Creativity is widely regarded as a key cognitive resource in the 21st century, yet it remains a complex and elusive phenomenon. Language constitutes a central medium of creative thought and expression—for example, through the production and comprehension of novel metaphors. At the same time, a growing body of research suggests that operating in more than one language may shape creative cognition. In an increasingly multilingual world, this raises important questions about how bilinguals’ creative performance depends on the language in use and the contexts in which creativity unfolds.

In this talk, I focus on the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying creative cognition and examine how creative performance is modulated by language of operation, prior knowledge, and feedback. I will present a series of electrophysiological (EEG) studies addressing two main questions: (1) how domain-specific knowledge and knowledge of an additional language influence the neural dynamics of novel metaphor comprehension, and (2) whether engaging in creative idea generation in one’s native versus a foreign language alters creative potential, and which neural mechanisms support such effects. Together, these findings illuminate how bilingualism interacts with creativity at the level of brain dynamics, offering new insights into the cognitive and neural foundations of creative language use and highlighting promising directions for future research.

Rafał Jończyk ist Assistant Professor an der Faculty of English der Adam Mickiewicz Universität Poznań. Seine Forschungsinteressen liegen an der Schnittstelle zwischen Linguistik und Neurowissenschaften, insbesondere affektive Neurowissenschaften, experimentelle Pragmatik, Psycholinguistik, Zweisprachigkeit und Emotionen, Neurophysiologie der Kreativität und neurophysiologische Methoden in Sprachverarbeitungsstudien (EEG).