Ning Hao

• Professor (full)
• East China Normal University

This study aimed to examine how communication modes affect creative idea generation in groups. Three communication mode conditions were created: natural (N), turn-taking (T), and electronic brainstorming (E). Participants were randomly recruited and grouped in dyads to solve one alternative uses task (AUT) in each condition, during which functional...

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...

This study aimed to investigate which type of group (e.g., consisting of less-creative or highly-creative individuals) would perform better in solving creativity problems, and explore the underlying inter-brain neural correlates between team members. A preliminary test (an alternative-uses task) was performed to rank individuals' level of creativit...

Group creative ideation, the capacity of group to produce novel and useful ideas, is essential for navigating challenges and embracing opportunities. Despite its significance, research to decode its neurocognitive underpinnings utilizing interpersonal neuroscience paradigm has just commenced, linking group creative ideation to interpersonal neural...

Gestures accent and illustrate our communication. Although previous studies have uncovered the positive effects of gestures on communication, little is known about the specific cognitive functions of different types of gestures, or the instantaneous multi-brain dynamics. Here we used the fNIRS-based hyperscanning technique to track the brain activi...

This study explored the origins of creative ideas in groups, validating the triple-pathway model of group creative ideation with behavioral and neuroscientific evidence. A total of 123 college student dyads completed a creative ideation task and a contrast task while their brain activity was simultaneously recorded using functional near-infrared sp...

Creativity is a multifaceted cognitive process that can be driven by either malevolent or benevolent intentions, leading to divergent social outcomes. There is still uncertainty about the similarities and differences in the underlying neural activities of creativity associated with malevolent and benevolent intentions. This study investigates how i...

This study investigated whether transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) targeting the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) can alter the thinking process and neural basis of creativity. Participants’ performance on the compound remote associates (CRA) task was analyzed considering the semantic features of each trial after receiving different tDCS pr...

Raven’s Advanced Progressive Matrices (APM) is a widely recognized tool for assessing intelligence. However, it often faces challenges related to lengthy administration times, which can diminish its practicality and increase resource costs. Although several short-form APMs have been developed, they typically overlook the differences in cognitive co...

A substantial body of empirical research has focused on the interaction between creativity and mood, yet the results regarding the impact of anger on creative performance are notably varied. To clarify the overall relationship between the two, a three-level meta-analysis employing a random effects model was conducted. This analysis reviewed 115 eff...

Deception is a complex social behavior that manifests in various forms, including scams. To successfully deceive victims, liars have to continually devise novel scams. This ability to create novel scams represents one kind of malevolent creativity, referred to as lying. This study aimed to explore different neural substrates involved in the generat...

Creativity which is driven by negative intention can be termed as malevolent creativity (MC). Existing findings revealed that unfairness promoted regular antisocial behavior like aggression or lying. But the relationship between unfairness and creative antisocial behavior (i.e., MC) have not been investigated. Based on AMORAL theory, two studies we...

In response to intergroup threats, group members typically exhibit aggressive behaviors. These aggressive behaviors include malevolent creativity (MC), which refers to the application of novel ideas to intentionally harm others. However, whether and how intergroup threats affect MC remains unclear. This study comprehensively examines the impact of...

Interpersonal emotion regulation is the dynamic process where the regulator aims to change the target’s emotional state, which is presumed to engage three neural systems: cognitive control (i.e., dorsal and ventral lateral prefrontal cortex, etc.), empathy/social cognition (i.e., dorsal premotor regions, temporal-parietal junction, etc.), and affec...

Creativity can be driven by negative intentions, and this is called malevolent creativity (MC). It is a type of creativity that serves antisocial purposes and deliberately leads to harmful or immoral results. A possible classification indicates that there are three kinds of MC in daily life: hurting people, lying, and playing tricks. This study aim...

It is said that our species use mnemonics-that "magic of memorization"-to engrave an enormous amount of information in the brain. Yet, it is unclear how mnemonics affect memory and what the neural underpinnings are. In this electroencephalography study, we examined the hypotheses whether mnemonic training improved processing-efficiency and/or alter...

Malevolent creativity (MC) is defined as a manifestation in which people propose to materially, mentally, or physically harm themselves or others in a novel manner. Malevolent creative ideation can be inhibited by high moral emotions (i.e., sympathy, guilt, and shame) and low negative emotions, which promote prosocial behaviors. Given that the righ...

This hyperscanning study aimed to identify a neural coupling profile that distinguishes high-creative group dynamics through functional near infrared spectroscopy. A total of 123 dyads completed one creativity task (alternative uses task, AUT) and contrast task (objective characteristics task). A K-means clustering analysis on AUT performance group...

This study aimed to investigate how the ways leaders arise (appointed vs. emergent) affect the leader–follower interaction during creative group communication. Hyperscanning technique was adopted to reveal the underlying interpersonal neural correlates using functional near-infrared spectroscopy. Participants were assigned into 3-person groups to c...

