A realistic first idea might not be as creative as an abstract second one, new research shows.
“Evaluating creativity is difficult,” says Justin M. Berg, an assistant professor at Stanford University Graduate School of Business. “A lot of research suggests that people are not very good at it, that a number of biases and challenges get in the way.”
In the new paper, Berg investigates a relatively understudied part of the creative process: the very early stage, when we first generate rough ideas. This, he notes, is when people are brainstorming in their own heads or sketching in secret; many of these ideas are never shared. But if you work in a job that involves creativity, these earliest choices about which initial idea you ought to pursue can greatly affect your creativity. Investing your time in the right idea can lead to a breakthrough.
So how good are people at knowing if an initial idea is worthy of time and energy? Not very good, it turns out, but also not terrible, which opens a path to improvement.
'Tortoise and Hare Dynamic'
Berg conducted five experiments in which participants tackled creative projects, like devising an innovative piece of fitness equipment or a mechanism to keep people from falling asleep in self-driving cars.
He tested how well people were able to assess the potential creativity of their ideas. The general setup asked participants to come up with three initial solutions to the challenge and then rank them from most to least promising. Next, they spent time fleshing out and finalizing one of these three ideas. Berg then asked a separate sample of experts and consumers to rate the creativity ..
Support the originator by clicking the read the rest link below.
