The effect of idea generation techniques and of group after individual brainstorm

Simone Ritter and me are proud to share our recent publication in Creative Industries Journal of the results from our study on the effect of idea generation techniques and of group brainstorm after individual brainstorm.

We found 2 main results from our study:

1. Different idea generation techniques deliver different ideas with respect to: fluency, quality (originality x usefulness) and cognitive flexibility.
2. Group brainstorming after individual brainstorm has positive effects.

1. Different idea generation techniques deliver different ideas

In idea generation sessions, people often arrive at a point where no new ideas are generated, that is, where ideation gets exhausted. The findings of our research suggest that, if one is afraid that ideas might get exhausted during the idea generation process, it might be wise to progressively apply a couple of different creativity techniques.

In our study we compared the effect of 4 different idea generation techniques. The techniques we used are Silent brainstorm, Lines of evolution, Random connections and Scamper.  Some findings are that:

• The number of ideas generated per technique did not differ—each technique resulted in a comparable amount of ideas generated. These findings suggest that throughout the whole four-technique procedure, ideation does not get exhausted.
• With regard to idea creativity quality (creativity = the originality x the usefulness of the ideas generated) some differences were observed between the techniques. Whereas all four techniques brought about equal levels of originality in idea generation, a difference was found between the techniques on usefulness.

2.      Group brainstorming after individual brainstorm has positive effects

Although idea sharing in groups can be stimulating, it can also distract from one’s own ‘train of thought’, a process called cognitive interference. Based on the current findings it can be assumed that this negative effect is ruled-out by first asking people to generate individually and, thereafter, in a group.

• An interesting finding is that idea generation in groups after individual idea generation has an important advantage in terms of idea quality: the originality of the ideas generated in groups after generating ideas alone did significantly increase. These findings suggest that generating ideas in a group after generating ideas individually has a strong beneficial effect on the originality, and thus the quality of the ideas generated.

Read our article

We invite you to read our full article, with more interesting finds on Tailor & Francis Online.

Thank you,

Nel M. Mostert also on behalf of Simone M. Ritter

Our publications are:

The effect of idea generation techniques and of group after individual brainstorm, Creative Industries Journal, November 2018

Enhancement of Creative Thinking Skills Using a Cognitive-Based Creativity Training, Journal of Cognitive Enhancement, page 1-11, October 2016.