You’ve Been Framed! The Effect of Opportunity and Prosocial Framing on the Novelty and Usefulness of Student Solutions

Abstract

Creativity, the production of ideas that are both novel and useful, is increasingly important to businesses’ long-term success. This study looks at whether instructors can use framing—increasing the saliency of some aspects of a perceived reality in a communication—to affect the creativity of student solutions. More specifically, building on research on issues interpretation, the study examines the effect of opportunity framing on the novelty of student ideas. Building on the literature on perspective taking, the study also looks at the effect of prosocial framing on the usefulness of student ideas. Using a sample of 76 students, I found that students who received an assignment description that included opportunity framing produced more novel solutions. Students who received the same assignment but with prosocial framing created less useful solutions. These findings indicate that the novelty and usefulness (i.e., the creativity) of student solutions can be affected by framing and suggest that framing can be a valuable tool for instructors aiming to encourage creativity. Furthermore, by demonstrating that different types of framing affect novelty and usefulness, this study also reinforces the importance of measuring novelty and usefulness independently rather than looking at creativity as a composite measure.

Keywords

creativity framing management education business model canvas

Introduction

Organizations need creative individuals to cope with the increasing rate of innovation required to remain competitive. Thus, there is strong interest from academia and industry in understanding how creativity—the production of ideas that are both novel and useful (Amabile, 1996)—can be enhanced. However, common classroom conditions tend to inhibit creativity (Adobe, 2012; Schlee & Harich, 2014; Wallach & Kogan, 1965). For example, students are not rewarded for being creative on standardized tests (Sternberg, 2012), a prevalent phenomenon in education. This prevents students from learning how to be creative in dealing with the uncertainty and ambiguity typical of many, if not most, industries. Thus, fostering creativity in educational settings presents an important area for research (Runco, 2004). In particular, there have been several calls to find ways to enhance the ability of business students to think creatively (Driver, 2001; Kerr & Lloyd, 2008; Runco, 2004; Schmidt-Wilk, 2011; Ungaretti et al., 2009; Weick, 2003) as well as calls to implement new pedagogical models that support the development of creative potential at all levels of education (e.g., Adler, 2006; Baker & Baker, 2012; Halpern, 2010). Nonetheless, it is not well understood how creativity can be enhanced (Nickerson, 2010) and, as a result, specific pedagogical tools to increase creativity are lacking.

The objective of this article is to examine if specific types of framing can help increase the creativity of student solutions—that is, their novelty and usefulness. Framing is the practice of emphasizing certain elements of a message and deemphasizing others to influence the interpretation of the message. Research has shown that the way a message is framed can shape various behavioral outcomes. For instance, subjects presented with a choice of gambles varied in their preferences depending on whether particular choices were framed as losses or gains (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979). In other studies, subjects’ decisions about whether or not to apply for a job depended on framing language in the job posting (Bohnet, 2016), and decisions about whether or not to pay a surcharge on an airline ticket depended on whether the charge was framed as an offset or a tax (Hardity, Johnson, & Weber, 2010). These findings give rise to the question whether specific types of framing could influence students’ behavior, motivating them to produce more novel and useful ideas.

The literature on issues interpretation in managerial decision making shows that framing is an element in business decisions. When managers face a new situation they interpret as an opportunity, this opportunity framing leads to a sense of mastery, which supports more open information searching, knowledge sharing, flexibility, and, consequentially, increased creativity and a greater willingness to adopt new business models and foster organizational change (Chattopadhyay, Glick, & Huber, 2001; Dutton, Fahey, & Narayanan, 1983; Dutton & Jackson, 1987; George, Chattopadhyay, Sitkin, & Barden, 2006; Gilbert, 2005; Naidoo, 2016; Thomas, Clark, & Gioia, 1993; Thomas & McDaniel, 1990; Tripsas & Gavetti, 2000; van Burg, Berends, & van Raaij, 2014). The literature on perspective taking suggests that taking the perspectives of another person helps people to consider new and different viewpoints, which leads them to select more useful solutions (Galinsky, Maddux, Gilin, & White, 2008; Grant & Berry, 2011). For example, product innovators develop more useful product designs when they understand the perspectives of their customers (Dougherty, 1990, 1992). Prosocial framing, presenting an issue in a way that suggests that the solution to the issue will benefit others, can help students adopt the perspectives of others by increasing their prosocial motivation, the desire to help others (Grant, 2008).

Taken together, these two literatures suggest mechanisms by which framing may influence student creativity. If opportunity framing leads to cognitive changes in managers that motivate them to go beyond usual routines and promote the adoption of novel solutions such as new business models, instructors might motivate students to create solutions that are more novel by presenting them with issues labeled as opportunities. If prosocial framing leads to prosocial motivation, enabling people to adopt other perspectives, instructors might motivate students to create solutions that are more useful by presenting them with prosocially labeled issues. I thus posit that (1) opportunity framing increases the novelty of solutions and (2) prosocial framing increases the usefulness of solutions. I tested these hypotheses in a quasi-experimental design using a sample of 76 students.

This study’s theoretical perspective and empirical findings offer important theoretical, methodological, and practical contributions to knowledge about the concept of creativity and enhancing creativity in management education. First, building on framing theory, I demonstrate that instructors can affect the novelty and usefulness of student solutions by framing assignments in certain ways. By doing so, this research responds to calls to enhance the ability of business students to think creatively (Driver, 2001; Kerr & Lloyd, 2008; Runco, 2004; Schmidt-Wilk, 2011; Ungaretti et al., 2009; Weick, 2003). To my knowledge, this is the first attempt to measure the direct effects of opportunity framing on novelty and prosocial framing on usefulness. Second, this research confirms that it is critical for researchers to measure novelty and usefulness separately to isolate the effects of the antecedents of creativity on its two dimensions. Most researchers acknowledge that creative ideas have to be both novel and useful, but they do not measure these two dimensions of creativity separately (Ford & Gioia, 2000). This research demonstrates that different types of framing affect novelty and usefulness, reinforcing the importance of measuring them independently. Third, this article provides a set of tools for instructors who might be interested in using framing as an educational method to improve creativity, responding to calls to implement new pedagogical models that support the development of creative potential at all levels of education (e.g., Adler, 2006; Baker & Baker, 2012; Halpern, 2010).

Literature

The Importance of Developing People’s Creative Potential

Individual creativity is an important antecedent to innovation by organizations (Amabile, 1988; Oldham & Cummings, 1996). Indeed, executives across private and public sectors widely share the belief that creativity is an important leadership competency in today’s increasingly complex world (IBM Institute for Business Value, 2010). Some view creativity to be as important a focus of education as literacy (Robinson, 2006). It has even been claimed that the MFA (master of fine arts) is the new MBA (Bell, 2008; Rae-Dupree, 2008). When creative ideas generated by individuals and selected by organizations are retained by the field (Campbell, 1960; Csikszentmihalyi, 2014; Nakamura & Csikszentmihalyi, 2001), they affect organizational performance variables such as growth, competitiveness, and survival (Amabile, 1996; George, 2007; Nonaka, 1991; Oldham & Cummings, 1996). Individual creativity can also increase organizational effectiveness by leading to small or large improvements in internal process, for example, in teamwork or communication (George, 2007; Shalley, Zhou, & Oldham, 2004). Hence, creative individuals are likely to be valued by organizations for their expected impact on the organization’s performance.

