Researchers Map Brain's Inspiration Point

April 21 -- We've all had those moments, from time to time, when the solution to a complex problem suddenly strikes out of thin air, providing an insight into something we've never understood before.

Cognitive scientists call it the "Aha!" experience. Or the "Eureka!" moment. You know you've had it because a mythical lightning bolt comes out of the sky, or a light goes off over your head, or you just feel euphoric.

Until now, many scientists had believed there's no fundamental difference between that Aha experience and any other cognitive process. But scientists at two universities, using some of the most valuable tools in their field, had found evidence that the moment when insight strikes is very different indeed.

Two different brain imaging techniques have revealed that a specific area of the brain "lights up" when the Aha moment arrives, according to cognitive neuroscientists Mark Jung-Beeman and Edward Bowden of Northwestern University and John Kounios of Drexel University. They reported their findings in the April 13th edition of PloS Biology, an online journal that is available free through the Public Library of Science.

"We believe this is the first research showing that distinct computational and neural mechanisms lead to these breakthrough moments," says Jung-Beeman. "This was the first real crack at it (understanding how insight occurs) in terms of looking at the brain."

Areas of Concentration

Participants in the study grappled with 144 simple problems, some of which required insight, and some of which could be solved without the need for a lightning bolt.

The researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging, which allowed them to determine which parts of the brain were active, in the first of two experiments. Part of the brain "lit up" when the participants experienced Aha, but not when they didn't. The increased activity was observed in part of the right temporal lobe (the anterior superior temporal gyrus.)