Usefulness of the Ideation Principle of Extended Effort in Real World Professional and Managerial Creative Problem Solving*

Abstract

Two hypotheses relating to using the ideation principle of extended effort in idea generation to solve real world technical and managerial problems are tested in field research. In two studies involving training and application of a "complete process of creative problem solving" emphasizing the ideation-evaluation process, the "most preferred ideas" were well dispersed and furthermore were more likely to be found among the latter two thirds of the ideas listed serially than in the first third. This provides support for the usefulness of the extended effort principle.One study (n=lOl) involved individual creative problem solving, while the other (n=264) involved small groups. The data give rise to speculation that perhaps the more effort devoted to fact finding and problem definition prior to idea generation, the earlier in the list of ideas will the most preferred idea occur.The technique or principle of extended effort in idea generation in creative problem solving has been of interest to researchers for sometime.Extended effort is defined as striving to obtain as many ideas_as possible (rather than stopping with the early ideas that come to mind) during idea generation. One statement attibuted to Linus Pauling that relates to extended effort is "the best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas" (Parnes, Noller, and Biondi 1977). Another saying, "quantity breeds quality", represents one of the four operational rules of the well known brainstorming technique (Osl:x>rn, 1963):

Building on the ideas of others: An examination of the idea combination process

“…The tendency of novel combinations increasing with time supports Hypothesis 4, is consistent with Kohn and Smith (in press), and matches other findings that creative outputs increase over time (Basadur & Thompson, 1986;Ward, Sifonis, & Wilkenfeld, 1996). The pattern of findings from the combination process is similar to that of prior research on computer based idea generation.…”

“…The combination process should also vary over time. One would expect more novel combinations over the course of a combination session, as is the case in regular brainstorming (Basadur & Thompson, 1986;Parnes, 1961). The most easily accessible and thus more common ideas should be tapped in the early phase of the idea search process (Paulus & Brown, 2003).…”

Assessing Ideational and Evaluative Skills and Creative Styles and Attitudes

“…The latter did not, however, use problems that the participants were familiar with or committed to, and the duration of the training was much shorter than that of the former study. Basadur and Thompson (1986) demonstrated that, for both individuals and groups, on real world technical professional problems, training produced results consistent with the paradigms established in the laboratory by Meadow (1959, 1960). Other support of the value of creative problem solving techniques includes Rickards and Carson (1979) and Gryskiewicz (1987).…”

Interdependency between average novelty, individual average novelty, and variety

“…According to Osborn (1953) quantity breeds quality in ideation and early ideas are unlikely to be of higher quality during an ideation session. The rationale for the measure quantity is that generating a large number of ideas enhances the chance of better ideas (Osborn, 1953;Kumar et al, 1991;Basadur and Thompson, 1986). However, this is applicable under certain conditions (e.g.…”