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“What’s the Point of the Task?” Exploring the Influence of Task Meaning on Creativity in Crowdsourcing

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  • Thomas Görzen

    (University of Paderborn)

Abstract

In pursuit of product innovation, companies increasingly use crowdsourcing for idea generation. Apart from financial motives, previous studies on the motivation of crowd workers identified intrinsic motivation, such as task meaningfulness, to play a key role. These studies, however, focused on routine tasks such as image labelling, using output quantity as the variable of interest. Since the primary goal for a creative task such as idea generation is not abundance but high quality, we investigate the influence of task meaning on workers’ effort and on output creativity. In a field experiment involving idea generation by an online crowdsourcing platform, we vary the task meaning in two different conditions, and evaluate the quality of the ideas generated. We find that higher task meaning has no positive influence on either the quantity or the creativity of the output, which carries practical implications for both commissioners and crowdsourcing platform designers.\\

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas Görzen, 2019. "“What’s the Point of the Task?” Exploring the Influence of Task Meaning on Creativity in Crowdsourcing," Working Papers Dissertations 54, Paderborn University, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:pdn:dispap:54
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    JEL classification:

    • L86 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Information and Internet Services; Computer Software
    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments
    • M55 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Personnel Economics - - - Labor Contracting Devices
    • O32 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D

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