Those individuals are also likely to perform better in other ways. Technological advances are occurring more rapidly than before, leading to an accelerating rate of change; thus, individuals must be able to cope with change in their personal and professional lives (Runco, 2004). Increasingly, students must be prepared to reinvent themselves, as career paths are much more volatile than they used to be and the jobs they trained for might even disappear. Creativity skills enable individuals to adapt to environmental change.

The State of Creativity in Management Education

Educational institutions are recognizing this need. A report by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, “Business Schools on an Innovation Mission,” calls for business schools to sharpen students’ creative problem-solving skills to enable innovation (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business International, 2010). Some schools have started to infuse creativity into the business curriculum (Ungaretti et al., 2009). For example, the D-school at Stanford University, the approach taken by Singularity University, and the University of Virginia’s Coursera offering “Design Thinking for Business Innovation” all seek to help students develop creative thinking skills.

But these attempts are still exceptions rather than the norm. Typically, students learn how to answer questions and solve problems, but opportunities to produce original ideas remain rare (Schmidt-Wilk, 2011). Indeed, the idea of improving creative thinking in students remains more of a “desirable vision than an empirical outcome,” not just in business schools but also in higher education more generally (Halpern, 2010, p. 381). This concern applies across the educational system; respondents in Adobe’s State of Create Study (Adobe, 2012)¹ expressed a universal concern that the Western educational system is stifling creativity (see also Schlee & Harich, 2014). Innovative approaches are clearly needed to supplement the traditional analytical and decision-making skills emphasized in business school (Adler, 2006).

Researchers have begun to look for tools and approaches to teach creative thinking. Weick (2003) tried to encourage creative thinking in a strategic management course by using nonbusiness metaphors for strategy, drawing from realms like athletics, military strategy, philosophy, science, and art. Much of the literature on creativity in business education has focused on bringing art forms into the classroom (for an overview of the literature, see, e.g., Maranville, 2011). Researchers have tried to integrate arts into management curricula by using film to demonstrate concepts such as leadership and power (Comer, 2001; Harrington & Griffin, 1990) or influence and motivation (Huczynski, 1994). Some have adopted music metaphors for team-based learning, such as melody, harmony, dynamics, and rhythm (Fairfield & London, 2003), or used the metaphor of dance to teach students about leadership (Peterson & Williams, 2004). Others have asked students to create organizational graffiti using words, drawings, or symbols to express organizational climate (Taylor, 1999), interpret artistic and literary works with respect to leadership topics (Harrison & Akinc, 2000), capture strategic vision using paint (Maranville, 2011), create musical instruments using available resources (Lengnick-Hall & Lengnick-Hall, 1999), or draw pictures to illustrate the effect of positive and negative group environments on creativity (Zimmerman & Gallagher, 2006). Studies that attempt to enhance creativity in management students using the elements of the business domain seem to be rare, which is problematic because the ability to think creatively requires domain-relevant expertise (Amabile, 1996; Beghetto, 2010; Csikszentmihalyi, 2014; Sternberg, 2006).

A Path Forward for Creativity in Management Education

People who are creative have a certain attitude toward life that allows them to routinely approach problems in a novel way (Maslow, 1967; Schank & Childers, 1988). According to Sternberg (2012), that habit is reinforced by (1) opportunities to engage in it, (2) encouragement to take advantage of these opportunities, and (3) rewards for thinking and behaving creatively. All three elements may be provided—or discouraged—by the classroom environment. Thus, instructors should be able to increase the creativity of student outcomes by taking pedagogical approaches that provide students with opportunities to develop creative skills and encourage and reward them for taking advantage of those opportunities, for example, by explicitly considering creativity in grading.

Although some researchers caution against the use of extrinsic incentives (Amabile & Cheek, 1988; Amabile, Hennessey, & Grossman, 1986; Condry, 1977), there is considerable support in the literature for the positive effects of explicit creativity requirements in grading criteria at all levels of education (Amabile, 1979; Eisenberger, Armeli, & Pretz, 1998; Eisenberger & Cameron, 1996, 1998; Eisenberger & Shanock, 2003; O’Hara & Sternberg, 2001; Shalley et al., 2004). Shalley’s (1991) research showed that having creativity goals had a positive effect on creative performance. O’Hara and Sternberg (2001) looked at the question of whether explicit instructions to be creative, as an extrinsic motivator, had a positive goal effect or a negative constraint effect on creative performance. They found support for goal-setting theory in that students who were given specific instructions to be creative, practical, or analytical all scored higher than students who were given no special instructions. Amabile (1979) found that undergraduate subjects who were explicitly told their artistic work would be evaluated for creativity and received specific instructions on how to make artworks that would be judged creative, produced more creative work. Overall, it seems that evaluation that includes explicitly defined creativity requirements leads to greater creativity. This finding is supported by learned industriousness theory (Eisenberger, 1992), which states that individuals will direct more effort to those dimensions of performance that are more rewarded (Eisenberger et al., 1998; Eisenberger, Mitchell, McDermitt, & Masterson, 1984).

Despite the limited progress in enhancing creativity in management students, many researchers do believe that creativity can be enhanced (Amabile, 1983; Cropley, 1992; Finke, Ward, & Smith, 1992; Perkins, 1990; Stein, 1974; Sternberg & Lubart, 1996). This study also adopts the perspective that creativity is not an inert trait but rather a function of the environment and of individual characteristics that can be developed (Amabile, 1996; Baker & Baker, 2012; Runco, 2004) by manipulating the context in which individuals work. In the classroom, we can manipulate context by providing students with opportunities to be creative and rewarding them for creativity by adopting it as a component of grading. In addition, we might be able to use framing to stimulate students to create ideas that are more novel and useful and to enhance their overall creativity skills.

Framing

Entman (1993) defined “to frame” as “to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text” (p. 52). For example, organizations can try to influence the response of stakeholders to organizational actions by framing those actions in a way that emphasizes preferred meanings and obscures others (Benford & Snow, 2000; Rhee & Fiss, 2014). Framing helps simplify and condense “the world out there” (Snow & Benford, 1992), establishes a context for questions and actions, and influences what gets done (Pfeffer, 1992).

Framing effects are of interest in this study because they shape behavioral outcomes and frames can be externally imposed (Gilbert, 2006; Kahneman & Tversky, 1979; Porac & Thomas, 1990; Staw, Sandelands, & Dutton, 1981; Tripsas & Gavetti, 2000). For example, Tversky and Kahneman (1981) found that people systematically violated the consistency principle of expected utility theory because a different framing of the same problem changed the relative desirability of options they were provided with. They found that “individuals who face a decision problem and have a definite preference might have a different preference in a different framing of the same problem” (Tversky & Kahneman, 1981, p. 457). More specifically, two people who have the same wealth will not be equally happy, depending on whether they frame their wealth as a loss or as a gain from a defined reference point (e.g., their previous wealth).

