3. The Final Examination
Each individual was required to stay at the same location for the research. This was obviously done to maintain uniformity throughout the study. Nancy would get to know her subject over a meal at her house (possibly some wine) and later on they would probably roam around her natural reserve in an SUV – much like a safari adventure. These soothing activities helped the transition into the deeper and more complex parts of the study. The real work starts with the scanning of the brain while the individual undertakes several various tasks on top of relaxing. These relatively easy chores were vocabulary, image and design affiliations. Enjoying a game of Scrabble hardly seems like a job of a scientist but this actually comes quite close to be a catalyst of creativity. Remember that the soul of creative thought was to form links and solve problems. The scans would of course allow Nancy to study the activity of the cerebrum while these tasks were done. As Nancy guessed, the lemmas in the brains of geniuses showed powerful occupations during the chores. This was irrespective of their fields of study and career choices. Intensive and thorough interviews followed the MRIs. Nancy enjoyed her preparations for these question-answer sessions as it usually included some fun activity or the other. A broad range of topics were covered including early childhood, parents’ histories, relationships, hobbies and so on. The interview ends with the subject describing an average day at the workplace and to come up with a reason as to how they managed to achieve such high levels of creative thought. Perhaps the most difficult part of the conversation is when the topic of psychological instability is broached. Early life problems and traumatic experiences are shared and individuals tell Nancy how they’ve learned to handle emotional burdens of their pasts.