Cooperation Makes a Group be More Creative

Abstract

This study investigated how cooperative and competitive interaction modes affect the group creative performance. The participants were recruited as dyads to solve 2 problems either demanding divergent thinking (alternative uses task, AUT) or not (object characteristic task, OCT). The dyads solved 1 of the 2 problems in the cooperative mode and the other in the competitive mode. Functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS)-based hyperscanning was used to record their neural activities in the prefrontal and right temporal-parietal junction (r-TPJ) regions. Results revealed the dyads showed higher AUT fluency, AUT originality, OCT fluency, and cooperation level in the cooperative mode than in the competitive mode. The fNIRS data revealed increased (task-baseline) interpersonal brain synchronization (IBS) in the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (r-DLPFC) and r-TPJ, only for dyads in the AUT/cooperation condition. In both r-DLPFC and r-TPJ, the IBS of dyads in the AUT/cooperation condition was stronger than in the AUT/competition and OCT/cooperation. Moreover, a stronger IBS was evoked between the regions in prefrontal and posterior temporal regions in the AUT/cooperation condition, as compared with the competition mode. These findings suggest that enhanced IBS may underlie the positive effects of cooperation as compared with the competition in terms of group creativity.

What has social neuroscience learned from hyperscanning studies of spoken communication? A systematic review

“…Seven J o u r n a l P r e -p r o o f studies employed these experimental paradigms (Table 3), and all but one used fNIRS. IBS was predominantly identified either in the frontal (Fishburn et al, 2018;Lu et al, 2019a;Lu and Hao, 2019;Lu et al, 2020) or both the frontal and the temporal-parietal regions (Antonenko et al, 2019;Lu et al, 2019b;Mayseless et al, 2019;Xue et al, 2018). Fishburn et al (2018) reported IBS in the PFC for triads cooperatively solving creative…”

“…The effects of cooperation, problem-solving, and creativity in relation to IBS have been popular topics of study in ecological settings (Antonenko et al, 2019;Fishburn et al, 2018;Lu and Hao, 2019;Lu et al, 2019aLu et al, , 2019bLu et al, 2020;Mayseless et al, 2019). Seven J o u r n a l P r e -p r o o f studies employed these experimental paradigms (Table 3), and all but one used fNIRS.…”

Team flow is a unique brain state associated with enhanced information integration and neural synchrony

“…Recent social neuroscience studies have reported interactions between the brains of a group of members measured as inter-brain synchronization (e.g., phase synchrony). This synchrony can be enhanced during intense socialization, body or speech coordination, music production, dancers, student-teacher interactions in classrooms, touch-mediated pain reduction, creativity in cooperative tasks, and even in socially interacting bats (32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41). Hence, it can be a metric for more effective group interactions.…”

“…The normalized power was calculated through subtracting the individual's mean PSD from the PSD at each condition. The normalized power was averaged within the following frequency bands: delta (1 -3 Hz), theta (4 -7 Hz), alpha (8)(9)(10)(11)(12), beta (13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26)(27)(28)(29)(30), gamma (31 -120 Hz), and lower gamma (31)(32)(33)(34)(35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41)(42)(43)(44)(45)(46)(47)(48)(49)(50). The normalized power for the 128 channel data and the permutation statistics with Bonferroni multiple comparison correction was projected to topographical maps using EEGLAB toolbox.…”

Individual differences in trait creativity moderate the state-level mood-creativity relationship

“…The participants' trait creativity was measured procedure using the two classical tests of the AUT and the RAT. The AUT and RAT have different focuses, with the former focused on divergent thinking and the latter on convergent thinking [42,52,53]. As several trait factors (i.e., openness, emotion intelligence) have been reported to moderate the state-level mood-creativity relationship and trait creativity can be regarded as an integrated concept possibly covering all creativity-related trait factors, we expected to see a moderating role of trait creativity on the state-level mood-creativity relationship.…”