The Trade-off between Novelty and Usefulness: Cultural Cognitive Differences and Creativity

Author(s)

Marina McCarthy, Nova Southeastern UniversityFollow
Chao C. Chen, Rutgers University - NewarkFollow
Robert McNamee, Temple UniversityFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Title

Academy of Management

ISSN

2151-6561

Publication Date

2013

Abstract/Excerpt

Creativity and Innovation have become critical organizational capabilities in today’s global environment and leveraging creative potential of employees across various cultural contexts has become increasingly important. Although recognized among researchers, cross-cultural differences in creativity are not yet well understood. We contribute to this line of research by constructing a theoretical model of cross-cultural creativity that focuses on cultural differences in cognition (i.e., holistic vs. analytic thinking) that affect the evaluation of creative ideas. Our cognitive perspective is built on a framework that explicitly highlights the interrelationship between an idea’s novelty and its usefulness and complements prevalent social or normative approaches to explain cross-cultural differences in creativity. We argue that cognitive differences influence the trade off relationship between novelty and usefulness and in combination with select organizational factors drive evaluation of ideas.

DOI

https://doi.org/10.5465/ambpp.2013.10727abstract

Volume

2013

Issue

1

NSUWorks Citation

McCarthy, Marina; Chen, Chao C.; and McNamee, Robert, "The Trade-off between Novelty and Usefulness: Cultural Cognitive Differences and Creativity" (2013). HCBE Faculty Articles. 1131.
https://nsuworks.nova.edu/hcbe_facarticles/1131