Similarly, building on prospect theory, Thaler (1985, 1999) focused on how the mental accounting processes of organizing, evaluating, and keeping track of financial activities influence choice. He posited that mental accounting is topical—influenced by a reference level determined by the context within which the decision arises. For example, he found that most people would travel 30 minutes to save $5 on a $15 item—but not to save the same amount on a $125 item. The absolute value of the savings is identical ($5), but these savings are being compared to different reference levels ($15 vs. $125), and that changes the perceived utility of the savings. Thaler’s research also illustrated that segregated gains are perceived as more enjoyable and integrated losses are perceived as less painful. For example, multiple Christmas gifts wrapped separately are perceived as more valuable than the same gifts wrapped together as one. Conversely, one loss of $1,050 has less impact than two separate losses of $1,000 and $50. The difference in preference for segregation versus integration depends on whether the contextual reference point frames these issues as losses or gains.

Framing is omnipresent in our lives; it is used by politicians, the news media (see, e.g., de Vreese, Boomgaarden, & Semetko, 2011), and our friends and family. The role of framing in influencing behavior has been examined in many different contexts, including, but not limited to, executive decision making (e.g., Papadakis, Kaloghirou, & Iatrelli, 1999), advertising (Hardity et al., 2010), organ donation (van Andel, Tybur, & Van Lange, 2016), and communications (Bohnet, 2016; Tenbrunsel, Wade-Benzoni, Messick, & Bazerman, 2000). Entrepreneurs have been shown to use framing to manage the perceptions of various stakeholders to gain legitimacy (Hargadon & Douglas, 2001; Rao, 1998).² Basadur and colleagues (e.g., Basadur, Ellspermann, & Evans, 1994; Basadur, Potworowski, Pollice, & Fedorowicz, 2000) demonstrated that framing questions by using specific words helped people be more proficient in formulating ill-structured problems. Their “why-what’s stopping” analysis combines analytical precision with structured imagination to help participants defer judgment and actively engage in divergent and convergent thinking, leading to a better definition of the problem to be solved (i.e., a reframed problem formulation). These studies all suggest that framing, or the way in which a situation is presented, influences people’s decisions. Framing therefore might have the potential to encourage more creative thinking and enhance creativity.

The Dimensions of Creativity

Creativity is generally seen in the creation of an original and useful product (Mayer, 2010; Plucker, Beghetto, & Dow, 2004). It has been defined as “the production of novel and useful ideas” (Amabile, 1988, p. 126) or novelty that is also useful (Stein, 1974). A more creative person has a greater ability to produce work that is novel (i.e., original, unexpected), high in quality, and appropriate (i.e., useful, meeting task constraints) (Sternberg, Kaufman, & Pretz, 2002). Creativity is practical, unique, and outcome oriented (Amabile, Conti, Coon, Lazenby, & Herron, 1996; Oldham & Cummings, 1996). Novelty for the sake of novelty is not creativity (George, 2007), and neither is problem solving that generates solutions that are not novel (Runco, 2004). Rather, for a solution to be creative, it must have both attributes; it must be simultaneously (1) novel and (2) useful.

Although novelty and usefulness are independent, unrelated dimensions of ideas that can be examined separately, studies on creativity tend to focus primarily on novelty and originality over usefulness (Grant & Berry, 2011) or treat creativity as a composite (Litchfield, 2008). Neither of these approaches is relevant to management education. Novelty does not matter much to industry if the idea is impractical to implement or unlikely to add value. Nor is it particularly useful to treat creativity as a composite, since the dimensions of novelty and usefulness have been shown to be affected by markedly different processes that are “essentially independent of each other” (Ford & Gioia, 2000, p. 723). Thus, work that focuses on novelty or that treats creativity as a composite will not necessarily extrapolate to the dimension of usefulness. For example, Csikszentmihalyi and Getzels (1971) found that the originality (a proxy for novelty) and technical quality (a proxy for usefulness) of student paintings were related differently (in terms of strength and significance) to exploratory behaviors for problem finding and problem solving.

Opportunity Framing and Novelty

Before managers can take action, they first need to interpret the unfamiliar situations or “issues” they are facing (Thomas et al., 1993). Managers use cognitive frames (Kaplan, 2008) to interpret these issues as deviations from a reference point (the status quo) and assess the degree to which they represent threats or opportunities. For example, the issue of technological change might be interpreted as a threat (when it could cannibalize a core revenue stream) or as an opportunity (when it might add revenues or improve competitive position). Threats and opportunities are constructs that have been found to be salient in executive decision making because they are both urgent and difficult to address (Jackson & Dutton, 1988). It is well established that labeling, or framing, an issue in terms of the threat of losses or, alternatively, as an opportunity for gains affects decision makers’ cognition and motivation in addressing the issue (Chattopadhyay et al., 2001; Dutton et al., 1983; Dutton & Jackson, 1987; George et al., 2006; Gilbert, 2005; Thomas et al., 1993; Thomas & McDaniel, 1990).³

Opportunity framing is of specific interest for this study’s focus on creativity because prior research in the executive decision-making literature suggests a link between opportunity framing and the embrace of novel solutions. In an application of issues interpretation principles to the newspaper industry as it faced disruptive business model innovations, Gilbert and Bower (2002) found that opportunity framing provided the control, gains, and positive situation needed for companies to free themselves from a rigid response to disruptive shocks. Dewald and Bowen (2010) found empirical support for the increased likelihood that a new business model would be adopted when it was perceived as an opportunity. Kennedy and Fiss (2009) found that among hospitals adopting Total Quality Management (TQM), those reporting a concern for achieving economic and social gains (i.e., opportunity framing) took more actions to implement TQM than those reporting a concern for avoiding economic and social losses (i.e., threat framing). van Burg et al. (2014) found that framing future innovation developments as opportunities motivated organizational actors to engage in organizational knowledge transfer activities, leading to heightened knowledge sharing and joint knowledge development. Naidoo (2016) looked at how leader message framing (i.e., whether leaders framed an issue as an opportunity or as a threat) affected the creativity of their followers and found that followers’ ideas showed greater overall creativity when their leader framed an organizational crisis as an opportunity rather than as a threat.

Opportunity framing leads a decision maker to interpret a strategic issue as a positive situation in which gain is likely and over which he or she has a fair amount of control (Dutton & Jackson, 1987, p. 80). This sense of mastery makes risky behavior more likely (George et al., 2006). Opportunity framing also has been shown to result in open information searching (Dutton, 1992; Nutt, 1984), more offensive-type actions (Barr, 1998), and a questioning attitude (Papadakis et al., 1999). Thus, it allows organizations to escape the usual routines stored in organizational memory (Levitt & March, 1988) and relax rigidities (Chattopadhyay et al., 2001; George et al., 2006; Gilbert, 2005; Papadakis et al., 1999; Staw et al., 1981), encouraging flexibility and willingness to adapt (Dutton, 1992; Thomas et al., 1993) and promoting organizational change (Thomas et al., 1993).

In sum, opportunity framing has been shown to produce a sense of mastery, leading to open information searching, knowledge sharing, flexibility, and willingness to adapt, which results in organizational action, greater creativity, the adoption of new business models, and overall organizational change. If opportunity framing leads managers to engage in cognitive changes that motivate them to go beyond usual routines and promote the adoption of novel solutions such as new business models, it follows that students presented with an issue that is labeled as an opportunity might be motivated to produce more novel ideas.

