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Jörg Munkes

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Jörg Munkes, Dr.

Short Vita

Born 1972 in Sigmaringen (Germany)

Study of Psychology:

1992 - 1995

University of Mainz (Germany)

1995 - 1996

Humboldt-University at Berlin (Germany)

1996 - 1999

University of Tübingen (Germany)

1999

Graduation in Psychology at the University of Tübingen (Germany). Thesis: "Veränderungen von Erwartungen und Einstellungen während der stationären Therapie alkoholabhängiger Patienten" (Changes in expectancies and attitudes during in-patient treatment of alcohol dependent patients).

Oct 1999 - Dec 2001

PhD student of the VGK (without scholarship).

Jan 2002

Publication of the dissertation.

Contact

Phone: +49-(0)7071-29-78336
FAX: +49-07071-29-5899
email: joerg.munkes@uni-tuebingen.de
WWW: My homepage

Universität Tübingen
Psychologisches Institut
Friedrichstraße 21
72072 Tübingen
Germany

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Ph.D. Project

Topic: Social comparison processes in computer-mediated idea generation.

Supervisors: Prof. Dr. M. Diehl (Tübingen)

Start of the Ph.D. project: October, 1999

Summary

One of the most popular techniques to enhance creativity is the so-called brainstorming (Osborn, 1957). The brainstorming technique can be used by groups as well as by individuals to generate creative ideas. However, a common result is that the number of ideas produced by face-to-face (ftf) groups is lower than the number of ideas generated by an equal number of non-interacting individuals. Since number of ideas and quality of ideas are highly correlated, ftf groups also produce less good ideas and are therefore less creative. Diehl and Stroebe (1987) identified production blocking as the main cause for this productivity loss. Production blocking refers to the fact, that in an interacting group only one member can speak at the same time.
Connecting computers via local area networks or internet made it possible to eliminate production blocking in interacting groups since members of a computer-mediated brainstorming group can enter parallel (e.g. Gallupe, Bastianutti & Cooper, 1991, Valacich, Dennis & Nunamaker, 1992). However, the expected superiority of computer-mediated brainstorming could either not be shown (Gallupe, Bastianutti and Cooper, 1991; Valacich, Dennis and Conolly, 1994) or only for very large groups (Gallupe, Dennis, Cooper, Valacich, Bastianutti & Nunamaker, 1992; Dennis & Valacich, 1993, Valacich, Dennis & Connolly, 1994, Experiment 3).
Besides production blocking, social comparison processes are assumed to cause production matching and thus a productivity loss in ftf brainstorming groups (Paulus & Dzindolet, 1993). According to this view, social comparison processes might explain why computer-mediated brainstorming groups fail to outperform groups of non-interacting individuals. However, the Performance Comparison Model (PCM; Munkes & Diehl, 2000) that is based on Festingerís (1954) social comparison theory and extends assumptions on social comparison of performance by Rijsman (1974, 1983) does not predict a productivity loss for brainstorming tasks due to social comparison. If group members compared their performance with the performance of other group members to evaluate their abilities, individuals should not only match the performance of the other group members but should rather try to outperform the other group members. Therefore, information about the performance of other group members should lead to motivational gains and as a result to a higher productivity. This assumption was tested in a first experiment. In this experiment, participants were made to believe that they received the information when another participant entered an idea. This information was manipulated to be superior, equal or inferior to the performance of the participant. A second experiment investigated the additional effects of production blocking and exchange of ideas between group members on productivity. The results of the two experiments showed that information about the number of ideas of other group members increased the individual productivity. Production blocking reduced the productivity and exchanging ideas had a negative effect on the flexibility of ideas.

References

Dennis, A. R. & Valacich, J. S. (1993). Computer brainstorms: More heads are better than one. Journal of Applied Psychology, 78(4), 531-537.
Diehl, M. & Stroebe, W. (1987). Productivity loss in brainstorming groups: Toward the solution of a riddle. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 53: 497-509.
Festinger, L. (1954). A theory of social comparison processes. Human Relations, 7: p. 117-140.
Gallupe, R.B., L.M. Bastianutti, & W.H. Cooper (1991). Unblocking brainstorms. Journal of Applied Psychology, 76(1): p. 137-142.
Gallupe, R. B., Dennis, A. R., Cooper, W. H., Valacich, J. S., & et al. (1992). Electronic brainstorming and group size. Academy of Management Journal, 35(2), 350-369.
Munkes, J. & Diehl, M. (2000). The Performance Comparison Model (PCM). Unpublished manuscript.
Osborn, AF. (1957). Applied imagination (rev. ed.). New York: Scribner.
Paulus, P.B. & Dzindolet M.T.(1993). Social influence processes in group brainstorming. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 64(4): p. 575-586.
Valacich, J. S., Dennis, A. R., & Nunamaker, J. F. (1992). Group size and anonymity effects on computer-mediated idea generation. Small Group Research, 23(1), 49-73.
Valacich, J. S., Dennis, A. R., & Connolly, T. (1994). Idea generation in computer-based groups: A new ending to an old story. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 57(3), 448-467.

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