies were innocent baby blue with puffy cartoon clouds. This was when I started my love affair with all things with two wheels.

Roughly 30 years later, I’ve come full circle and put myself back on the saddle of my awesome ride where everything else is secondary when I’m riding in the present. Like any other discipline, it takes patience and preflection to reach one’s mastery of optimal experience. Staying in the zone makes people more apt to gaining a positive environment.

Archetypes and Arseholes

Men in modern society have no true and respectable archetypes in which to refer to when it comes to being realistic. Let’s face it, women have all of the good ones taken: the Great Mother (earth, nurturer, caretaker), the seductress (assertive, strong, and clever), the crusader (courageous, resolute, and persuasive), the librarian (efficient, dependable, and self-reliant), the waif (pure, trusting, and kind), the free spirit (sincere, upbeat, and imaginative), the sister (funny, reliable, and supportive), and more so everyday, the boss (confident, dynamic, yet competitive).

On the other hand, men have the hunter (workhorse, provider, and laborer), the hero (fictional comic, isolated, and chastised), the warrior (physical, imbalanced, and strong), the priest (guide, counselor, and spiritual), and the king (no longer exists).

Does this mean that I would throw out being a warrior for being a mother? Not in the least! However, given these archetypes, modern men must be forced to re-sculpt older archetypes into role models that can successfully navigate the shifting course of today’s societal economy. We are at a pinnacle time in history where we are witnessing a major shift in consciousness and evolutionary development. The Hopi prophecies state that we are now entering the Fifth World and that we are currently blessed with the divine opportunity to redefine our world!

How can you deny that charge? At every man’s core is his Elder Shield where a wise patriarchal guide resides. We must do the work and delve into further introspection to find his wisdom in order to find a more caring, less destructive, and more expressionistic existence.

These are not simply female qualities. These are qualities of a human and it is my intention to value, respect, and embody them.

Conflicting Causes

As a Filipino-American born in the States (Minneapolis, Minnesota) in the early seventies, I have lived more than half of my life while my country has been at war. I was born into conflict between the US/South Vietnamese and the North Vietnamese, a war that resulted in one of the most untrustworthy moments in American history. By 1971, over 2/3 of the American population wanted President Nixon to order troop withdrawals from Vietnam.

Fast forward to present day, Obama (and some feel Bush, or Dubya) orders all troops involved in the invasion of Iraq out by the end of 2011. 40 years after our involvement in Vietnam, it appears that, we as a United force stand more apt to fight battles abroad with clerical authoritarianism than handle stateside socioeconomic, education, and environmental issues. The answer to the Iraq enigma is simple macroeconomics, to gain geo-strategic control of Iraq along with its 2nd largest proven oil reserves.

So, why then do so many American folks stand idly in support of our troops without examining the historical involvement the US has had on foreign soil? Is it strictly fear of movements that instill fear and terror. As a 2nd generation immigrant, I can plainly state that I am a true American, 100% through and through, but I question our motives and tactics and our foreign ‘policy’ of bringing peace and democracy to countries that don’t ask for it. To put it bluntly, if a bully on the playground pushed you off of the teeter-totter you and your best friend were riding on, would you not feel pressure to retalliate. What is it about this type of mentality that we think is status quo?

Old Mold

One thing that fascinates me about snakes is that they get to shed their skin from time to time. Humans do, too, just not as dramatically. Wise old adages and newer ways of progressing have more in common than they seem. Much like ancient snakes and modern humans, we coexist in a commensalistic where man benefits from the more neutral snake. Another words humans can live without the snake, and traditionally either hunts, kills, and/or eats the snake or uses it for it’s skin. It’s much the same way with other animals and humans. We are a more complex species, but we are also selfish in a sense that we don’t protect our habitat for others as much as ourselves. We pollute, steal, and hate like no other species in the sense that we don’t discriminate that which we destroy.

It’s time to break out of the old mold, forge newer thoughts and sustainable relationships with the planet, and tread more lightly into a more thoughtful future.

Relativity

Sitting in the southwest corner of my loft, I can see the West, South and downtown Loop of Chicago as well as the trucks, palettes, and forklifts that buzz through my new neighborhood in the Fulton Market. I’ve sat here many times, writing, thinking, napping, and simply incubating ideas. It’s a stark difference from the old Irish-American neighborhood I lived in for the past few years back in Philadelphia.

I had a four story row home in an old part of Philly called Manayunk which is a Native American term for “the place to drink”, which it was appropriately named. I lived off the Schuylkill River which led through the parks of downtown Philly, past the old bars and river community into the suburbs. I felt a real connection to the natural landscape, but never felt the same for my neighbors and neighborhood. My life in Philly was completely based and enmeshed in my work and studies, leaving me with only brief moments of peace and respite.

Ten years prior to relocating to the Northeast, I lived in beautiful Charleston, South Carolina. I thought I’d only stay to finish my graduate schooling and move on, but the city had its way of alluring me to stay. So, I did just that. I lived on several beaches and mainly in downtown Charleston, which had an abundant night life and it’s share of beautiful and creative souls. In retrospect, I was a bit out of pocket in the Holy City, but I alway felt it was my home away from home.

Rewinding to seven years earlier, on my motorcycle through the Southern California mountains, and sometimes on whim, I’d take a run up to Vegas, Joshua Tree, or even the Bay area. Carefree, idealistic, and free, my time in Los Angeles defined my early post-collegiate thoughts of what it all ‘meant’ and encouraged me to always tap into my child’s heart. Although it was only home for a relatively short time (4 years), I found it hard to find any of it truly my home.

Years eariler, in post-adolescence, I was living in a large, shared home in Rock Island, Illinois. My school, Augustana College, was a walk through the woods down to a path (the slough) that led to my early education in Medicinel, much like the sludge I collected in centrifuge at the bottom of my test tubes. I was never connected to the city and it’s surroundings, but the people I knew felt familiar and real. I needed this time to reset before my ‘quest’ around the country. I always think back to old Augie with a big smile as it was truly my first time away from home.

For thirteen years prior to college, I lived on Lake Springfield and went to a then small school outside of the city called Chatham-Glenwood. I didn’t know then that I would live on both coasts and one day return to the Heartland, but I did know I had a curious, restless, and investigative spirit. I knew and ran with the same ‘kids’ from the time I was five to the time I left the nest at 17. It was comforting and, perhaps, the place I will always call my hometown.

Which brings me all back to my earliest memories living in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I lived in the city with my four older siblings and parents from birth to five years. I recall puffy snowsuits, mountains of precipitation, treehouses, sleds, and lakes everywhere. Most of my memories are likely created from the pictures I’ve seen of my family and our homes in Minneapolis. Only some of them, I know for sure occurred. Years later, we made trips to all the different homes to reminisce on the ‘early years,’ the ones experiences directly after my parent’s moved to America. One of the houses my family was most proud of was in an architectural digest. It was also my favorite, largely because of the sunken living room where I’d sit for hours.

In retrospect, as I sit in my corner easy chair, I smile at all the different experiences I’ve been fortunate enough to have. I can now laugh at the struggles and champion the challenges. Being ‘home’ again is truly a carthartic feeling as I know for sure that I set out to simply live and experience. After nearly 15 years away, I’m glad to be home.