Revisiting Morenian psychodramatic encounter in light of contemporary neuroscience: Relationship between empathy and creativity

Polarization of the biological and psychosocial aspects of the human condition has long created aloofness between psychotherapists and neuroscientists, and prevented an open dialogue regarding a possible integrative approach. While we know that mind and brain are inseparable, the complexity of one's unique subjectivity, moreover intersubjectivity, is not easily translatable to the complexity of the brain's chemistry and physiology. This overview incorporates current biological thinking about the relationship of mind to brain into the philosophy and techniques of psychodrama. J.L. Moreno's concepts of encounter and role reversal are considered in light of the recent advances in cognitive neuroscience regarding creativity and empathy. These two faculties seem to be associated with opposite functioning in the prefrontal cortex, empathy with activation and creativity with inhibition. Although the neural circuitry involved in the two phenomena would be more complex, evaluating these two mental processes within a neuroscientific framework offers a renewed outlook on psychodrama, including more sophisticated hypotheses of how psychodrama may affect brain functioning and vice-versa.     

中药炮制理论研究的思路——突破与创新

中药炮制研究关系中药的发展与应用,现代中药炮制水平依旧停留在传统之中,缺乏可以量化的控制系统,理论研究方面没有创造性的突破,其原因是思路与方法的限制、方向上迷茫导致。应采用突破常规的研究思想,运用现代的科技力量,多方协作才能得到突破和创新。     

Application of alpha/theta neurofeedback and heart rate variability training to young contemporary dancers: State anxiety and creativity

As one in a series on the impact of EEG-neurofeedback in the performing arts, we set out to replicate a previous dance study in which alpha/theta (A/T) neurofeedback and heart rate variability (HRV) biofeedback enhanced performance in competitive ballroom dancers compared with controls. First year contemporary dance conservatoire students were randomised to the same two psychophysiological interventions or a choreology instruction comparison group or a no-training control group. While there was demonstrable neurofeedback learning, there was no impact of the three interventions on dance performance as assessed by four experts. However, HRV training reduced anxiety and the reduction correlated with improved technique and artistry in performance; the anxiety scale items focussed on autonomic functions, especially cardiovascular activity. In line with the putative impact of hypnogogic training on creativity A/T training increased cognitive creativity with the test of unusual uses, but not insight problems. Methodological and theoretical implications are considered.     

Where is the Baby From,Why is it Here? Creative Ways of Working with Dissociated States in Private Practice

Through one clinical example involving complex post‐traumatic stress disorder, this paper explores the ways in which the psychoanalytic psychotherapist may need to find creative ways of working which incorporate findings from neuroscience whilst holding the basic frame and methods of the traditional psychoanalytic approach. This entails bringing knowledge of how the body (including the brain) works into the consulting room. In particular, the author describes ways of accompanying the patient during florid flashbacks to chronic and severe childhood abuse and of using grounding techniques afterwards, so that anxiety levels can be sufficiently contained for the necessary therapeutic work to take place. The role of supervision is also explored in terms of how the dynamic of rescuer/victim/persecutor may be played out in the supervisory relationship. Unusually, some of the patient's own reflections, written at the end of the therapy, have been incorporated into the paper. Consideration is given to whether departures from standard psychoanalytic technique constitute boundary violations or useful enactments, which can be seen as a form of creativity which enables the work to move on.     

Creativity and dissociation. Dance/movement therapy interventions for the treatment of compartmentalized dissociation

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between creativity and compartmentalized dissociation (CD) and explore clinical implications for treatment. After examining the distinction between detachment and CD, the paper presents the main developmental pathways that lead to pathological presentations of CD, highlighting the role of creativity and fantasy proneness. The paper defines the potential benefits of using creative approaches specifically focusing on dance/movement therapy (DMT) in the treatment of CD. These dance/movement interventions address some of the therapeutic tasks required for people with CD, such as the identification and mapping of alters and the improvement of communication, collaboration and coordination among them. The paper finally applies choreographic and performance lenses to the integration and mastery of therapeutic transitions, specifically pertaining to the transformation and fusion of alters. In this process, the paper both examines the benefits of the use of body and movement and also stresses potential caveats in working with this population.     

