Effect of Working Memory on Insight and Analytic Problem Solving

ZHANG Xin-Ru; YU Wei; DUAN Hai-Jun; DIAO Xiang-Xiang; HAN Huo-Sui; HU Wei-Beng

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Journal of Psychological Science ›› 2019, Vol. 42 ›› Issue (4) : 777-783.

Effect of Working Memory on Insight and Analytic Problem Solving

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Abstract

Abstract Creative problems can be solved by either insight or analysis. Insight denotes the sudden formation of a concept or the reconstruction of knowledge. On the contrary, when employing an analytic approach, the correct answer to the solution always comes from a series of conscious initiative thinking. The effect of working memory on creative problem solving has been discussed by numerous researchers, for the reason that central executive function components of working memory are closely related to the effects of attention control and suppression of distraction. Researchers have tried to clarify whether working memory plays different roles in insight and analytic problem solving, but the cognitive processing mechanism of creative problem solving remains controversial and inconsistent. Based on the previous studies, it is proposed that different experimental materials and paradigms may cause interference. On the one hand, if the initial representation phase of creativity problem solving process is too difficult, the relationship between the subsequent processing phase and working memory would not be embodied. On the other hand, different experimental materials for insight and analysis may cover the actual psychological process of problem-solving. In order to eliminate the dependence of information processing load on working memory in the initial representational stage of creative problem solving，this study has focused on the relationship between working memory and creative problem-solving when the information processing load of representation stage is relatively small. And the Remote Association Task has been employed as the experimental material in the self-report paradigm to ensure that insight and analytic problem solving can be compared under equivalent experimental conditions. In line with the previous studies, two experiments have been conducted from the perspective of working memory capacity and additional working memory load respectively. The former focuses on individual differences, while the latter focuses on contextual factors and makes further exploration through direct experimental manipulation. In Experiment 1, working memory capacity of participants was measured by the Automation Operation Span task (AO-span). In Experiment 2, the dual-task paradigm has been applied in which participants are asked to speak loudly following the warning sounds while completing the creative problem-solving task. The result has shown that (1) The overall performance of creative problem solving by high WMC individuals is better, but the proportion of problem solving by means of insight is lower than that by low WMC individuals. (2) Higher working memory capacity is related to better performance on analytic approach instead of insight. (3) Additional working memory load could harm creative problem-solving performance. (4) Compared with the high WML condition, the number of problems solved by analysis under low WML condition increases. Whereas there is no significant difference in insight between the two conditions. The results of the experiment indicate that analytic problem solving relies on the support of working memory when completing the RAT task, but working memory has no effect on insight. This result has provided a strong refutation on the concept of nothing-special view. In addition, the results suggest that adequate cognitive resources help problem solvers to solve creative problems more analytically, and that when cognitive resources are insufficient, the proportion of problems solved by insight is larger. Compared with the experimental results obtained from the creative problem with high information processing load in the initial characterization stage, when the initial representational load is small, the effect of working memory on the initial representational stage has reduced. This may be one of the reasons why the results of this study are inconsistent with some previous studies. This study found that working memory has different effects on insight and analytic problem solving. There are two possible explanations for this result. Firstly, according to the dual-process theory, insight and analysis can be controlled by different processing systems which may be the reason why working memory plays different role among them. Based on the results of this study, the analysis may depend on the control processing system, while insight may depend on the automatic processing system. Secondly, the reason that working memory does not affect insight problem solving may be that the promoting and hindering effects at different stages offset each other. On the basis of this study, the future research can directly compare the creative problem solving process with different information processing loads in the initial representation phase.

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working memory / creativity / insight / analytic problem solving

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Effect of Working Memory on Insight and Analytic Problem Solving[J]. Journal of Psychological Science. 2019, 42(4): 777-783

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