Group Creativity

1
Group Creativity

• September 29, 2005

2
Barriers to Group Creativity

• Groups should be more creative than individuals.
• Diversity of knowledge, information,
  perspectives, strategies that can be brought to
  bear on a problem.
• Potential to build upon, combine and improve upon
  each others ideas.
• Brainstorming groups example of promise not
  realized.
• Additional barrier in the form of knowledge
  sharing.

3
Decision Making Problem

• Under which conditions should groups be at their
  absolute best?
• Each individual in the group knows something
  unique.
• Group must decide between 3 candidates who each
  have positive and negative attributes.
• One candidate has the highest number of positive
  relative to negative attributes and is clearly
  the best.

4
Everyone Has Complete Information

• When group members received each candidates full
  profile (knowledge completely shared) 67 chose
  the best person before meeting with their group.
• Subsequent group discussion increased support for
  the best candidate to 83.

5
Hidden Profile

• What happens when individual members are not
  fully informed?
• Information distributed such that no one
  individual had complete information.
• Each individual had some information shared by
  all and some information unique only to them.
• Group will only arrive at correct solution if
  they each share what they know.

6
Groups Made Inferior Decision

• Groups were more likely to choose the inferior
  candidate after the discussion.
• Support for the best candidate remained stable
  before as compared to after the discussion.
• Groups did not share information that would lead
  them to the correct solution.

7
Common Knowledge Effect

• Groups more likely to share and focus on
  information they have in common.
• When unique information was presented to the
  group
• It was less likely to be repeated than common
  information.
• It was discussed for a shorter amount of time.
• It was regarded with more suspicion.
• Social costs of sharing information can be
  reduced by confidence, status or expertise.

8
Search for interventions that increase group
creativity

• Challenge is to find ways to liberate people to
  share their unique ideas and perspectives.
• Potentially solution emerging from research on
  attribution theory.
• As groups become more and more popular,
  individuals are getting less credit for their
  unique contributions.
• Will creativity increase if focus is shifted back
  to individuals?

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Do Attributions Have Consequences for Group
Creativity?

• Attributing to properties of the group may
  increase conformity by calling attention to
  shared norms
• (Cialdini, Reno Kallgren, 1990).
• Conformity contributes to convergent thinking in
  groups
• (Nemeth, 1986 Nemeth Staw, 1989).
• Hypothesis 1 Attributing success to properties
  of the group will increase a groups
  creativity.

10
Attributing Success to Individuals May Increase
Creativity

• Focusing attention on unique knowledge
• (Stasser, 1992).
• Making individual contributions more identifiable
• (Williams, Harkins Latane, 1981).
• Increasing accountability to the group
• (Tetlock, 1983).
• Hypothesis 2 Attributions to individual members
  will lead to more creativity than will
  attributions to properties of the group.

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Research Design

• Groups of 4 students given false positive
  feedback about their success on a task.
• Asked to explain their success
• Individual Focus What are the qualities of
  each individual in your group that you believe
  led to your successful performance on the
  previous task?
• Group Focus What are the qualities of your
  group that you believe led to your successful
  performance on the previous task?

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Overview of Experimental Conditions

• Success (Positive feedback)
• Condition 1 Individual-focused attribution
• Condition 2 Group-focused attribution
• Condition 3 No attribution
• No Success (No feedback)
• Condition 4 Control

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Measuring Creativity

• Scenario Generate new business ideas for empty
  
• space formerly occupied by school
  restaurant.
• Number of total ideas
• Diversity of ideas
• Ideas categorized based on their similarity
• Example Jack in the Box, Dennys, Chinese
  restaurant, Deli, health clinic
• 5 ideas, 2 categories

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Results More Ideas Generated After Attributing
Success to Individuals
15
Results More Diverse Ideas After Attributing
Success to Individuals
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Study 2 Attributions and Group Decision-Making

• Same procedure as in Study 3
• Success (Positive feedback)
• Condition 1 Group-focused attribution
• Condition 2 Individual-focused attribution
• Failure (Negative feedback)
• Condition 3 Group-focused attribution
• Condition 4 Individual-focused attribution
• N 56 groups, 3 subjects per group.

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Task Based on HP-Compaq (2003) Merger

• Against Merger
• Analysts project that General Printers stock
  price would increase by 14-17 US dollars per
  share if merger were rejected.
• For Merger
• The merger is expected to generate cost
  synergies of approximately 2.0 billion in fiscal
  2003, the first full year of operations.
• As a group, please discuss all the alternative
  courses of action that General Printer should
  consider when making the decision whether or not
  to merge with PC Corporation.
• DV Number of alternatives considered (Janis
  Mann, 1977)
• Groups who consider more alternatives are
  thinking more divergently

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Results More Alternatives Considered after
Attributing Success to Individuals
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Results More novel alternatives considered
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Study Conclusions

• Excessive focus on groups as a cause of success
  stifles creativity.
• Direct attention to the unique contributions made
  by individual members and the group as a whole
  will be more creative.
• Shared success can actually stimulate creativity
  depending on how it is explained.

21
Next Week

• Creativity and Organizational Culture.
• Announcement
• Class on November 22nd Cancelled.
• Group presentations begin on November 17.