The Prototype Elicitation Effect Of Creative Problem Solving In Operation And Management Scenarios And Material Editing

Creative thinking embraces general forms of insight, analogical transfer, hypothesis testing, creative imagination etc (Mayer,1995). Prototype elicitation effect was carried out by Zhang et al. (2004) in their research on the cognitive mechanism of insight. Prototype elicitation effect has been broadly proved and is closer to the features of creative thinking and creative problem solving in reality. Upon this basis, the "learning-testing" paradigm and several experimental material databases have been developed for research on these topics, especially insight in problem solving.Existing experimental materials and paradigms are too immature to be used in laboratory simulation experiments of creative thinking in operation and management scenarios, and hereby behavioral, ERP and fMRI experiments are all limited as well. Therefore, the present study aimed to develop and validate tools and paradigms for researches on creative problem thinking in operation and management scenarios, upon the basis of prototype elicitation effect.The present study consisted of three sub-studies. In study 1, real operation and management cases were broadly gathered upon the criteria of being heuristic, being novel and being easily understandable. These cases were compiled into experimental materials according to the STAR rule and peer-reviewed and rated. Finally,44 scenarios were generated.In Study 2, there was a one factor design with two experimental levels.22 scenarios were randomly selected for use. Learning/no-learning condition was the only manipulation, and RT and accuracy were set as DVs. Prototypes were firstly shown and then the scenarios for participants to solve in the learning condition, where as only scenarios were shown in the no-learning condition. Oral reports were recorded and rated 1/0 as right/wrong. The materials used were counterbalanced across conditions. Results showed that RT and accuracy were both significantly different between the conditions. Therefore the newly developed materials and paradigms were guaranteed for its effectiveness of measuring prototype elicitation effect in creative problem solving.In study 3, all 44 materials were adopted with the same experimental paradigm and design in study 2. Prototype elicitation amount and difficulty were the two indexes calculated from accuracy. Four prototypes were deleted for their elicitation amounts were not higher than zero. Therefore the final Experimental Material Database for Creative Thinking in Operation and Management Scenarios contains 40 items with 2 indexes for each of them. After validation, RT and accuracy for each material are significantly different across learning/no-learning conditions. Results also showed that prototype elicitation amount was positively correlated with difficulty. All the above results implied that the materials and the paradigms are all valid, especially in creative thinking researches.The present study can be concluded that:1) Participants’RT and accuracy were significantly different between learning/no-learning conditions for all and each of the materials. It indicated that the prototype elicitation effect existed in the creative problem solving process in operation and management scenarios, which could be measured with the newly developed materials and paradigms2) The Experimental Material Database for Creative Thinking in Operation and Management Scenarios that includes two objective indexes was successfully set up and proved as an effective tool for researches on creative problem solving in operation and management scenarios.