Influencing Factors And Mechanisms Under The Effect Of Approach-avoidance Motor Actions On Divergent Thinking

Divergent thinking(DT)refers to the ability to produce original ideas for given open questions.It is an important measurement for creativity potential.Researchers found that,arm flexion promoted divergent thinking in contrast to arm extension in the condition of arm flexion being perceived as an approach action and arm extension being perceived as an avoidance action.The dissertation extended this study by investigating whether this arm movements' effect on DT is constrained by other factors and the neural mechanisms underlying such arm movements' effect.Study 1(experiment 1 to 3)investigated the function of distance between the target object and the self in arm movements' effect on DT.Distance-regulation theory found a connection between arm movements and the object-self distance.The object-self distance refers to the distance between target object and the self.Arm flexion decreases that distance and arm extension increases that distance.It must be noted that,the connection between arm movements and the object-self distance is limited by other factors.Therefore,the connection of arm movements and attribution of approach or avoidance of that movements is flexible.Experiment 1 manipulated the body position variable(being seated and lying)to change the distance between the target object and the self induced by arm movements.Results showed that arm flexion in the condition of a seated position and arm extension in the condition of a lay down position lead the decrease of the distance between the target object and the self,which facilitated the performance of DT.Experiment 2 was completed in the lying position and found similar results with that in experiment 1.Experiment 3 manipulated instructions to change subjects' cognition of that distance.Results showed that,when arm flexion being perceived as accepting something and arm extension being perceived as reaching for something,both arm movements facilitated DT for being approach arm movements.Study 2(experiment 4 and 5)investigated the function of emotion states and emotion systems in arm movement's effect on DT.Researchers found that approach movements were induced by positive stimuli whereas avoidance movements were induced by negative stimuli.In other words,approach movements were congruent with positive emotions while avoidance movements were congruent with negative emotions.In experiment 4,subjects' positive or negative emotions were primed by video materials.Results showed that,when emotion and arm movements were in the incongruent condition,DT performance was better.Experiment 5 adopted BIS/BAS(Behavioral Inhibition System/Behavioral Activation System)to measure individual differences of emotion system.Experiment 5 showed the similar results with that of experiment 4.The incongruent effect of creativity found that when people in incongruent state of emotions or cognition,they prefer to consider the situation as novel,which is beneficial for their creativity including DT.Study 3(experiment 6)investigated the neural mechanisms underlying the arm movements' effect on DT when subjects were in a lying body position.An fMRI experiment in study 3 found that performance of DT in the condition of arm extension was better.Moreover,caudate and anterior cingulate in rewarding system were activated in DT process.This may provide evidence for arm movements' connection with approach or avoidance which is consistent with the results of experiment 1 and 2.These brain areas function as executive function in creative thinking.Therefore.experiment 6 provided evidence for neural mechanisms underlying arm movements'effect on DT.To summarize,the dissertation investigated the effect of distance between the target object and the self on such arm movements' effect on DT as well as emotion's modulation in such arm movements' effect.In addition,mechanisms underlying such effect were explored.The dissertation contributes to creative study theoretically in two ways.First,it found factors influencing the arm movements' effect on DT as well as the possible neural mechanisms underlying such effect.Second,it extended the distance theory and incongruent theory in creative thinking.