Toward More Creative and Innovative Group Idea Generation: A Cognitive‐Social‐Motivational Perspective of Brainstorming

In many meetings and work sessions, group members exchange ideas in order to come up with novel, creative solutions for problems and to generate ideas for future innovations. This type of group idea generation or brainstorming process has been studied in detail, and we have discovered much about the cognitive and social processes that underlie group idea generation. It appears that the brainstorming performance of groups is often hindered by various social and cognitive influences, but under the appropriate conditions, group idea exchange can be quite effective. In this article, we summarize the present state of knowledge, point out some significant gaps in our knowledge, and suggest a cognitive-social-motivational perspective to integrate the major findings and to guide future research in the area of group creativity and group idea generation.

[1]  S. Parnes,et al.  Effects of "brainstorming" instructions on creative problem solving by trained and untrained subjects. , 1959 .

[2]  M. Diehl,et al.  Why Groups are less Effective than their Members: On Productivity Losses in Idea-generating Groups , 1994 .

[3]  M. Mumford,et al.  Process analytic models of creative capacities: Evidence for the combination and reorganization process , 1992 .

[4]  D. Harrison,et al.  Beyond Relational Demography: Time and the Effects of Surface- and Deep-Level Diversity on Work Group Cohesion , 1998 .

[5]  Michael A. West,et al.  Innovation Implementation in Work Teams , 2003 .

[6]  P. Paulus,et al.  The Role of Social Anxiousness in Group Brainstorming , 1995 .

[7]  Vincent R. Brown,et al.  Effects of Task Instructions and Brief Breaks on Brainstorming , 2006 .

[8]  E. Tulving,et al.  Availability versus accessibility of information in memory for words , 1966 .

[9]  Steven M. Smith.  The constraining effects of initial ideas. , 2003 .

[10]  R. Baumeister,et al.  Personal narratives about guilt: Role in action control and interpersonal relationships. , 1995 .

[11]  C. Nemeth.  Differential contributions of majority and minority influence , 1986 .

[12]  Wolfgang Stroebe,et al.  How the Group Affects the Mind: A Cognitive Model of Idea Generation in Groups , 2006, Personality and social psychology review : an official journal of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc.

[13]  L. Festinger.  A Theory of Social Comparison Processes , 1954 .

[14]  Vincent R. Brown,et al.  Enhancing ideational creativity in groups: Lessons from research on brainstorming. , 2003 .

[15]  R. Geen,et al.  Alternative conceptions of social facilitation. , 1989 .

[16]  Vincent R. Brown,et al.  Modeling Cognitive Interactions During Group Brainstorming , 1998 .

[17]  M. West.  West Innovation Implementation in Work Teams , 2003 .

[18]  Roni Brown,et al.  Before the Gates of Excellence: The Determinants of Creative Genius , 1991 .

[19]  K. Dugosh,et al.  Cognitive stimulation in brainstorming. , 2000, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[20]  Daniel R. Ilgen,et al.  Enhancing the Effectiveness of Work Groups and Teams , 2006, Psychological science in the public interest : a journal of the American Psychological Society.

[21]  D. van Knippenberg,et al.  Work group diversity. , 2007, Annual review of psychology.

[22]  N. Charness,et al.  Expert Performance Its Structure and Acquisition , 2002 .

[23]  P. Paulus,et al.  Should there be a romance between teams and groups , 2004 .

[24]  John P. Campbell,et al.  The effect of group participation on brainstorming effectiveness for 2 industrial samples. , 1963 .

[25]  Paul B. Paulus,et al.  Social influence processes in computer brainstorming , 1996 .

[26]  Paul B. Paulus,et al.  Psychology of Group Influence , 1981 .

[27]  K. Dugosh,et al.  Cognitive and social comparison processes in brainstorming , 2005 .

[28]  B. Nijstad,et al.  Group creativity : An introduction , 2003 .

[29]  M. West.  Sparkling Fountains or Stagnant Ponds: An Integrative Model of Creativity and Innovation Implementation in Work Groups , 2002 .

[30]  Donald A. Hantula,et al.  The medium matters: Mining the long-promised merit of group interaction in creative idea generation tasks in a meta-analysis of the electronic group brainstorming literature , 2007, Comput. Hum. Behav..

[31]  Mary T. Dzindolet,et al.  Social influence processes in group brainstorming. , 1993 .

[32]  Warren E. Watson,et al.  Cultural diversity''s impact on interaction process and performance: Comparing homogeneous and diver , 1993 .

[33]  M. Diehl,et al.  Productivity loss in brainstorming groups: Toward the solution of a riddle. , 1987 .

[34]  D. Simonton.  Origins of genius : Darwinian perspectives on creativity , 1999 .

[35]  M. Neale,et al.  What Differences Make a Difference? , 2005, Psychological science in the public interest : a journal of the American Psychological Society.

[36]  Paul B. Paulus,et al.  Group Brainstorming and Teamwork: Some Rules for the Road to Innovation , 2006 .

[37]  Andrew B. Hargadon,et al.  Brainstorming groups in context: Effectiveness in a product design firm , 1996 .

[38]  D. Harrison,et al.  Time, Teams, and Task Performance: Changing Effects of Surface- and Deep-Level Diversity on Group Functioning , 2002 .

[39]  Vincent R. Brown,et al.  Cognitive stimulation and problem presentation in idea-generating groups. , 2000 .

[40]  Steven M. Smith,et al.  Creative Cognition: Theory, Research, and Applications , 1996 .

[41]  T. Bouchard,et al.  Size, performance, and potential in brainstorming groups. , 1970, The Journal of applied psychology.

[42]  Verlin B. Hinsz,et al.  The emerging conceptualization of groups as information processors. , 1997, Psychological bulletin.

[43]  Michael D. Mumford,et al.  Process analytic models of creative capacities , 1991 .

[44]  Alan R. Dennis,et al.  Electronic brainstorming: Theory, research, and future directions. , 2003 .

[45]  B. Nijstad,et al.  Cognitive stimulation and interference in idea generating groups , 2003 .

[46]  Jyotsna Vaid,et al.  Creative Thought: An Investigation of Conceptual Structures and Processes , 2001 .

[47]  B. Nijstad,et al.  Cognitive stimulation and interference in groups: Exposure effects in an idea generation task , 2002 .

[48]  E. Salas,et al.  Productivity loss in brainstorming groups: A meta-analytic integration. , 1991 .

[49]  G. Stasser,et al.  Group Creativity and Collective Choice , 2019, The Oxford Handbook of Group Creativity and Innovation.

[50]  P. Paulus,et al.  Performance and Perceptions of Brainstormers in an Organizational Setting , 1995 .

[51]  P. Paulus,et al.  Idea Generation in Groups : A Basis for Creativity in Organizations , 1994 .

[52]  Kipling D. Williams,et al.  PROCESSES Social Loafing: A Meta-Analytic Review and Theoretical Integration , 2022 .