Intercultural Relationships and Creativity:Current Research and Future Directions

In the global economy, individuals have to engage in cross-cultural interactions when tasked to develop creative new products or services. Research on the effects of cultural diversity on creativity, however, has been equivocal. One stream of research champions that cultural diversity in relationshi...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Wiruchnipawan, Fon, CHUA, Roy Y. J.
Format: text
Language:English
Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2018
Subjects:
Online Access:https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/lkcsb_research/4210
https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/lkcsb_research/article/5209/viewcontent/Intercultural_Relationships_Creativity_2018_afv.pdf
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Institution: Singapore Management University
Language: English
Description
Summary:In the global economy, individuals have to engage in cross-cultural interactions when tasked to develop creative new products or services. Research on the effects of cultural diversity on creativity, however, has been equivocal. One stream of research champions that cultural diversity in relationships broadens ideas and resources for creative thinking, whereas skeptics counter that intercultural tensions and conflicts hurt rather than help. This chapter discusses both sides of the argument. We examine the effects of intercultural relationships on creativity from three perspectives: (a) how a culturally diverse social environment (including social networks) influences individuals’ creativity; (b) how individuals can successfully engage in intercultural dyadic creative collaboration; and (c) how intercultural relationships influence creativity of multicultural teams. In addition, we investigate the underlying mechanisms and boundary conditions of how intercultural relationships impact creative performance. We conclude by integrating ideas from existing research and proposing new research directions.