Could One Head Be Better Than Two? A Qualitative Examination of Paired Ideation

Group Support Systems (GSS) have been used to support facilitated ideation sessions for years. Participants in GSS ideation sessions typically work individually at their workstations, but a previous study found that pairing participants could yield higher quality ideas and participant satisfaction. That study did not, however, explain how paired participants could generate higher quality results or why they reported perceptions different from previous studies. This study examined the experiences of paired ideation session participants and found that having a partner heightened participants’ sense of engagement in the ideation process, leading to higher quality ideas and increased satisfaction, while simultaneously providing a new communications channel that reduced production blocking.