Intrinsic default - executive coupling of the creative aging brain.

Creativity refers to the ability to generate novel associations and has been linked to better problem-solving and real-world functional abilities. In younger adults, creative cognition has been associated with functional connectivity among brain networks implicated in executive control (fronto-parietal and salience networks) and associative or elaborative processing (default network). Here, we investigate whether creativity is associated with the intrinsic network architecture of the brain and how these associations may differ for younger and older adults. Young (mean age: 24.76, n=22) and older (mean age: 70.03, n=44) adults underwent multi-echo functional MRI scanning at rest and completed a divergent thinking task to assess creative cognition outside the scanner. Divergent thinking in older adults, compared to young adults, was associated with functional connectivity between the default and both executive control networks (fronto-parietal and salience networks) as well as more widespread default-executive coupling. Finally, the vmPFC appears to be a critical node involved in within- and between- network connectivity associated with creative cognition in older adulthood. Patterns of intrinsic network coupling revealed here suggest a putative neural mechanism underlying a greater role for mnemonic processes in creative cognition in older adulthood.