Therefore, I hypothesize the following:

Hypothesis 1: Opportunity framing positively affects the novelty of solutions.

Prosocial Framing and Usefulness

Adopting the perspective of others can provide access to new and different viewpoints (Galinsky et al., 2008), enabling more informed judgments about usefulness (Grant & Berry, 2011). For example, when academic researchers take the perspective of industry practitioners, their research is judged more useful by practitioners (Mohrman, Gibson, & Mohrman, 2001). Product development teams that adopt the perspectives of coworkers by connecting the technical possibilities of a product with its market possibilities develop better (more useful) product designs (Dougherty, 1990, 1992; Sethi & Nicholson, 2001). Product innovators who understand their customers also develop more useful products (Dougherty, 1990). If adopting alternate perspectives can help academic researchers and product innovators develop research and products that are judged to be more useful, it follows that students might develop ideas that would be more useful to others by considering diverse perspectives.

One way to increase students’ concern for others, enabling them to take others’ perspectives, is by increasing their prosocial motivation (the motivation to benefit others). Grant and Berry (2011) hypothesized that prosocial motivation moderates the relationship between intrinsic motivation and creativity through a higher emphasis on usefulness. Intrinsic motivation has been shown to be an important driver of creativity (Amabile, 1983; Csikszentmihalyi, 1990; Elsbach & Hargadon, 2006; Getzels & Csikszentmihalyi, 1976; Sternberg & Lubart, 1991). Intrinsically motivated individuals expend effort based on interest, curiosity, and a desire to learn (Ryan & Deci, 2000). A higher level of intrinsic motivation leads to a higher level of excitement about an activity, higher interest in engaging in that activity, greater focus on the nature of the task, and persistence to work on a problem longer (Oldham & Cummings, 1996). Consequently, Grant and Berry (2011) suggested that (1) people who are intrinsically motivated will create more novel solutions and (2) if those people are also prosocially motivated, and thus able to adopt other perspectives (De Dreu, Weingart, & Kwon, 2000; Mohrman et al., 2001), they will then select those novel solutions that are also the most useful. Hence, prosocial motivation strengthens the relationship between intrinsic motivation and overall creativity, a hypothesis Grant and Berry (2011) confirmed, although they did not look at the direct effect of prosocial motivation on usefulness. Prosocial motivation can be encouraged through prosocial framing, presenting an issue in a way that suggests that the solution to the issue will benefit others.

Therefore, I hypothesize the following:

Hypothesis 2: Prosocial framing positively affects the usefulness of solutions.

My hypotheses are visualized in Figure 1.

Figure 1.

Manipulating novelty and usefulness through opportunity and prosocial framing.

Methods

Sample, Design, and Procedures

To test these hypotheses and to control as much as possible for alternative explanations, I conducted a quasi-experimental study in which participants generated ideas for improvements to the business model of a family pizzeria. It was not possible to assign students in a random fashion, and therefore, demographic, personality, and environmental variables were controlled for. Data were collected in fall 2015, spring 2016, and fall 2016 from 104 undergraduate business majors enrolled in a capstone management course at a public college in New York City, New York. The study received initial institutional review board approval in September 2015.

In the study, students were given a Business Model Canvas (see Figure A1 in Appendix A) representing a traditional family pizzeria and asked to play the role of a consultant hired to come up with ideas to change the business model. The Business Model Canvas (Osterwalder & Pigneur, 2010) is a template that depicts an entire business model in one visual chart; it can be used to document existing business models or develop new ones. Its nine building blocks are arranged into four categories: (1) the firm’s infrastructure, which consists of its key activities, key resources, and partner network; (2) the firm’s offering, which captures the value propositions that allow the firm to distinguish itself from its competitors; (3) the firm’s customers, including customer segments, the channels through which the firm distributes its value proposition to targeted customers, and customer relationships; and (4) the firm’s finances, which include its cost structure and revenue streams.

I chose an assignment around business models because I wanted to focus on enhancing creativity in the business domain and because it is increasingly recognized that the business model is at the base of business innovation (Chesbrough, 2010; Christensen & Raynor, 2003; Girotra & Netessine, 2014; Johnson, Christensen, & Kagermann, 2008; Osterwalder & Pigneur, 2010). The pursuit of modified and new business models is seen by executives as an important leadership skill (IBM Institute for Business Value, 2010). Moreover, business models require students to recognize and address holistic, complex management issues. In addition, the nine elements of the Business Model Canvas and the ability to delete, add, or modify items within these elements offer plentiful possibilities for students to suggest changes. The importance of the business model as a construct that can change the competitive landscape and the many ideas the Business Model Canvas can accommodate make this assignment an appropriate tool to determine the effect of framing on novelty and usefulness.

The capstone course in which the students received the assignment was a natural habitat for the experiment because the Business Model Canvas requires the combination of insights in many areas of business. The assignment represented 5% of students’ grade for the course; all aspects of the assignment were completed outside of class time. To control for exposure to the Business Model Canvas, all students viewed the same video lecture and six short videos by Strategyzer and The Kauffman Foundation (2013) about the Business Model Canvas; they did not receive any additional instruction on the Business Model Canvas. To motivate the students to watch the videos, they were required to explain in one sentence what they learned after watching each video; failure to complete this part of the assignment resulted in a 1% penalty on their class grade (20% of the project grade). All students submitted this part of the assignment.

Assignment and Task Framing Manipulations

In the assignment, students were told that they were consultants hired by a local family pizzeria to revamp its business model. The actual assignment can be found in Appendix A. They were provided with the pizzeria’s current Business Model Canvas and a narrative explaining the canvas. They were also provided with no framing, an opportunity framing clause, or a prosocial framing clause. By presenting students with a business whose management is motivated to change its business model to respond to opportunities in the environment or to be more prosocial, the assignment attempted to create a situation in which the decision maker (i.e., the student) is more likely to interpret the strategic issue either as an opportunity for financial gain or as a prosocially motivated call for change. Which interpretation is adopted, I hypothesize, will affect students’ cognition and motivation and, consequently, the novelty and usefulness of their ideas.

Opportunity Framing Manipulation

Dutton and Jackson (1987) posit that opportunities imply a “positive situation in which gain is likely and over which one has a fair amount of control” (p. 80). In empirical research, Jackson and Dutton (1988) found that opportunities have a number of characteristics: positivity, high potential for gain without loss, successful resolution likely, high feelings of control because resources needed for resolution are available, high feelings of being qualified, and a sense of autonomy to act and freedom to decide whether to act. The opportunity framing text sought to address all these characteristics:

Bellyfull has seen increasing demand for the pizzeria’s products and its manager feels the pizzeria has great opportunity for growth and increased profitability. To modernize in general and to respond to this opportunity, Bellyfull wants to significantly change the way it does business through the implementation of a new business model. The pizzeria is committed to providing any resources required to implement the new business model.

You are hired as a consultant to revamp the business model and have been given great autonomy and freedom. In addition to business model changes that can address the opportunity to grow . . .