Creative cognition and dopaminergic modulation of fronto-striatal networks: Integrative review and research agenda

Creative cognition is key to human functioning yet the underlying neurobiological mechanisms are sparsely addressed and poorly understood. Here we address the possibility that creative cognition is a function of dopaminergic modulation in fronto-striatal brain circuitries. It is proposed that (i) creative cognition benefits from both flexible and persistent processing, (ii) striatal dopamine and the integrity of the nigrostriatal dopaminergic pathway is associated with flexible processing, while (iii) prefrontal dopamine and the integrity of the mesocortical dopaminergic pathway is associated with persistent processing. We examine this possibility in light of studies linking creative ideation, divergent thinking, and creative problem-solving to polymorphisms in dopamine receptor genes, indirect markers and manipulations of the dopaminergic system, and clinical populations with dysregulated dopaminergic activity. Combined, studies suggest a functional differentiation between striatal and prefrontal dopamine: moderate (but not low or high) levels of striatal dopamine benefit creative cognition by facilitating flexible processes, and moderate (but not low or high) levels of prefrontal dopamine enable persistence-driven creativity.     

Dreams,Perception, and Creative Realization

This article draws on the ethnography of Aboriginal Australia to argue that perceptual openness, extending from waking life into dreaming experience, provides an important cognitive framework for the apprehension of dreamt experience in these contexts. I argue that this perceptual openness is analogous to the “openness to experience” described as a personality trait that had been linked with dream recall frequency (among other things). An implication of identifying perceptual openness at a cultural rather than at an individual level is two-fold. It provides an example of the ways in which cultural differences affect perception, indicative of cognitive diversity; and, given the relationship between dreams and creativity suggested anecdotally and through research, a cultural orientation toward perceptual openness is also likely to have implications for the realization of creativity that occurs through dreams. Such creativity though cannot be separated from the relational context in which such dreamt material is elaborated and understood.     

医用化学教学改革与医学生创新能力培养

为培养医学生的创新能力，近年来我们对医用化学的教学过程进行了一系列改革。通过提高教师队伍素质、组织研究性学习、开设选修课程、开展暑期科研活动等多方面的教学改革活动，加强了医学生创新能力的培养，教学改革收到了理想的效果，在培养医学生创新能力方面积累了宝贵的经验。     

Hippocampal amnesia disrupts verbal play and the creative use of language in social interaction

Background: While the neural substrates and cognitive components of creativity have received considerable attention in cognitive neuroscience, the creative use of language in social interaction has been less well studied. As part of a broader programme of research on language‐and‐memory‐in‐use in individuals with hippocampal amnesia, we analysed verbal play, a creative use of language that is pervasive in everyday communicative interaction.

Aims: To identify instances of creative uses of language in the protocols of social and collaborative interactions, to characterise the qualitative nature, and to determine the frequency of these interactions initiated by participants with hippocampal amnesia vs comparison participants in order to ascertain whether amnesia impairs this aspect of social communication.

Methods & Procedures: This study uses quantitative group comparisons and detailed discourse analysis to analyse verbal play in the interactional discourse sessions of four participants with hippocampal amnesia and four healthy (demographically matched) comparison participants, each interacting with a familiar partner while completing a collaborative referencing task and with a researcher between task trials.

Outcomes & Results: All participants used verbal play. However, significantly fewer episodes were initiated in sessions with amnesia participants (312) and by participants with amnesia themselves (187) than in sessions with comparison participants (572) and by comparison participants (395). No significant group differences were observed for interactional forms, resources, or functions. Qualitative differences were also observed in amnesia sessions (e.g., more rotely produced episodes, lack of thematically linked episodes).

Conclusions: These findings suggest that hippocampal amnesia disrupts the creative use of language in social interaction and accord with our previous work pointing to impairments in language‐and‐memory‐in‐use more broadly. These findings highlight the interdependence of language and memory especially in the interactional aspects of communication.