Real World vs. Simple Problem Solving

In the Neural Basis of Thinking, Vinod Goel reflects on the puzzle of a brain-injured architect. Although after his injury (R prefrontal cortex), he was still found to have a superior IQ (128 on the WAIS-R), he found himself unable to resume his work as an architect and live independently in the world.

What is it that common psychometric (and many school tests) miss, and how are they different from surviving and thriving in the real world?


Goel found that although the architect could manage the well structured problems of IQ tests well, he was unprepared for a more "real world task" that required him to design a new lab space. When his performance was matched to an architect of similar training and age,  he had trouble transitioning from the problem scoping to problem planning stage, he started planning too late in the exercise,  and he had trouble tying together earlier bits of information into a coherent plan to solve the task. He never made it to the detail stage.

What Goel suggests is that: "the right PFC (prefrontal cortex) plays a selective but critical role in situations where the problem space (1) is very broad and poorly constrained, (2) contains misleading / conflicting information, or (3) contains insufficient information to determine the conclusion. These are all hallmarks of real-world problems." Many have dismissed the right PFC to almost a supporting role to the left PFC, but in other testing paradigms that would seem closer models of real world problem solving (e.g. requiring hypothesis generation or trial-and-error learning),  the right PFC again leaps to prominence.

Goel goes on to speculate: "As standard neuropsychological test batteries consist only of well-structured problems, while real-world problems have both ill-structured and well-structured components (the former preceding the latter), patients may perform well in the lab, but stumble in the real world.

If this is a genuine double dissociation (and if success in the world consists of primarily dealing with the lack of structure), it should be possible to find individuals exhibiting the reverse pattern; ie being very successful in the world by underperforming in the neuropsychology laboratory...Certainly, there are anecdotal stories of individuals who have amassed great power and wealth but would turn in a mediocre performance on IQ tests..."

The idea seems compelling. A host of adults who struggled in school but thrived in real life come to mind (this is not an uncommon profile for dyslexics, for instance).

If we aren't regularly presenting our students with poorly structured problems or open-ended challenges from the real world, maybe we need to change.

High Fluid Intelligence, Gestures, and Simulation

In an interesting study, German researchers found that increased hand gestures of 11th graders predict their correct solving of a chessboard visual analogy problem as well as predicting increased cortical thickness and higher fluid intelligence.

"...all the students talked about the same things in their explanations, but almost no one actually mentioned anything about rotation. But by looking at their hands – not by listening to what they were saying – we could distinguish between people with high and average fluid intelligence. We think that these hand gestures mimicked the strategy that the students used in solving the task. That is, they rotated the patterns in their imagination, just as they did with their hands. This suggests that individuals with high fluid intelligence engage more in simulation when imagining the problem than those with average fluid intelligence.

In fact, when we made Magnetic Resonance Imaging scans of the students’ brains, we found that the cortical tissue in several areas of the brain was thicker among those students with high fluid intelligence who gestured more than among those with average fluid intelligence.

Our results indicate that the cortical thickness of those brain regions is related to both high fluid intelligence and the production of gestures. We do not know with certainty yet, but this result suggests that some brain areas may be more developed for the students with high fluid intelligence, possibly like a muscle that grows larger when it is trained.

Recent theories about the processes of thought emphasize the role of so-called action simulation. Evidence from other brain imaging experiments show that some of the same areas of the brain are activated when people only imagine performing an action as when they actually perform it. One theory proposes that these strongly activated simulated actions are manifested as gestures.

We do not know yet whether gesturing facilitates the development of fluid intelligence or whether it is a by-product. But we do know that children who are asked to gesture in certain ways while learning new tasks learn better than children who are asked not to gesture. Considering that gesturing benefits children while learning, it is possible that gesturing plays a role in the development of fluid intelligence, perhaps by simulating action. If this proves to be true, children might be able to literally give themselves a hand in their own development by gesturing more."

It's interesting to think that teaching children to problem solve certain types of problems should involve strategies that take into account that fact that one is trying to train the imagery of the students. Just verbally saying back the steps of a problem or even watching an explanation won't internalize the imagery. To really 'get' certain problems, we have to enter into the simulation and perceive the question and solution in a bodily way.

http://atomiumculture.eu/node/303

ADHD, Creativity, and Reduced Inhibition

"ADHD may have negative consequences for academic achievement, employment performance, and social relationships. However one positive consequence of ADHD may be enhanced creativity..."

Using the Remote Associates Test as a measure of convergent thinking and Unusual Uses Task as a measure of divergent thinking, White and Shah found that college students with ADHD scored higher than their non-ADHD counterparts on the Unusual Uses Task (fluency, flexibility, and originality), but lower than the control group on the Remote Associates Test.

The authors conclude:

"...the current findings have exciting implications for non-laboratory contexts. Research suggests that different types of creative thinkers may excel at different types of problem-solving (e.g., Finke, 1996; Zhang, 2002). For example, Finke (1996) describes ‘‘chaotic thinkers’’ as individuals who have an unstructured, spontaneous cognitive style (‘‘chaotic cognition’’) that tends to result in original creative products (Finke, 1996). This divergent thinking style may facilitate insight thinking, or ‘‘thinking outside the box’’.... to what extent are the negative consequences of ADHD balanced by some possible benefits? Rather than focusing exclusively on the limitations associated with ADHD, perhaps future studies will address the potential benefits of the uninhibited ADHD mind."

Creativity in Adults with ADHD

Stimulating Creativity and the Brain

In the alternative uses task, test subjects are asked to think of alternative uses of everyday objects like "tin" and "umbrella". If we think of unusual uses rather than typical characteristics, the most striking changes are deactivation of the right parietal lobe and activation of the supramarginal gyrus.

Interestingly, the deactivated area in the right parietal lobe is a similar area deactivated in musical improvisation (Berkowitz and Ansari, 2010) and the left supramarginal gyrus has been implicated in motor planning imagery (praxis) and action-based metaphors such as "reach for the stars" (Tell Tale Brain, VS Ramachandran).

Two additional observations were made from the study - first, that allowing people to incubate about their answers increased the likelihood that they'd have more original answers, and being exposed to some of the creative answers of others stimulated their creativity even more (p > 0.001).

For more on the the benefits of group brainstorming read here. Negative effects on creativity can occur because of "group think" and "social loafing", but positive effects result too because the triggering of new associations, addition of new ideas about the nature of the problem (problem scoping), and social motivational factors to generate more possibilities.

So when we give a student an assignment, how much time do we spend brainstorming with others about different possible ways to answer a question or write a report? If the work seems less creative than we would like, maybe we should think more about 'priming the pump.'


  Enhancing Creativity with Cognitive Stimulation pdf