This text directly addresses Jackson and Dutton’s (1988) characteristics of opportunities. It includes the assertions that a change in the business model is needed to accommodate high demand for the pizzeria’s products and that the consultant has great autonomy and freedom and the necessary resources to implement the new business model.

Prosocial Framing Manipulation

Prosocial motivation is motivation to benefit others. Prosocial framing, then, suggests that the solution of the issue will benefit others. The prosocial framing text addressed the task from this perspective:

Bellyfull’s manager has heard about Tom’s Shoes and was inspired by the story. As a consequence, she wants to be able to donate a pizza to a family in need for every pizza sold. To modernize in general and to address its new social mission, Bellyfull wants to significantly change the way it does business through the implementation of a new business model.

You are hired as a consultant to revamp the business model. In addition to business model changes that can address the social aspect . . .

This prompt includes a description of the family’s wish to help others by providing free food, more specifically to donate a pizza to a family in need for every pizza sold and offers the business model of Tom’s Shoes, with which many students are familiar, as an example. This framing clearly engages students’ desire to help others.

Expectation of Creativity

An explicit expectation of creativity in responding to the assignment was expressed in the assignment description and the grading rubric (see Appendix A). The grading rubric included in the assignment explicitly stated that the assignment would be graded on the components of novelty and usefulness. The assignment itself read,

Bellyfull is especially interested in business model changes that are both novel (and could set the pizzeria apart from the competition) and useful (practical and likely to lead to profits). You are allowed to propose any change to the business model including deleting or modifying existing components or adding new components to the Business Model Canvas elements. To evaluate your new Business Model Canvas, Bellyfull’s manager will look at the novelty and usefulness of the changes you propose (see grading rubric).

Measures

Novelty and Usefulness

Researchers have measured creativity in various ways. Fluency, flexibility, and uniqueness are often used as measures of creativity (Beuk & Basadur, 2016; Guilford, 1950). Fluency is measured as the number of ideas per respondent; flexibility is measured as the total number of distinct categories of thinking these ideas represent; and originality is defined as a low frequency of occurrence of ideas when compared with all ideas given (see, e.g., Beuk & Basadur, 2016). Other researchers measure creativity on an anchored scale, from “very uncreative” to “very creative” (Grant & Berry, 2011; Naidoo, 2016).

We measured novelty and usefulness, the two dimensions of creativity, separately using a self-developed measure (see Appendix B) based on modifications to the canvas proposed by the first sample of 35 students in the fall 2015 semester. To develop the measure, the author first examined all the canvasses collected during the first semester and made a list of all the changes proposed by the students in the class. She then developed a comprehensive rubric that included all these ideas and organized them in multiple categories. The rubric also allowed for the addition of new ideas proposed by students in later semesters that had not been included in the base rubric. These ideas were valued by placing them in one of the rubrics’ major categories and awarding them the category’s corresponding points. Overall, students across all semesters had similar ideas, and relatively few new ideas needed to be categorized. The same rubric was used for grading.

Ideas that had a lower frequency of occurrence were assigned a higher number of novelty points than ideas that were very common. For example, almost all students increased the radius of operation for the pizzeria and added items to the menu, so those ideas received only 1 novelty point. Ideas that were less common, such as developing an app or offering cooking classes, received more novelty points. Examples of ideas rated as highly novel were the use of drones for pizza delivery and the development of pizzas shaped and decorated in kid-friendly ways (e.g., a pizza that looks like a Christmas tree). Hence, the novelty points attempted to capture the extent to which a student’s modifications to the canvas were unusual within the context of the classroom sample (Ford & Gioia, 2000). All novelty points were added together to arrive at a novelty score for a given assignment, taking into account both the number of ideas and their unusualness.

A similar approach was taken to measure usefulness. Ideas that were likely to increase profitability, which is typically desired by a business like the pizzeria (Ford & Gioia, 2000), received higher usefulness points than ideas that would not affect the bottom line as much. Students received usefulness points depending on whether their ideas were likely to increase the volume sold (e.g., by increasing the radius), add new revenue streams within the product sales model (e.g., by providing catering), add value without adding substantial costs (e.g., social media marketing), add new revenue streams through new channels (e.g., food truck), save costs (e.g., automation), or embrace entirely new revenue models (e.g., franchising). Students could also receive penalty points for usefulness if ideas were difficult to implement, reflecting the reality that an idea that cannot be implemented is not useful. Examples of ideas rated as highly useful were those that could increase revenues through new channels (e.g., sales of frozen pizzas at Trader Joe’s), new revenue models (e.g., pizza-making classes), or cost savings (e.g., automation decreasing the need for personnel). Hence, the usefulness points attempted to capture the extent to which a student’s modifications to the canvas were useful in the context of a small business (Ford & Gioia, 2000). As with novelty points, usefulness points were added together to produce a usefulness score that took into account both the number of ideas and their potential impact on the business’s financial performance.

Although this study attempts to measure novelty and usefulness as separate constructs, some business model modifications were both novel and useful. For example, the addition of catering to the pizza business earned both novelty and usefulness points. This was done very deliberately because not all pizzerias offer catering (hence, there is some novelty) but catering is likely to increase the volume of pizzas sold and thus could affect profitability (hence, it is useful).

Developing this extensive rubric in a way that represented the class sample reduced the level of subjectivity involved in rating solutions. Novelty and usefulness were scored independently by two raters using the extensive rubric. For all the canvasses, the first rater was the author of this article, and the second rater was a senior undergraduate honors student who was also the author’s research assistant. The second rater was not aware of the framing conditions of the canvasses she received or the hypotheses of the study. Data were collected from a second rater to allow for tests of interrater agreement, which can help support the reliability of the measures for novelty and usefulness. Canvasses for which ratings differed dramatically were discussed and, where appropriate, scores were adjusted. Adjustments, if necessary, were straightforward as they usually concerned an inadvertent omission of an idea by one of the raters. The number of canvasses for which large differences existed represented a small portion of the total number of canvasses. The high inter-rater reliability—ICC(2, 2) = .97 for novelty and ICC(2, 2) = .93 for usefulness—should help ameliorate concerns of rater bias. A novelty and usefulness measure were created for each participant’s Business Model Canvas by averaging the scores given by the two raters.

Control Variables

Intrinsic motivation (e.g., Amabile, 1988; Elsbach & Hargadon, 2006; Oldham & Cummings, 1996), creative personality (Gough, 1979; Oldham & Cummings, 1996; Zhou & Oldham, 2001), and organizational encouragement (Amabile et al., 1996; Zhou & George, 2001) have been found to be important antecedents to creativity, so they were included as control variables. Data regarding these variables were collected via an online survey that also asked about demographic and academic variables. Students were offered 1% in extra credit for completing the survey; 17 students, of the 104 participants, did not fill out the survey data, resulting in a sample with complete data for 87 students.

