Connectivity and thought: the influence of semantic network structure in a neurodynamical model of thinking.
Neural networks : the official journal of the International Neural Network Society August 1, 2012 Nagendra Marupaka, Laxmi R Iyer, Ali A Minai
Thought arises from the combination of existing concepts through associations, and the structure of semantic networks—small-world, scale-free connectivity—influences the creativity of ideation. A new neural model represents semantic memory as a recurrent network with itinerant dynamics, where conceptual combinations emerge as co-active neural groups and persist as metastable attractors, recognized as ideas. Simulations show that networks with both small-world and scale-free characteristics significantly enhance the generation of unique conceptual combinations, linking the qualitative structure of associations to the effectiveness of spontaneous thought.