IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/ormksc/v40y2021i6p1106-1122.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Raw Ideas in the Fuzzy Front End: Verbosity Increases Perceived Creativity

Author

Listed:
  • Laura J. Kornish

    (Leeds School of Business, University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, Colorado 80309)

  • Sharaya M. Jones

    (School of Business, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia 22030)

Abstract

At the “fuzzy front end” of an innovation process, organizations typically consider dozens, or even hundreds, of raw ideas. Selecting the best ones is a double challenge: evaluating so many ideas is a large undertaking, and the ideas in their raw form permit only noisy evaluations. In this paper, we demonstrate a further challenge to that large-scale evaluation of raw ideas. We show that verbosity raises the evaluation of ideas, that is, ideas expressed in more words are rated higher. This relationship is especially pronounced for ratings of creativity. Theory tells us that the effect of length on creativity is compounded because length cues both components of creativity—novelty and usefulness. We demonstrate how effort in reading (disfluency) and perceptions of complexity work together to explain the relationship between length and creativity. Our findings provide simple but important new directives for improving the use of crowdsourcing in the practice and study of innovation: either standardize the length of the ideas or control for length in their evaluation. Overall, we urge care with using measures of novelty or creativity when the idea descriptions vary in length.

Suggested Citation

  • Laura J. Kornish & Sharaya M. Jones, 2021. "Raw Ideas in the Fuzzy Front End: Verbosity Increases Perceived Creativity," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 40(6), pages 1106-1122, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:ormksc:v:40:y:2021:i:6:p:1106-1122
    DOI: 10.1287/mksc.2021.1300
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mksc.2021.1300
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/mksc.2021.1300?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Berg, Justin M., 2019. "When silver is gold: Forecasting the potential creativity of initial ideas," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 154(C), pages 96-117.
    2. Jacob Goldenberg & Donald R. Lehmann & David Mazursky, 2001. "The Idea Itself and the Circumstances of Its Emergence as Predictors of New Product Success," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 47(1), pages 69-84, January.
    3. Thomas Åstebro & Samir Elhedhli, 2006. "The Effectiveness of Simple Decision Heuristics: Forecasting Commercial Success for Early-Stage Ventures," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(3), pages 395-409, March.
    4. Brown, Christina L & Carpenter, Gregory S, 2000. "Why Is the Trivial Important? A Reasons-Based Account for the Effects of Trivial Attributes on Choice," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 26(4), pages 372-385, March.
    5. Erin L. Scott & Pian Shu & Roman M. Lubynsky, 2020. "Entrepreneurial Uncertainty and Expert Evaluation: An Empirical Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(3), pages 1278-1299, March.
    6. Jehoshua Eliashberg & Sam K. Hui & Z. John Zhang, 2007. "From Story Line to Box Office: A New Approach for Green-Lighting Movie Scripts," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 53(6), pages 881-893, June.
    7. Mukherjee, Ashesh & Hoyer, Wayne D, 2001. "The Effect of Novel Attributes on Product Evaluation," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 28(3), pages 462-472, December.
    8. Laura J. Kornish & Karl T. Ulrich, 2011. "Opportunity Spaces in Innovation: Empirical Analysis of Large Samples of Ideas," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 57(1), pages 107-128, January.
    9. Lurie, Nicholas H, 2004. "Decision Making in Information-Rich Environments: The Role of Information Structure," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 30(4), pages 473-486, March.
    10. Alba, Joseph W, et al, 1994. "The Influence of Prior Beliefs, Frequency Cues, and Magnitude Cues on Consumers' Perceptions of Comparative Price Data," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 21(2), pages 219-235, September.
    11. Xinshu Zhao & John G. Lynch & Qimei Chen, 2010. "Reconsidering Baron and Kenny: Myths and Truths about Mediation Analysis," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 37(2), pages 197-206, August.
    12. Daniel A. Levinthal, 1997. "Adaptation on Rugged Landscapes," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 43(7), pages 934-950, July.
    13. Olivier Toubia & Oded Netzer, 2017. "Idea Generation, Creativity, and Prototypicality," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 36(1), pages 1-20, January.
