Preparation, incubation, solution, and verification are the four phases of issue solving:
1. PREPARATION.
- When we prepare to solve an issue, we pay attention to the ideas and facts that are important to a solution while ignoring everything else.
- Selective encoding is the term used by psychologists to describe the cognitive process of separating what is significant from what is not.
2. INCUBATION.
- The issue is addressed in the following step, incubation.
- During the incubation stage, we mix and recombine all pertinent data, looking for a solution among the new combinations.
- This method of trial and error is known as selective combination.
We also compare the current issue and its solutions to comparable situations in the past and their actual solutions.
This selective comparison assists us in evaluating the options we currently have and offers us with new options.
These actions take place both subconsciously and deliberately.
When deliberately combined and compared, they are seen as rational, analytical thinking processes (i.e., reasoning).
- Slowly and painstakingly, the solution emerges.
- It comes as no surprise since you can see it coming.
- The logical processes that lead to the answer are known and may be used to both explain and check if the result is accurate.
Non-Insight problem solving is what it's called.
- When the unconscious mind solves a problem via selective combination and comparison, the solution arrives in awareness abruptly and unexpectedly.
- You don't see it coming, and describing the reasoning behind the answer is equally tough. As a result, the procedure is often characterized as intuitive.
- This is known as insight problem solving, and the terms "intuition" and "insight" refer to the same thing in this case: unconscious information processing.
There is still another significant distinction between conscious thinking and intuitive understanding.
- The conscious mind easily solves "simpler" issues that may be solved by applying reasoning to the information that is instantly accessible.
- The unconscious mind, on the other hand, excels in solving complicated issues with unique characteristics.
Non-insight problem solving isn't as successful when it comes to addressing complicated and nuanced issues, simply because awareness is a single, sequential process.
The unconscious mind, on the other hand, is made up of a huge number of mental processes that all happen at the same time.
It's the difference between serial and parallel processing in computers, to use a contemporary example.
- Because there is only one conscious mind, it must restrict itself to the most probable combinations and comparisons as decided by logic for the purpose of efficiency.
- This is especially constricting when it comes to comparing prospective solutions to past experiences (selective comparison).
- Although you have a large number of previous experiences, there are only so many comparisons that can be made in a given amount of time.
- That time must also be shared with other conscious activities.
- However, since there are numerous unconscious sub-minds working on the issue rather than just one, unconscious processing has no such limits.
- That's why the unconscious is so excellent at coming up with solutions that include novel perspectives on an issue.
- The unconscious mind is considerably more free to experiment with extreme combinations and analogies that may seem illogical at first.
- Furthermore, since selective comparison is so essential, insight solutions are often allegorical and metaphorical—that is, the answer is best expressed and conveyed via analogies.
- Finally, the unconscious mind has access to everything that is going on in the conscious mind, including both partial accomplishments and failures, and may use this knowledge to its advantage.
- The conscious mind, on the other hand, has no access to what happens in the unconscious mind until it awakens.
3. SOLUTION.
When we finally solve an issue, it may come in the form of a "insight solution," which is a quick, intuitive understanding given from the unconscious.
- A non-insight solution, on the other hand, is when we have the conscious sensation of "all the pieces fitting into place" when we methodically think about the issue.
- In the most basic example of the former, an insight solution appears out of nowhere and instantly enters awareness.
- When conscious thinking leads straight to an answer, this is the most fundamental kind of non-insight solution. However, this isn't always the case.
- As we'll see, both conscious and unconscious processes have played a role in reaching that conclusion in the majority of instances.
4. VERIFICATION.
Verifying the answer is the last stage in the problem-solving process.
Even rational, non-intuitive ideas need to be tested in the real world.
However, unless you're prepared to continue on the basis of a wild "hunch," intuitive insight solutions must first be verified by reasoning.
Such verification always takes place in awareness, and it is here that the conscious mind really shines in the problem-solving process.
- For societal, legal, moral, or other reasons, many otherwise effective remedies are undesirable.
- Furthermore, a solution that precisely matches the problem's broad pattern may still not meet the problem's details.
- To put it another way, it may work in theory but not in reality.
- In real life, issue solving is typically a recursive process, and most difficulties are solved by addressing a succession of smaller problems first.
- Both non-insight and insight processes are engaged because the conscious and unconscious portions of the mind system interact.
- The conscious mind creates the issue first.
- The conscious and unconscious brains then start working on it at the same time.
- New ideas on how to address the issue will "pop into the mind" while we're actively thinking about it.
- These are all insights, but none of them are certainly "insight solutions" to the larger issue.
- We next actively assess these concepts, determining whether or not they are useful—that is, we validate them using logic analysis.
- If these ideas don't offer the solution we're searching for, we continue to think about the issue, and as we do, other ideas emerge for consideration.
As you can see, neither conscious analysis nor intuitive understanding are automatically superior. However, they are a great match for each other.
They are much more potent when used together than each technique could possibly be on its own.
We see this in everyday life as well; we all know individuals who depend too much on reasoning or intuition to their disadvantage.
