Individual Innovation and Creativity: An Interdisciplinary Mapping of Creative Cognition

Abstract

This chapter presents an interdisciplinary scoping review examining overlaps and differences in the way innovation and creativity are conceived and studied in the respective fields of innovation management and human experimental psychology research. The review mapped selected studies against five pre-existing higher-order categories of creative behaviour antecedents: topos (physical/virtual space), demos (demographic characteristics), logos (pre-existing abilities and personality traits), pathos (emotions), and ethos (values and motives); it also identified an additional sixth dimension: praxis (actions, habits, and behaviours). We conclude the review by comparing the antecedents of creative performance in these two fields. Notably, we found that user innovation research characterizes and seeks out individual creativity as a self-initiated, deliberate, and independent endeavour in personal contexts. Experimental psychology research, by contrast, often studies creativity using activities that are initiated by the experimenters rather than the participants in laboratory contexts. Future interdisciplinary research could combine efforts to better understand the basic cognitive processes at play in creative cognition with an understanding of its individual-led motivational and environmental drivers in situ or in laboratory environments designed to boost creative potential. Such an effort would manifestly be of great value to managers and policymakers who are poised to understand what needs to be done to unlock employees and citizens creative potential and empower them to innovate.

Gaëlle Vallée-Tourangeau

Professor of Behavioural Science

My research explores creative cognition, sustainable decision-making, and behavioural change in creative, organisational and health contexts.