Browsing by Author "November, Eben David"

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    The effectiveness of the spatial playmaker method of creative problem-solving: a pilot evaluation study
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2018-03) November, Eben David; Malan, D. J.; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences. Dept. of Industrial Psychology.
    ENGLISH SUMMARY : Creativity is of paramount importance to organisations. It is the essential building block of not only the competitive advantage of organisations but of their continued survival. Organisations often opt to implement training programmes based on group-based creative problem-solving. However, for various reasons, such group-based methods may be ineffective and logistically difficult to implement. Hence, a method used by individuals may hold significant promise for organisations. Using an individual-driven problem-solving method, employees can act as multiple problem-solving engines working in parallel instead of as a single session-based problem-solving engine as is the case with group problem-solving. The purpose of this study was to develop and test the effectiveness of a creative problem-solving method called the Spatial Playmaker. After a review of the existing psychological literature on creativity, diverse streams of research were utilized to build rationales for each tool (both existing and newly created by the current investigator) that became part of the Spatial Playmaker method. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of Spatial Playmaker empirically, the significance of the effects of the use of the Spatial Playmaker on (1) Originality, (2) Acceptability, (3) Implementability, (4) Effectiveness, and (5) Completeness of solutions produced had to be determined. This pilot study utilized a Pretest Posttest Control Group research design. A total of 60 Small Medium Micro Enterprise (SMME) owners participated voluntarily, either as intervention group participants or comparison group participants. All participants resided in the Cape Winelands region of the Western Cape province of South Africa. Differences in pre- and post-test scores of the intervention group (ni=30), who participated in a half-day training intervention detailing how to use the Spatial Playmaker, were compared with differences in scores of the comparison group (nc=30). The five dependent variables in question (i.e. Originality, Acceptability, Implementability, Effectiveness, and Completeness) were measured by using the rating scales developed by Dean, Hender, Rodgers, and Santanen (2006). The results show that there was a significant group/time interaction effect on four of the five dependent variables, namely originality, acceptability, effectiveness, and completeness (p < .01 for all four variables). Furthermore, post hoc comparisons using the LSD test revealed that the intervention group significantly outperformed the comparison group on the post-test in terms of these four dependent variables. There was a group/time interaction effect on the fifth dependent variable implementability, but it failed to reach significance (p > .05). However, contrary to research expectations, post hoc comparisons using the LSD test revealed that the comparison group significantly outperformed intervention group on the post-test in terms of implementability. Taken together, these findings suggest that the Spatial Playmaker holds significant benefits as a creative problem-solving method for individuals. It is therefore concluded that the intervention (i.e. How to use the Spatial Playmaker method) had a positive impact on the originality, acceptability, effectiveness, and completeness of the solutions generated by the intervention group. This study contributes to a body of previous research supporting the training individuals in the use of creative problem-solving methods.