It is said that our species use mnemonics – that “magic of memorization” – to engrave an enormous amount of information in the brain. Yet, it is unclear how mnemonics affect memory and what the neural underpinnings are? In this electroencephalography study, we examined the hypotheses whether mnemonic training improved processing-efficiency and/or a...

The Dark Triad has been found to be associated with malevolent creativity (MC) in terms of trait level, and its underlying mechanism remains unclear. Based on the cognitive–affective processing system theory and the existing studies, the current study aimed to explore the internal mechanism between the Dark Triad and MC behavioral tendencies/perfor...

Non-verbal cues tone our communication. Previous studies found that non-verbal factors, such as spatial distance and gaze direction, significantly impact interpersonal communication. However, little is known about the behind multi-brain neural correlates and whether it could affect high-level creative group communication. Here, we provided a new, s...

Social interaction is a dynamic and variable process. However, most hyperscanning studies implicitly assume that inter-brain synchrony (IBS) is constant and rarely investigate the temporal variability of the multi-brain networks. In this study, we used sliding windows and k-mean clustering to obtain a set of representative inter-brain network state...

This study examined how example features (i.e. idea novelty and idea diversity) affected creativity after creative exhaustion. In addition, how individual differences in creativity influenced the effect of example diversity was also investigated. By dividing examples into high-, medium- and low-novel ideas, experiment 1 revealed that idea originali...

Malevolent creativity, as one dark side of creativity, refers to manifestations people propose to harm themselves or others materially, mentally, or physically in an innovative way. This study aimed to explore the neural correlates of malevolent creative idea generation using task-based static and dynamic functional connectivity (FC) analysis acros...

This study aimed to explore the neural correlates underlying idea generation during malevolent creativity (MC) using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). Participants were asked to solve problems during three types of creativity tasks: malevolent creativity task (MCT), benevolent creativity task (BCT), and alternative uses task (AUT). fNI...

Malevolent creativity is typically defined as the application of original ideas to purposely harm others. Instances of malevolent creativity appears everywhere in antisocial incidents such as financial crime, terrorist attack, and etc. Unveiling factors that can impact malevolent creativity and the underlying mechanism is of much importance to help...

Creativity is not only a natural part of the design process but also one of the most important criteria for the quality of design performance. However, the difference in creativity between design novices and experts remain to be explored. To explore this question, this study compared the differences in domain-specific and domain-general creativity...

Educational diversity is defined as the diversity of educational backgrounds measured by multiple subjects. This study aimed to unveil the interpersonal neural correlates that underlie the effect of group educational diversity on group creativity. One hundred and sixteen college students were assigned to high educational diversity (HD; the members...

An increasing number of studies have found that a few, specific subcortical regions are involved in creative visual divergent thinking. In addition, creative thinking is heavily reliant on the fronto-striatal dopaminergic pathways. This study aimed to explore whether spontaneous fluctuations in the subcortex, which contribute to our creative abilit...

The study investigated the effects of examples’ timing and quality on divergent thinking (DT). In study 1, participants received two novel or common examples in the early or late stage of the realistic presented problem task. Results revealed higher fluency and flexibility in the late stage than that in the early stage. Moreover, originality was hi...

This study aimed to testify whether spontaneous fluctuations in the subcortex contribute to creative divergent thinking. Individuals at high- and low levels of creativity were recruited and the resting-state fMRI data was collected. Seed-wise and dynamic functional connectivity (FC) were used to identify differences between the two groups. The topo...

The current study aimed to explore the effect of anger on malevolent creativity and its underlying mechanisms and to determine whether such an effect could be modulated by strategies of emotional regulation. Experiment 1 compared the differences of malevolent creativity between individuals in anger, sadness, and neutral emotions and found that indi...

Abstract Recent research has shown that the cerebellum is involved not only in motor control but also in higher-level activities, which are closely related to creativity. This study aimed to explore the role of the cerebellum in visual divergent thinking based on its intrinsic activity. To this end, we selected the resting-state fMRI data of high-...

This study aimed to determine how gender composition affects the group creative process. Participants were recruited into dyads with different gender compositions (female–male dyad, F–M; female–female, F–F; male–male, and M–M) to solve two problems. One problem demanded creativity alternative use task (AUT) and the other did not object characterist...

Three studies were conducted to investigate the relationship between motivation and malevolent creativity (MC). In Study 1, participants completed motivation scales and a measure of MC in online formats. Results showed that approach motivation accurately predicted MC, whereas avoidance motivation was negatively related to MC. In Study 2, participan...

This study aimed to explore the neural correlates of the embodied metaphor “breaking the rules” and how it affects creativity by using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). To embody the metaphor “breaking the rules,” we created a circumstance in which participants can experience “breaking the walls” through virtual reality (VR) technology...