Demographic and academic variables

From a demographic standpoint, the study controlled for age, ethnicity, and gender. Students varied between 20 and 32 years of age, with 86% of the students 24 years of age or younger. The sample was ethnically diverse with a White/Caucasian majority (58%) and minorities representing Hispanic American (9%), Black/African American (8%), Asian/Pacific Islander (13%), and multiple or other ethnicities (12%). Nobody identified as American Indian/Alaskan Native. Regarding gender, 57% of respondents were female. The study controlled for academic performance by using students’ self-reported average GPA as well as the grade for the capstone course expressed on the standard 4-point scale.

Creative personality

It is assumed that creative personality is positively associated with creativity outcomes and that creative personality influences how people respond to contextual factors (Shalley et al., 2004). Creative personality was measured using the Creative Personality Scale (Gough, 1979). The instrument asks participants to review a list of 30 adjectives, including words such as honest, intelligent, cautious, conservative, sincere, and snobbish, and mark those they think describe them; 18 of the entries on the list are indicative of creative individuals, and 12 are contraindicative. A value of +1 was assigned to adjectives that describe creative people (e.g., confident) and a −1 to those that describe less creative people (e.g., interests narrow) (Gough, 1979). The results were then summed to arrive at a Creative Personality Scale index (Cronbach’s α = .81), which falls between −12 and +18 and indicates the respondent’s position along a latent creativity dimension.

Intrinsic motivation

Intrinsic motivational orientation was measured using the Work Preference Inventory (Amabile, Hill, Hennessey, & Tighe, 1994). Sample items include “I want my school work to provide me with opportunities for increasing my knowledge and skills,” “Curiosity is the driving force behind much of what I do,” and “What matters most to me is enjoying what I do.” After factor analysis, 11 items of the original scale of 15 items were retained. Coefficient alpha was .94 and AVE (average variance extracted) was .63.

Organizational encouragement

Amabile et al. (1996) found that workers’ perceptions about the work environment significantly affected the level of creativity in projects. To capture this element, a measure of “organizational encouragement” was adapted from Amabile et al. (1996) to be applicable to the classroom. Sample items included “New ideas are encouraged in this classroom,” “Students in this classroom can express unusual ideas without the fear of being called stupid,” and “Students are rewarded for creative work in this class.” After factor analysis, 10 items of the original 12 were retained. Coefficient alpha was .93 and AVE was .67.

Results

Overview

Prior to hypothesis testing, analyses of variance were run to establish equivalence between the experimental conditions. No statistical mean differences (p < .5) were found between students in the three framing conditions with regard to age, ethnicity, average GPA, class grade, creative personality, intrinsic motivation, and/or organizational encouragement. There was a significant difference among the three groups for gender, with more women in the opportunity framing group. The group that received the prosocial framing prompt also had a higher number of Blacks/African Americans and a lower number of Whites/Caucasians. To account for the differences in gender and ethnicity, I tested hypotheses controlling for gender (dummy variable) and ethnicity (dummy variables), among other control variables. There were no significant mean differences in novelty and usefulness scores between the 87 students who filled out the survey and the 17 who did not (and thus could not be included in this study), establishing equivalence between respondents and nonrespondents.

Novelty, usefulness, intrinsic motivation, and organizational encouragement were found to have significant skewness and/or kurtosis. Therefore, transformations were performed to bring skewness and/or kurtosis within acceptable range. Transformation of these variables did not significantly alter the results. Because the age variable was highly skewed, a dummy variable for age was created to distinguish between more traditional college students (aged 24 years and younger) and nontraditional college students (older than 24 years). Dummy variables were also created for ethnicity and gender so that they could be included as dummy covariates. Univariate outliers were detected by means of standard deviations (z scores with absolute values higher than 3.29); nine cases with univariate outliers were detected and not included in further analyses. Multivariate outliers were determined with Mahalanobis Distance (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2007); two cases that were multivariate outliers were encountered and deleted. This brought the total sample for analysis to 76 respondents. Of these 76 respondents, 22 received the prosocially framed assignment, 27 received the opportunity framed assignment, and 27 received the assignment with no framing. The correlations, means, standard deviations, and alphas for the study variables are displayed in Table 1.

Table 1.

Descriptive Statistics and Correlations.^a

Variable	Mean	SD	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12
1. Age^b	0.14	0.35
2. White/Caucasian^c	0.58	0.50	−0.03
3. Hispanic American^d	0.09	0.29	0.13	−0.37^**
4. Black or African American^e	0.08	0.27	0.02	−0.34^**	−0.09
5. Asian/Pacific Islander^f	0.13	0.34	−0.05	−0.46^**	−0.12	−0.11
6. Male^g	0.43	0.50	−0.21	0.16	−0.10	−0.16	−0.11
7. Class grade GPA	2.93	0.85	0.11	0.09	−0.06	−0.25^*	0.14	0.04
8. Average GPA	3.43	0.87	0.10	0.12	−0.11	−0.26^*	0.12	0.11	0.35^**
9. Creative personality	3.03	3.46	0.24^*	0.01	0.26^*	0.04	−0.38^**	0.21	0.09	−0.06	(0.81)
10. Intrinsic motivation	0.60	0.16	0.10	0.14	0.06	0.15	−0.43^**	0.06	−0.07	0.08	0.30^**	(0.94)
11. Organizational encouragement	2.38	0.27	−0.06	0.08	0.00	0.03	−0.14	−0.07	0.02	−0.12	0.15	0.27^*	(0.93)
12. Prosocial framing	0.29	0.46	−0.15	0.34^**	−0.20	−0.24^*	−0.01	0.09	0.07	0.12	−0.05	0.04	−0.19
13. Opportunity framing	0.36	0.48	0.07	−0.08	0.05	0.12	−0.12	−0.40^**	0.05	−0.20	−0.01	−0.14	0.24^*	−0.47^**

Note. SD = standard deviation; GPA = grade point average.

Internal consistency reliabilities (coefficient alpha) are on the diagonal in parentheses, when appropriate. n = 76. ^b“Age ≤ 24” = 0, “Age > 24” = 1. ^c“Non-White/Caucasian” = 0, “White/Caucasian” = 1. ^d“Non-Hispanic American” = 0, “Hispanic American” = 1. ^e“Non-Black/African American” = 0, “Black/African American” = 1. ^f“Non-Asian/Pacific Islander” = 0, “Asian/Pacific Islander” = 1. ^g“Female” = 0, “Male” = 1.

Correlation is significant at the .05 level (two-tailed). **Correlation is significant at the .01 level (two-tailed).

Hypothesis Testing

Given the focus of the analysis on mean differences in continuous dependent variables within the different framing groups and the inclusion of continuous and dichotomous control variables, analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was determined to be the appropriate statistical technique. However, since the two dependent variables, novelty and usefulness, were correlated and also make sense as a single construct (namely, creativity), I also ran a multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA) analysis.

The coefficients for both the independent and the control variables from the ANCOVAs (n = 76) are presented in Table 2. The first ANCOVA (adjusted R² = .320) focuses on the effect of opportunity framing on the novelty of student solutions. My hypothesis that opportunity framing positively affects the novelty of student solutions was strongly supported (b = 0.584, F_{1, 63} = 7.179, p = .009, observed power = .751). The control variables of age (b = 0.718, F_{1, 63} = 7.293, p = .009), class grade (b = 0.389, F_{1, 63} = 11.753, p = .001), intrinsic motivation (b = 1.394, F_{1, 63} = 4.216, p = .044), and organizational encouragement (b = 0.880, F_{1, 63} = 6.178, p = .016) were significantly and positively related to the novelty of student solutions, and average GPA (b = −0.226, F_{1, 63} = 3.949, p = .051) was marginally and negatively related to novelty, providing support for the idea that novel ideas do not per se contribute to a higher GPA.

