Resolving Ideation Paradoxes: Seeing Apples as Oranges through the Clarity of ThinkLets

Ideation literature enjoys a rich and varied past. This past is also filled with a great deal of controversy and ambiguity. Until the advent of the microcomputer, the vast majority of studies focused on the use of verbally interactive groups and examined the performance differences between nominal groups and interactive groups. A very robust and consistent finding in the literature is that nominal groups are more productive (generate a larger quantity of unique ideas) than are interactive groups in a verbal environment. Since the advent of the microcomputer and electronic brainstorming, the comparison of nominal and interactive groups has shed a great deal of light on why the findings from the verbally interactive groups occur. Dennis and Valacich have even proposed that new brainstorming rules are needed in order to maximize the potential benefits of using electronic brainstorming (EBS). Despite the advances in this field over the past decade, a debate rages on concerning the performance of idea generating groups. This paper examines previous research through the lens of ThinkLets and shows how each of the results obtained in previous research can easily be accounted for, bringing clarity and order to these apparent conflicts.