An Empirical Investigation of Two Group Idea Generation Techniques: Manual vs. Electronic Gallery Writing

Gallery writing is a widely used variant of brain writing and the technique is available in electronic and manual forms. This study posits a model based on the input-process-output framework to empirically test the relative efficacy of electronic and manual gallery writing. An experiment using a student sample was conducted and data were collected to test the proposed model. Path analysis shows that while either technique can be used successfully, groups using the electronic version generated more text. Also, free riders were dissatisfied with the meeting process. Some implications of this study are that when a large number of ideas are desired in group meetings, electronic gallery writing might be the preferred technique, while manual gallery writing might be better when meeting participants want to keep the discussion focused on succinct ideas.