Table 2.

Analysis of Covariance Results.

	Novelty				Usefulness
Variables	b	SE	t	p	b	SE	t	p
Intercept	0.338	0.958	0.353	.725	0.799	0.794	1.007	.318
Age	0.718**	0.266	2.701	.009	0.571*	0.225	2.535	.014
White/Caucasian	−0.315	0.277	−1.137	.260	−0.054	0.234	−0.230	.819
Hispanic American	−0.524	0.387	−1.356	.180	0.132	0.321	0.411	.682
Black or African American	−0.233	0.412	−0.565	.574	0.228	0.346	0.659	.512
Asian/Pacific Islander	−0.453	0.397	−1.142	.258	−0.347	0.319	−1.088	.281
Male	0.118	0.207	0.571	.570	0.358*	0.160	2.240	.029
Class grade GPA	0.389**	0.113	3.428	.001	0.150	0.093	1.602	.114
Average GPA	−0.226^†	0.114	−1.987	.051	0.086	0.094	0.920	.361
Creative Personality Scale	−.007	0.031	−0.224	.823	−0.033	0.026	−1.304	.197
Intrinsic motivation	1.394*	0.679	2.053	.044	0.946^†	0.549	1.725	.089
Organizational encouragement	0.880*	0.354	2.486	.016	0.278	0.295	0.944	.349
Prosocial framing					−0.530**	0.179	−2.958	.004
Opportunity framing	0.584**	0.218	2.679	.009
R ²	.429**			.000	.355**			.003
Adjusted R²	.320**				.232**

Note. SE = standard error; GPA = grade point average.

†

Correlation is significant at the .10 level (two-tailed). *Correlation is significant at the .05 level (two-tailed). **Correlation is significant at the .01 level (two-tailed).

The second ANCOVA (adjusted R² = .232) focuses on the effect of prosocial framing on the usefulness of student solutions. My hypothesis that prosocial framing positively affects the usefulness of student solutions was not supported (b = −0.530, F_{1, 63} = 8.747, p = .004, observed power = .830). Contrary to the hypothesis, prosocial framing significantly reduced the usefulness of students’ solutions in my sample. Age (b = 0.571, F_{1, 63} = 6.424, p = .014) and gender (b = 0.358, F_{1, 63} = 5.016, p = .029) were significantly and positively related to usefulness scores, and intrinsic motivational orientation was marginally and positively related to usefulness scores (b = 0.946, F_{1, 63} = 2.977, p = .089). Cell means of novelty and usefulness for both framing conditions can be found in Table 3.

Table 3.

Cell Means of Novelty and Usefulness Under Framing Conditions.

Variable	Novelty	Usefulness
No prosocial framing (n = 54)		2.84
Prosocial framing (n = 22)		2.37
No opportunity framing (n = 49)	3.53
Opportunity framing (n = 27)	3.92

Next, a MANCOVA was performed with novelty and usefulness as dependent variables and the same independent variables as used in the ANCOVAs. This analysis showed support for the significant relationship between prosocial framing and the dependent variables (λ [Wilks’ Lambda] = .890, F_{2, 61} = 3.769, p = .029) and marginal support for a significant relationship between opportunity framing and the dependent variables (λ [Wilks’ Lambda] = .909, F_2,61 = 3.057, p = .054). The parameters for the hypothesized effects were significant and similar to the parameters revealed by the ANCOVAs.

Post Hoc Analyses

The finding that opportunity framing increases novelty and prosocial framing decreases usefulness suggests that it is important to look at framing effects on usefulness and novelty separately. If the effect of prosocial or opportunity framing on creativity as a combined variable were to be considered, results might be different. Post hoc analyses using creativity as the dependent variable led to loss of significance of most of the observed effects.

To perform this analysis, a creativity variable was first created by summing students’ novelty and usefulness scores. For this composite variable, no significant effect was found for prosocial framing (b = −0.241, F_{1, 63} = .580, p = .449); opportunity framing remained positive and significant (b = 0.628, F_{1, 63} = 4.866, p = .031). The results were similar independent of whether the analysis used an untransformed sum variable with significant skewness or a transformed sum variable bringing skewness within acceptable range (the results for the transformed sum variable are reported here).

Next, a creativity variable was created by multiplying students’ usefulness and novelty scores (this operation penalizes solutions that were novel or useful but not both). In this analysis, significance for prosocial framing (b = −0.173, F_{1, 63} = 1.852, p = .179) and opportunity framing (b = 0.165, F_{1, 63} = 1.637, p = .206) were lost. The results were similar independent of whether the untransformed product variable with significant skewness and kurtosis was used or a transformed product variable bringing skewness and kurtosis within acceptable range (the results for the transformed product variable are reported here).

This analysis extends the findings of Ford and Gioia (2000), whose study on creativity in managerial decision making suggested that the dimensions of novelty and usefulness were affected by markedly different processes that are “essentially independent of each other” (p. 723). Post hoc analyses further suggest that lumping the effects on novelty and usefulness together by looking at overall creativity reduces the ability to truly understand the antecedents of creativity and might lead to the erroneous conclusion that certain conditions do not affect creativity when in fact they affect only one dimension.

Discussion

Overall, our results suggest that framing effects might provide an important tool for unlocking individual creativity. This study indicates that (1) novelty and usefulness are affected by framing and (2) it is critical to measure novelty and usefulness rather than creativity as a composite because novelty and usefulness are affected by different types of framing and the overall effect on creativity might not always be apparent from a composite analysis. This article also suggests a set of tools to enhance creativity in business students.

First, in response to calls to enhance the ability of business students to think in creative ways (Driver, 2001; Kerr & Lloyd, 2008; Schmidt-Wilk, 2011; Ungaretti et al., 2009; Weick, 2003), this study found that novelty and usefulness are in fact affected by framing and that different types of framing influence novelty and usefulness. More specifically, opportunity framing increased the novelty of student solutions, and prosocial framing decreased the usefulness of student solutions. Hence, it follows that choice of framing is critical. Instructors can experiment with different types of framing and compare framing conditions to optimize the effectiveness of framing to increase creativity.

In light of the findings of this research, for instance, it might be profitable to change the type and degree of prosocial framing to see if that would change the results. Maybe asking students to donate one pizza for every pizza sold was perceived as not attainable from a business perspective and therefore, in a way, as threatening. Changing this prosocial frame to represent a different model—perhaps one in which the pizzeria rounds up every purchase and donates the change (similar to Bank of America’s Keep the Change savings initiative) or one where the pizzeria commits a fixed percentage of profits to a cause—might change the framing’s effect on usefulness. In our case, it is also possible that the prosocially motivated students focused on the perspectives of those in need at the expense of the organization’s needs (Grant & Berry, 2011). It might be that prosocial motivation and perspective taking were too narrowly directed toward one beneficiary, leading to ideas that were less useful to other beneficiaries (Grant & Berry, 2011). Hence, future research looking at how framing could increase the usefulness of student solutions might benefit from including the perspectives of multiple others (e.g., the manager, employees, customers, neighbors, other stakeholders).

