Building blocks of idea generation and implementation in teams: A meta-analysis of team design and team creativity and innovation

Although organizations increasingly rely on teams to innovate, little systematic knowledge exists about how to design teams to do so. Building on the model of collaborative creativity and innovation and synthesizing findings from published and unpublished studies, this meta-analysis examines the role of team design on team creativity and innovation. We used random-effects meta-analysis to cumulate the correlations between different features of team design and team creativity or team innovation from 134 field studies representing 11,353 teams and 35 studies representing 2,485 student teams. We found that team tenure is curvilinearly related, autonomy-supportive leadership, task interdependence, and goal interdependence are positively related, and demographic diversity and team size are unrelated to team creativity and innovation. Examining meta-analytic path models, we found that task interdependence and supportive leadership positively relate to team creativity and innovation via team collaboration and team potency. In accounting for the literature, we found a dearth of studies examining team processes, some types of diversity such as racial diversity, and the role of team member turnover. We conclude by providing directions for future research and practical guidance about increasing team creativity and innovation through team design.     

Meaning in Life in Emerging Adulthood: A Person‐Oriented Approach

The present study investigated naturally occurring profiles based on two dimensions of meaning in life: Presence of Meaning and Search for Meaning. Cluster analysis was used to examine meaning‐in‐life profiles, and subsequent analyses identified different patterns in psychosocial functioning for each profile. A sample of 8,492 American emerging adults (72.5% women) from 30 colleges and universities completed measures on meaning in life, and positive and negative psychosocial functioning. Results provided support for five meaningful yet distinguishable profiles. A strong generalizability of the cluster solution was found across age, and partial generalizability was found across gender and ethnicity. Furthermore, the five profiles showed specific patterns in relation to positive and negative psychosocial functioning. Specifically, respondents with profiles high on Presence of Meaning showed the most adaptive psychosocial functioning, whereas respondents with profiles where meaning was largely absent showed maladaptive psychosocial functioning. The present study provided additional evidence for prior research concerning the complex relationship between Presence of Meaning and Search for Meaning, and their relation with psychosocial functioning. Our results offer a partial clarification of the nature of the Search for Meaning process by distinguishing between adaptive and maladaptive searching for meaning in life.     

The Fragmentation of Work,Entertainment, E-Mail,and News on a Personal Computer: Motivational Predictors of Switching Between Media Content

Personal computers allow multitasking among a greater variety of content than has ever been possible on a single device. We logged all switches made for 4 days for 30 people on personal computers used in natural environments. The median time before a switch occurred was 11 sec, shorter than previously observed. We also measured individual differences in appetitive versus defensive motivations to switch. Those people high on both motivations (Coactives) had the most switches per session. Risk takers had the shortest content segment lengths; risk avoiders and inactives were lower on the number of switches and anticipated arousal. Different patterns of content selection, in addition to switching behavior, were also observed for the different motivation activation groups. Results highlight how threads of experience that mix radically different short media segments may better define how people now search, process, and evaluate information. Implications in light of technological trends and individual differences are discussed.     

Explaining Religious Effects on Distress Among African Americans

This study applies Smith's (2003a) theory of religious effects to account for the link between religiosity and distress. Using a latent-variable structural equation modeling approach, we analyze survey data from a nationally representative sample of African-American adults and find empirical support for our hypotheses. In terms of anger, depression, and anxiety, religiously committed African Americans exhibit lower levels of distress than their less religious or nonreligious counterparts. Highly religious African Americans report higher levels of sense of control and social support, which consequently reduces distress. We also find that the indirect and salutary effects of religiosity via social support are due to support from family and friends as well as from other religious people.     

Floridi’s Fourth Revolution and the Demise of Ethics

Luciano Floridi has proposed that we are on the cusp of a fourth revolution in human self-understanding. The information revolution with its prospect of digitally enhancing human beings opens the door to engineering human nature. Floridi has emphasized the importance of making this transition as ethically smooth as possible. He is quite right to worry about ethics after the fourth revolution. The coming revolution, if it unfolds as he envisions, spells the demise of traditional ethical theorizing.