Creativity is a complex construct that would benefit from a more comprehensive mechanistic approach. Two processes have been defined to be central to creative cognition: divergent and convergent thinking. These two processes are most often studied using the Alternate Uses Test (heavily relying on divergent thinking), and the Remote Associates Test (heavily relying on convergent thinking, at least with analytical solutions). Although creative acts should be regarded compound processes, most behavioral and neuroimaging studies ignore the composition of basic operations relevant for the task they investigate. In order to provide leverage for a more mechanistic, and eventually even comprehensive computational, approach to creative cognition, we compare findings from divergent and convergent thinking studies and review the similarities and differences between the two underlying types of processes, from a neurocognitive perspective with a strong focus on cortical structures. In this narrative review, we discuss a broad scope of neural correlates of divergent and convergent thinking. We provide a first step towards theoretical integration, by suggesting that creative cognition in divergent- and convergent-thinking heavy tasks is modulated by metacontrol states, where divergent thinking and insight solutions in convergent-thinking tasks seem to benefit from metacontrol biases towards flexibility, whereas convergent, analytical thinking seems to benefit from metacontrol biases towards persistence. These particular biases seem to be reflected by specific cortical brain-activation patterns, involving left frontal and right temporal/parietal networks. Our tentative framework could serve as a first proxy to guide neuroscientific creativity research into assessing more mechanistic details of human creative cognition.

中文翻译：

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人类创造力的元控制：收敛和发散思维的神经认知机制

创造力是一个复杂的结构，它将受益于更全面的机械方法。两个过程被定义为创造性认知的核心：发散思维和聚合思维。这两个过程最常使用替代用途测试（严重依赖发散思维）和远程同事测试（严重依赖聚合思维，至少使用分析解决方案）进行研究。尽管创造性行为应该被视为复合过程，但大多数行为和神经影像学研究忽略了与他们研究的任务相关的基本操作的组成。为了为更机械化、最终甚至是综合计算的创造性认知方法提供杠杆作用，我们比较了发散性和聚合性思维研究的结果，并从神经认知的角度回顾了两种基本过程类型之间的异同，重点关注皮层结构。在这篇叙述性评论中，我们讨论了发散和收敛思维的广泛神经相关性。我们提供了实现理论整合的第一步，提出发散思维和收敛思维繁重任务中的创造性认知受元控制状态的调节，其中收敛思维任务中的发散思维和洞察力解决方案似乎受益于元控制对灵活性的偏见，而收敛性、分析性思维似乎受益于对持久性的元控制偏见。这些特殊的偏见似乎反映在特定的皮质大脑激活模式中，涉及左额叶和右颞/顶叶网络。我们的暂定框架可以作为指导神经科学创造力研究的第一个代理，以评估人类创造性认知的更多机械细节。