You’ve Been Framed! The Effect of Opportunity and Prosocial Framing on the Novelty and Usefulness of Student Solutions

Abstract

Creativity, the production of ideas that are both novel and useful, is increasingly important to businesses' long-term success. This study looks at whether instructors can use framing-increasing the saliency of some aspects of a perceived reality in a communication-to affect the creativity of student solutions. More specifically, building on research on issues interpretation, the study examines the effect of opportunity framing on the novelty of student ideas. Building on the literature on perspective taking, the study also looks at the effect of prosocial framing on the usefulness of student ideas. Using a sample of 76 students, I found that students who received an assignment description that included opportunity framing produced more novel solutions. Students who received the same assignment but with prosocial framing created less useful solutions. These findings indicate that the novelty and usefulness (i.e., the creativity) of student solutions can be affected by framing and suggest that framing can be a valuable tool for instructors aiming to encourage creativity. Furthermore, by demonstrating that different types of framing affect novelty and usefulness, this study also

Configuration of prosocial motivations to enhance employees’ innovation behaviors: From the perspective of coupling of basic and applied research

“…In addition, considering the influence of knowledge diversity on innovation behavior, Sun Y. et al (2020) reported that prosocial interaction helps innovators overcome the problem of knowledge diversity. Besides, Bertels (2018) explored the difference between the influence of prosocial motivation on novelty and the influence of prosocial motivation on the usefulness of creativity. He reported that members who received an assignment description that included opportunity framing produced more novel solutions, whereas those who received the same assignment but with prosocial framing created less useful solutions.…”

“…How to solve the optimal solution of prosocial motivations that facilitate different types of innovation behaviors needs to be further explored. On the other hand, previous analyses of the internal composition and characteristics of innovation behavior are insufficient ( Bertels, 2018 ). According to the output process of innovation, innovation behaviors can be specifically divided into basic research behavior, applied research behavior, basic-to-applied transformation behavior, and applied-to-basic transformation behavior.…”

“…Prosocial characteristics with different motivations can reflect employees’ structural characteristics. Second, there is an insufficient discussion on the impact of prosocial motivation on the composition of innovation behaviors ( Bertels, 2018 ). Therefore, it is necessary to further explore the applicability and effect of prosocial motivation on the innovation behavior within the department and the innovation behaviors between the departments.…”

Start-Up Sprint: Providing a Small Group Learning Experience in a Large Group Setting

“…Experiential learning approaches to the teaching of entrepreneurial tools have been developed and presented in the literature—however, these are often in small class settings that allow for hands-on instruction and close student–lecturer engagement (Schmidt et al, 2012; Bertels, 2018; Parris & McInnes-Bowers, 2019; Schumacher & Mayer, 2018) or without discussing the challenge of large (Mason & Arshed, 2013) or postgraduate (Nabi et al, 2017) classes. Proponents of experiential approaches to entrepreneurship education acknowledge the pressure for larger classes and the obstacles this places in the way of providing for experiential teaching (Fulgence, 2015; Henry, 2013).…”