Second, by explicitly separating the measurements for novelty and usefulness of ideas, this research responds to calls in the literature to consider the dimensions of creativity separately (Ford & Gioia, 2000; Grant & Berry, 2011). This study confirms that novelty and usefulness are affected by markedly different processes that are “essentially independent of each other” (Ford & Gioia, 2000, p. 723). Moreover, when overall creativity scores were assigned to students, significance was lost for most framing effects (opportunity framing remained positive and significant when using the sum of students’ usefulness and novelty scores as a creativity variable). As this research develops, it will be beneficial to continue to break creativity up into its separate dimensions and examine the effects of framing on each component individually. In later stages, when positive framing effects on novelty and usefulness have been established, the goal could shift to optimizing overall creativity by selecting or combining framing types.

There are several calls in the literature to implement new pedagogical models that can support the development of creative potential at all levels of education (e.g., Adler, 2006; Baker & Baker, 2012; Halpern, 2010). This study offers important implications for teaching practice in this regard. Framing is a valuable and accessible teaching tool that teachers can experiment with to increase creative outcomes in students using context-specific assignments. For framing to be effective, the exercise should (1) enable students to produce original ideas, (2) explicitly communicate that students will be graded on novelty and usefulness, and (3) be framed in ways that are likely to increase novelty or usefulness. As individual instructors provide more opportunities for students to engage in exercises that motivate and reward creative student outcomes, students will be more likely to habitually engage in creative problem solving. In this way, individual instructors who do not teach at institutions with formalized creativity or innovation programs can help students develop creativity skills. Moreover, implementing these exercises can allow students to practice creativity skills while also using their domain-relevant expertise (Amabile, 1996; Beghetto, 2010; Sternberg, 2006).

Footnotes

Appendix A

Appendix B

Novelty and Usefulness Rating Rubric.

SEMESTER/SECTION:				RATER:
SCORES	PTS	NOVEL IDEAS	USEFUL IDEAS	PTS	SCORES
	1	Adds value, but merely brings business up to current practice	Increases volume	1
		Expanded menu (e.g., pasta, ice cream, appetizers, heroes . . .)—1 pt max	Expanded menu (e.g., pasta, ice cream, appetizers, heroes . . .)—1 pt max
		Expanded radius/customer segments—1 pt max	Expanded radius/customer segments—1 pt max
		Kids’ menu	Kids’ menu
		Happy hour/lunch specials/family days/deals . . .	Increased convenience e.g. online ordering—1 pt each
		Alcoholic beverages or BYOB	Marketing/advertising beyond snail mail
		Non-alcoholic beverages (e.g., juice, shake)	Word-of-mouth through social mission
		Loyalty/reward program	Fundraising or sponsoring—1 pt each
		TVs, parking, typical facility upgrades	Email-management
		Bellyfull website
		Customer surveys, write-a-review and win a free pizza, social media surveys . . .
		Marketing other than snail mail/social media	Adds new revenue streams within product sales model	2
		Ordering via website, text, online—1 pt each	Catering business (drop-off or serviced)
		Social media presence—1 pt each	Kitchenware or merchandising—2 pts each
			Parties
			Events (attending or self-organize)—2 pts each
		Adds value and is not implemented by most up-to-date pizzerias	Alcoholic beverages
		Catering business (drop-off or serviced)	Non-alcoholic beverages (e.g., juice, shake)
SCORES	PTS	NOVEL IDEAS	USEFUL IDEAS	PTS	SCORES
	3	Kitchenware or merchandising—3 pts each	Raising prices / increasing mark-up
		Party/private room	Pizza making kits/premade meals/frozen—2 pts each
		Presence at local/social events	Gift cards
		Focus on vegan or vegetarian or gluten-free (3 pts max)
		Self-grown, organic, local farmer or farmer’s market, farm-to-fork (3 pts max)
		Make-your-own pizza/customization i.e. toppings; sauce in restaurant or online	Cost-effective or cost-neutral ideas	3
		Organization of events (e.g., karaoke, trivia, sports games night . . .)	Advertising/messaging on delivery vehicles, pizza boxes . . .—3 pts each
		Arcade/games/kids/teenager room	Student employees
		Fundraising or sponsoring—3 pts each	(Optional) customer donations (%, keep-the-change, $)
		Optional customer donations for charity (%, keep-the-change, $)	Social media marketing (if cost aspect mentioned)
		Gift cards
		App
		E-mail management
		Relation with schools (e.g., lunch, events, locations)—3 pts max	Adds new revenue streams through new channels	4
		Relation with local or microbrewery/winery—3 pts max	Food cart/truck
		Relation with shelter, food bank, food collectors, other charity etc.—3 pts max	Amazon Prime, FreshDirect, retail, gas stations . . .—4 pts each
		Relation with Seamless, Yelp, credit card companies . . .—3 pts each	Drive through or vending machine—4 pts each
		Innovative food designs/creations
SCORES	PTS	NOVEL IDEAS	USEFUL IDEAS	PTS	SCORES
			Cost savings (PTS depend on degree of anticipated cost savings)	3-6
	6	Adds value and is very uncommon or new to pizzerias	Away with snail mail (digital only)
		Pre-made pizza kits (for supermarket, at home . . .)	No physical presence/restaurant
		Food cart/truck	Automation or assembly-style cooking—3-6 pts each
		Data analytics for marketing or product design purposes	Bulk ordering with other partners/franchising
		Cooking classes or experiential pizza making (involved)	Reduction of needed personnel (outsource delivery; iPads . . .)—3-6 pts each
		Non-product sales revenue streams such as subscription fees, franchising . . .	Cost-effective purchasing management
		Frozen pizza (for supermarket, at home . . .)	Tax deductions for donations
		Distribution: Amazon Prime, FreshDirect, retail, gas stations . . .—6 pts each
		Delivery: Uber—6 pts each
		In-store delivery: Vending machines, drive through—6 pts each
		iPads on tables for ordering	New revenue models (not product sales)	3-6
			Classes
			Franchising
		Very innovative idea; not seen before	% of partners (brokerage/commission) e.g., arcade, games, retail
SCORES	PTS	NOVEL IDEAS	USEFUL IDEAS	PTS	SCORES
	6-15	“Pretty” pizza designs targeting kids e.g. Spinach Christmas Tree/Dec	Subscription
		Need pizza purchases to get to next level in app game	Delivery fee
		Conveyor belt for meal delivery to restaurant tables	Corkage fee for BYOB
		Virtual reality experience
		Marijuana
		Non-human delivery: Drones; driverless cars . . .	Penalty points for difficulty to implement (per idea)	1-3


0		TOTAL NOVELTY	TOTAL USEFULNESS		0

Acknowledgements

I thank Associate Editor Dr. Jennifer S. A. Leigh and three anonymous reviewers for their very constructive and developmental feedback on an earlier version of this article.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Heidi M. J. Bertels

Notes

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