The Cognitive Neural Mechanisms and Neuroregulatory Interventions of Realistic Creative Problem-solving Under the Effects of Drug Addiction

Drug addiction persists as a significant global social concern with a negative impact on social harmony and stability that cannot be ignored. After returning to society, individuals with drug addiction often suffer from impaired creative problem-solving abilities and difficulties in interpersonal cooperation. The difficulties in survival stress and the sense of helplessness triggered by these factors are important reasons that lead them to seek drugs repeatedly and even to commit criminal behaviors. Therefore, enhancing creative realistic problem-solving abilities emerges as a pivotal pathway for drug addicts to facilitate rehabilitation from drug addiction and achieve societal adaptation. The project emphasizes both individual and collaborative creative solution generation for realistic problem solving. The abnormal cognitive neural mechanisms and interpersonal neural mechanisms will be systematically explored by using multiple cognitive and neuroimaging methods, such as functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), electroencephalography (EEG), and eye-tracking. From the cognitive-behavioral-brain level, a comprehensive neurophysiological multimodal predictive model of how drug addiction affects creative realistic problem-solving will be constructed by multi-level data fitting modeling. Building upon this research foundation, The investigators will further implement single and repeated sessions of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) targeting damaged brain regions for the intervention of individual and collaborative problem-solving ability under the effect of drug addiction. The indicators of brain, cognition, and behavior will be tracked at multiple time points.