Intuition, incubation, and insight: implicit cognition in problem solving

Abstract

Abstract This chapter discusses the stages of thought, the scope of implicit cognition, the role of intuitions in insight problem solving, the evidence for intuitions in insight problem solving, the role of activation in intuition and incubation, priming in insight problem solving, the problem of incubation, autonomous and interactive activation in incubation, and implicit thought in detail. It is thought that introspective analyses of human problem solving have always focused on the phenomena of intuition, incubation, and insight. These phenomena that have long intrigued observers of problem solving have also long eluded scientific analysis partly because they seem to implicate unconscious processes. The advent of the cognitive revolution in the 1960s led to psychologists returning their attention to thinking and developed more on problems of categorization, reasoning, judgement, and problem solving per se. Wallas decomposed problem solving into stages which include the preparation stage, the verification stage, the incubation stage, and the illumination stage. Wallas is certain that incubation involves subconscious thought and that immediate and sudden flashes of illumination reflect the materialization of a previously unconscious thought into phenomenal awareness. This chapter argues that intuition and incubation are aspects of implicit thought, and a facet of implicit cognition.

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