Intuitive Feeling of Closeness to Solution Preceding Insight in Anagram Tasks

Abstract

One of the main research questions related to creativity is the dilemma of specificity vs. non-specificity of the mechanisms underlying insight solutions as compared to analytical solutions of a problem. The first goal of our study was to verify insight solution specificity on solving anagram tasks. The second goal was to test a hypothesis about the existence of unconscious processing prior to insight solutions. We presented two types of stimuli to participants: anagrams and pseudowords. During the experiment, participants had to perform two successive tasks. First they had to judge whether they were being shown an anagram or a pseudoword, and then they had to solve the anagram. Anagrams and pseudowords differed in some visual features, of which the participants were not aware. It was expected that unconscious processing (if it exists) would be influenced by the implicit difference between the appearance of stimulus categories. During the solving process, participants had to rate how close they were to a solution. After a successful solution, they also had to indicate which way they found it: analytically or with insight. Our results showed that prior to an insight solution, participants felt that they were farther from the final solution than in the case of an analytical solution. These results confirm Metcalfe and Wiebe’s (1987) conclusions on the difference between insight and analytical solutions. According to these data, we can propose different specific mechanisms for insight solutions and analytical solutions in anagram tasks. At the same time, the presence of visual differences between stimulus categories did not influence the anagram solving process. The current results did not show evidence for an important role of unconscious processing before insight solutions of anagrams