SOCIAL-INFLUENCE PROCESSES IN COMPUTER BRAINSTORMING

Groups of 4 brainstormed on computers for 20 min. In some groups infor mation about the number of ideas generated was exchanged every 5 min. Some groups verbalized their ideas as they were typed, and others only typed their ideas. Exchange of information about number of ideas incr eased group performance, but verbalization decreased performance. Both information exchange and verbalization increased the favorability of performance perception. These results are consistent with the Paulus a nd Dzindolet (1993) social influence model of group brainstorming.