    14. Karan Girotra & Christian Terwiesch & Karl T. Ulrich, 2010. "Idea Generation and the Quality of the Best Idea," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 56(4), pages 591-605, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. J. Jason Bell & Christian Pescher & Gerard J. Tellis & Johann Füller, 2024. "Can AI Help in Ideation? A Theory-Based Model for Idea Screening in Crowdsourcing Contests," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 43(1), pages 54-72, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Pedota, Mattia & Cicala, Francesco & Basti, Alessio, 2024. "A Wild Mind with a Disciplined Eye: Unleashing Human-GenAI Creativity Through Simulated Entity Elicitation," OSF Preprints 3bn95, Center for Open Science.
    2. Barry L. Bayus, 2013. "Crowdsourcing New Product Ideas over Time: An Analysis of the Dell IdeaStorm Community," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(1), pages 226-244, June.
    3. Niek Althuizen & Bo Chen, 2022. "Crowdsourcing Ideas Using Product Prototypes: The Joint Effect of Prototype Enhancement and the Product Design Goal on Idea Novelty," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(4), pages 3008-3025, April.
    4. Laura J. Kornish & Jeremy Hutchison‐Krupat, 2017. "Research on Idea Generation and Selection: Implications for Management of Technology," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 26(4), pages 633-651, April.
    5. Svenja C. Sommer & Elliot Bendoly & Stylianos Kavadias, 2020. "How Do You Search for the Best Alternative? Experimental Evidence on Search Strategies to Solve Complex Problems," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(3), pages 1395-1420, March.
    6. Sanjiv Erat & Vish Krishnan, 2012. "Managing Delegated Search Over Design Spaces," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(3), pages 606-623, March.
    7. Laura J. Kornish & Karl T. Ulrich, 2011. "Opportunity Spaces in Innovation: Empirical Analysis of Large Samples of Ideas," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 57(1), pages 107-128, January.
    8. Nayga, Rodolfo M., Jr. & Shaw, W. Douglass & Silva, Andres, 2006. "The Effect of Risk Presentation on Product Valuation: An Experimental Analysis," 2006 Annual meeting, July 23-26, Long Beach, CA 21429, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    9. Xiaoke Yang & Yuanhao Huang & Xiaoying Cai & Yijing Song & Hui Jiang & Qian Chen & Qiuhua Chen, 2021. "Using Imagination to Overcome Fear: How Mental Simulation Nudges Consumers’ Purchase Intentions for Upcycled Food," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(3), pages 1-21, January.
    10. Hossain, Mokter, 2018. "Motivations, challenges, and opportunities of successful solvers on an innovation intermediary platform," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 67-73.
    11. Ranjith Appuhami & Faruk Bhuiyan & Christina Boedker, 2024. "Navigating frugality and creativity urgencies: the role of diagnostic use of budgets and goal clarity," Journal of Management Control: Zeitschrift für Planung und Unternehmenssteuerung, Springer, vol. 35(2), pages 235-264, June.
    12. Luo, Yong (Eddie) & Wong, Veronica & Chou, Ting-Jui, 2016. "The role of product newness in activating consumer regulatory goals," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 600-611.
    13. Quignon, Aurelien, 2023. "Crowd-based feedback and early-stage entrepreneurial performance: Evidence from a digital platform," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(7).
    14. Mohsen Jafari Songhori & Madjid Tavana & Takao Terano, 2020. "Product development team formation: effects of organizational- and product-related factors," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 26(1), pages 88-122, March.
    15. Andries, Petra & Clarysse, Bart & Costa, Sergio, 2021. "Technology ventures' engagement of external actors in the search for viable market applications: On the relevance of Technology Broadcasting and Systematic Validation," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 36(6).
    16. Bleda, Mercedes & Querbes, Adrien & Healey, Mark, 2021. "The influence of motivational factors on ongoing product design decisions," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 129(C), pages 562-569.
    17. Dean C. H. Wilkie & Lester W. Johnson & Wynne W. Chin, 2018. "Does the type of attribute matter? Examining whether underlying factors explain product attribute preference," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 25(4), pages 305-321, July.
    18. J. Jason Bell & Christian Pescher & Gerard J. Tellis & Johann Füller, 2024. "Can AI Help in Ideation? A Theory-Based Model for Idea Screening in Crowdsourcing Contests," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 43(1), pages 54-72, January.
    19. Jillian Berk & Linda Rosenberg & Lindsay Cattell & Johanna Lacoe & Lindsay Fox & Myley Dang & Elizabeth Brown, "undated". "The External Review of Job Corps: An Evidence Scan Report," Mathematica Policy Research Reports c862f115989a4b94a151e38d9, Mathematica Policy Research.
    20. Vogel, Julia & Paul, Michael, 2015. "One firm, one product, two prices: Channel-based price differentiation and customer retention," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 27(C), pages 126-139.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:ormksc:v:40:y:2021:i:6:p:1106-1122. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.