This study aimed to investigate the situation in which interpersonal brain synchronization (IBS) occurs during a collaborative task and examined its trajectory over time by developing a novel functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS)-based hyperscanning paradigm. Participants were asked to perform a collaborative task in three-person groups whe...

This study aimed to investigate how different feedback affect group creative performance, and reveal the underlying interpersonal neural correlates using the functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS)-based hyperscanning technique. Participants solved one creativity task with two strangers in conditions with positive/negative/no feedback. Result...

This entry provides a technical review of virtual reality and its application in creativity studies. The first section defines the concept of virtual reality from technical aspects. The second section summarizes the technical landscape of virtual reality systems. In particular, the section highlights the technical developments of two important subc...

This research explores potential factors that may influence the relationship between beliefs about creativity and creative performance. In Study 1, participants (N = 248) recruited from upper secondary schools in Thailand were asked to solve the Alternative Uses Task (a typical divergent thinking task) and complete a series of questionnaires concer...

The present study aimed to investigate the integrated effect of approach/avoidance motor action and emotion on divergent thinking. A total of 115 participants were randomly assigned to one of the four experimental conditions (i.e., approach-positive, approach-negative, avoidance-positive and avoidance-negative). Participants' emotion was induced by...

Human memory performance is increased by the mnemonic training. The related neural mechanisms have not been clearly elucidated. In the current electroencephalography (EEG) study, we examined the hypotheses that mnemonic training can improve processing-efficiency or reorganize encoding-dynamics or both. A group of developing children practiced the d...

This study investigated whether the experience of "breaking the walls", the embodiment of the metaphor "breaking the rules", could enhance creative performance. The virtual reality technology was used to simulate the scenario where participants could "break the walls" while walking in a corridor. Participants were asked to solve the creativity-dema...

During the course of divergent thinking (DT), the number of generated ideas decreases while the originality of ideas increases. This phenomenon is labeled as serial order effect in DT. The present study investigated whether different executive processes (i.e., updating, shifting, and inhibition) specifically contribute to the serial order effect in...

This study tested whether compatibility or incompatibility between body posture and emotion was beneficial for creativity. In Study 1, participants were asked to solve the Alternative Uses Task (AUT) problems when performing open or closed body posture in positive or negative emotional state respectively. The results showed that originality of AUT...

Memory has been demonstrated to be improved by the mnemonic training. The intentionally targeted cognitive processes, however, are not themselves fully understood, making the mechanisms for the effectiveness of training unclear. In the present study, a group of developing children was trained to use a mnemonic method of encoding 2-digit groups into...

The present study developed the malevolent creativity behavior scale (MCBS), which contains 13 items and was designed to measure individuals’ malevolent creativity through the behavior of daily lives. A total of 958 participants from different regions of China completed the MCBS in an online fashion. Cronbach’s α coefficient, using the 908 MCBSs wi...

Creative things are always original, but they must be more than just original. They must also have some utility, effectiveness, or value. The present research tested the psychoeconomic definition of “value” and examined how value ratings fluctuated when individuals worked in groups or alone. This psychoeconomic definition of value is very different...

This study aimed to examine the interaction effect of response medium (i.e., write down ideas and orally report ideas) and working memory capacity (WMC) on creative idea generation. Participants (N = 90) with higher or lower WMC were asked to solve Alternative Uses Task (AUT) problems in the condition of writing down or speaking out ideas. The resu...

Several studies suggest that mind wandering (MW) benefits creativity when the MW occurs in the incubation period of creative problem solving. The aim of present study was to examine the effects of MW that occurs in the course of creative idea generation. Participants received an Alternative Uses Task (AUT) and were asked to generate ideas for 20min...

Previous studies have uncovered various influencing factors of the incubation effect in creative problem solving. Often, tests of divergent thinking (DT) are used as estimates of the potential for creative problem solving. The impact of emotional state during the incubation interval on subsequent creative performance has not yet been investigated....

Background s: Both monkey neurophysiological and human EEG studies have shown that association cortices, as well as primary sensory cortical areas, play an essential role in sequential neural processes underlying cross-modal working memory. Objective The present study aims to further examine causal and sequential roles of the primary sensory corte...

Previous studies revealed inconsistent findings about the effects of cognitively low or high demanding interpolated tasks during incubation period on post-incubation creative performance. To explain this contradiction, two intervention tasks were administered (Reflecting on the generated ideas [RF] and the Word puzzle task [WP]), which are supposed...

The experiment was designed to explore the effects of domain knowledge, instructional manipulation, and the interaction between them on creative idea generation. Three groups of participants who respectively possessed the domain knowledge of biology, sports, or neither were asked to finish two tasks: imagining an extraterrestrial animal and creatin...