The Effect Of Regulatory Focus On Creative Idea Selection

Various creativity theories have suggested the implementation of creative ideas include both generating many novel ideas and subsequently evaluating and selecting of ideas.Previous studies only focused on how to maximize the generation of creative ideas in the generation stage of creative ideas,few studies have been conducted to investigate creative idea selection.This is unfortunate,as history is replete with cases in which people's attitudes to creative ideas and products are like Lord Ye's love of dragons.While always emphasizing innovation,it excludes ideas and objects that are different.So how to recognize and choose the most creative ideas still needs further exploration.A widely used definition of creativity states that creativity(of ideas or products)requires both novelty and usefulness.Based on this goal orientation,individuals could make ideas and products more creative by adjusting their thoughts and responses.Therefore,different focus regulation(promotion focus and prevention focus)have different effects on creative ideas,and promotion focus could produce more novel ideas than prevention focus.In addition,the perception and evaluation of novelty and serviceability by different regulation focus individuals are different.Compared with the novelty of creative ideas,individuals who promote focus overestimate the novelty of ideas,while the prevention focus is just the opposite.Based on this,this study discussed the influence of adjusting focus on the choice of creative ideas from two creative ideas: image and text.These include the following three experiments:Study 1 used The Regulatory Focus Questionnaire to gauge respondents' chronic regulatory focus,compared effects of promotion versus prevention focus on creative idea selection.Creative answers pool and creative pictures pool were used as the task of creative idea selection,and the novelty and usefulness of the answer chosen as dependent variables.The results showed that the novelty of the idea of promotion focus was significantly higher than the prevention focus,and the usefulness was significantly lower than that of prevention focus.Experiment 2 served to examine whether priming a subject's regulatory focus influences the creative idea selection.Thus,we used a 2(instruction: be creative versus be best)× 2(regulatory focus: promotion versus prevention)between-subject design,and the novelty and usefulness of the answer chosen as dependent variable.The results show that instruction can affect the choice of creative ideas in different regulatory focus.Under the condition of “be creative” instruction,there was no difference between prevention focus and promotion focus in the novelty of idea selection.However,under the “be best” instruction condition,the novelty of promotion focus individual selection idea is significantly higher than the prevention focus.Experiment 3 served to examine whether regulatory fit influences the creative idea selection.We used a 2(strategy: ensure correct versus avoid failure)× 2(regulatory focus: promotion versus prevention)between-subject design,and the novelty and usefulness of the answer chosen as dependent variable.The results showed that different regulatory fit have different effects on creative ideas selection.The fit between promotion focus and ensure correct strategy was associated with higher novelty idea selection than non-fit.The fit between prevention focus and avoid failure strategy was associated with higher novelty idea selection than non-fit.Based on the above-mentioned findings,the present study suggests that:(1)regulatory focus could influence the creative idea selection.The promotion focus was significantly higher than the prevention focus in novelty,and the usefulness was significantly lower than that of prevention focus;(2)Instruction can affect the choice of creative ideas in different regulatory focus.“Be creative” instructions contribute to the promotion and prevention individuals to select a highly novel and highly useful material,but in “be best” instruction,different regulatory focus would choose according to their own needs and goals.(3)The fit between regulatory focus and strategy was associated with higher novelty idea selection than non-fit.