Abstract
In two experiments (n = 264 and 339), I treat brainstorming rules as assigned goals and compare their effectiveness to that of quantity goals as interventions to improve the number of ideas generated by individuals. Controlling for goal commitment, I find that brainstorming rules alone do not convey an advantage over even a vague quantity goal presented alone for enhancing the number of ideas generated in two common tasks. Detailed contrasts revealed that specific, difficult goals were only partially effective on their own, as expected when goal commitment is moderate. However, I find evidence in both studies that brainstorming rules are useful adjuncts to specific, difficult quantity goals. Importantly, their combination was the only consistently effective improvement over both vague quantity goals and brainstorming rules presented alone. I discuss implications for future research adopting a goal-based view of intervention in idea generation.
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Notes
A confusing problem relevant to the present report is that goal setting research using idea generation tasks commonly refers to them as “brainstorming tasks,” but such studies do not provide brainstorming rules to participants (e.g., Locke 1966).
Time for idea generation exercises such as the one used here has varied from one minute (e.g., Locke 1966) on up (e.g., 25 minutes used by Paulus and Dzindolet 1993). I chose 10 min because it seemed to be a reasonable compromise length and was acceptable to instructors who generously allowed data collection in their course sections.
Pro-rating the goal might seem unusual to some, since idea generation is not typically equal across time. However, my purpose was simply to follow Paulus and Dzindolet (1993) in setting the goal at a level that would be very difficult for individuals to hit (without seeming impossible) so that any discontinuation of goal pursuit would not be due to having accomplished the goal. Data show that this was successful.
Supporting the argument that “tell and sell” instructions help participants to avoid seeing specific, difficult goals as impossible, the quantity goal factor (vague versus specific) did not affect commitment in either study. Accordingly, I do not discuss this issue further in the paper.
Table 1 also shows that brainstorming rules led to higher goal commitment in this study. Although not predicted, the finding that goal content affects commitment is also not unprecedented (Seijts et al. 2004). Given the low average commitment in this study, it might be that brainstorming rules simply sounded a little more fun than quantity goals. Because this effect was not replicated in Study 2, I do not discuss it further.
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Acknowlegments
I thank associate editor Mark Muraven and the anonymous reviewers for their many helpful comments. I thank Angela Henderson for data coding. An earlier version of Study 1 was presented at the 2007 annual meeting of the Academy of Management.
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Litchfield, R.C. Brainstorming rules as assigned goals: Does brainstorming really improve idea quantity?. Motiv Emot 33, 25–31 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-008-9109-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-008-9109-x