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9/15/2004 12:09:00 AM

Bad, rather than positive, moods may spur creativity under certain conditions

While seemingly counterintuitive, researchers have found that employees with positive moods may sometimes be less creative at the workplace than those in negative moods.

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A critical challenge for many managers today is fostering creativity among employees. While some studies have shown that it requires the right culture, leadership and, not surprisingly, a positive mood, a recent study by Rice University management faculty suggests that under some conditions, negative moods may be a more likely stimulus.

In an article for the Journal of Applied Psychology , Jennifer George of the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management and colleague Jing Zhou offer the first study to identify and measure conditions under which positive moods may not encourage creativity, and negative moods may, in fact, enhance it. (Zhou, who is currently an associate professor of management at the Jones School, was at Texas A&M University when this research was conducted).

Entitled “Understanding When Bad Moods Foster Creativity and Good Ones Don't: The Role of Context and Clarity of Feelings,” their report focuses on the relationship between employees' moods and the conditions or context in which they perform their tasks, the role of recognition and rewards, and the extent to which employees know and understand their feelings.

Utilizing questionnaires and rating forms, the researchers collected data from 67 helicopter company employees and their supervisors who were in charge of developing creative designs and manufacturing techniques.   From the supervisors' ratings, they measured the employees' creativity over a given period of time, and from the employees' responses – their mood, their clarity of feelings and perceptions of the organization's recognition and rewards for creativity.

Their results show that depending on a number of factors, negative moods can enhance workplace creativity. “When given an overall objective such as creative performance, and when clear about how they feel,” George says, “employees may rely on their current mood to judge their progress on a creative task.   Good moods signal that good progress has been made and current efforts are sufficient.

“If they're in a positive mood, are clear about their feelings and have an overall objective to be creative, but decide for themselves how much effort to exert, positive moods may lead to overconfidence,” she adds.

Under those circumstances, George explains, employees in a positive mood will think more positively about their performance and believe that additional effort on their part is not necessary.

“By contrast,” she adds, “negative moods can signal that things are not going very well, that the status quo is problematic, and that more effort needs to be exerted.”

The study also examines the role of mood in creativity when the conditions are slightly different – such as in the case of a company whose employees don't perceive rewards for creativity, but their feelings are very clear and positive. “Those employees may still be creative because they enjoy and, therefore, are positive about their task,” George says.

These new findings suggest a number of factors managers may consider. “Left to their own devices,” George concludes, “ people in positive moods, who are clear about how they feel, and who have an overall objective to be creative, may need feedback about how well they actually are performing in terms of creativity.”

Of course, neither researcher is suggesting that managers should purposely dampen employees' moods. “We simply wanted to identify conditions under which naturally occurring negative mood might be a kind of energizing force,” George says.

In addition to articles that have appeared in numerous scholarly journals, including her award winning paper on the role of emotional intelligence, George has co-authored two widely-used textbooks, Contemporary Management and Understanding and Managing Organizational Behavior , which distill research findings for business school students.

George received her undergraduate degree from Wesleyan University and her M.B.A. and doctoral degrees from New York University. She joined the Jones School faculty in 1999 and is currently a professor of psychology and the Mary Gibbs Jones Professor of Management.

To learn more about this research, e-mail George at jgeorge@rice.edu , or Debra Thomas in the Jones School at dthomas@rice.edu .

Research @Rice, 2004