The impact of intergroup idea exposure on group creative problem-solving

Intragroup and intergroup network creativity were assessed in an experiment varying the degree of access to ideas generated by other groups. In an open-access condition, all members of two concurrent groups had access to the other group’s ideas. In the brokered condition, one member of each group had access to the other group’s ideas. In the control condition, two groups performed independently. Following three phases of idea generation and elaboration, groups developed their final plan for surviving a zombie apocalypse. The brokered condition led to the highest level of intergroup activity, and the final product novelty across all conditions was influenced by the novelty of the ideas and elaborations in the prior session. The effect of experimental condition on the integrative complexity of the final product was mediated by the degree of lexical similarity between the two groups’ documents. Final product novelty was negatively predicted by lexical similarity. Theoretical advances, implications, and future directions are discussed.