An investigation into the effectiveness of collaborative brainstorming at the pre writing stage in intermediate english classes at a university in hanoi

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
****************

TRẦN THỊ ÁNH TUYẾT

AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE EFFECTIVENESS OF
COLLABORATIVE BRAINSTORMING AT THE PRE-WRITING STAGE IN
INTERMEDIATE ENGLISH CLASSES AT A UNIVERSITY IN HANOI

(Khảo sát hiệu quả của việc thảo luận ý tưởng theo nhóm trước khi viết
trong lớp học tiếng Anh trình độ Trung cấp tại một trường đại học ở Hà
Nội)

M.A. COMBINED PROGRAM THESIS

Field: English Language Teaching Methodology
Code: 60140111

Hanoi - 2015


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
****************

TRẦN THỊ ÁNH TUYẾT

AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE EFFECTIVENESS OF

COLLABORATIVE BRAINSTORMING AT THE PRE-WRITING STAGE IN
INTERMEDIATE ENGLISH CLASSES AT A UNIVERSITY IN HANOI

(Khảo sát hiệu quả của việc thảo luận ý tưởng theo nhóm trước khi viết
trong lớp học tiếng Anh trình độ Trung cấp tại một trường đại học ở Hà
Nội)

M.A. COMBINED PROGRAM THESIS

Field: English Language Teaching Methodology
Code: 60140111
Supervisor: Dr. Hoàng Thị Hạnh

Hanoi - 2015


DECLARATION
I, Trần Thị Anh Tuyết , K21 being a candidate for the degree of Master of Arts hereby
certify that this minor thesis entitled AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE
EFFECTIVENESS OF COLLABORATIVE BRAINSTORMING AT THE PREWRITING STAGE IN INTERMEDIATE ENGLISH CLASSES AT A
UNIVERSITY IN HANOI is completely the result of my own work for the Degree of
Master at University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National
University, Hanoi and that this thesis has not been submitted for any degree at any other
university or institution.
nd

Hanoi, April 2 , 2015

TRẦN THỊ ÁNH TUYẾT

i


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To complete this thesis, I owe profound indebtedness to many people for
their enthusiastic help during the conduct of my research.
I would like to give my sincere thanks to my supervisor, Dr. Hoang Thi
Hanh, for her invaluable support, helpful guidance and considerable encouragement,
which plays a highly significant part in the completion of this paper.

Besides, I would like to send my heartfelt thanks to a critical colleague of
mine as well as twenty students in my class, who enthusiastically participated in the
data collection process. In fact, without their help, I could not complete this thesis.
Also, I owe a great debt of gratitude to my parents and my friends, who have
constantly encouraged me during the time when I conducted my research paper.

Last but not least, I would like to thank my readers for their interests and
comments on this study.

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ABSTRACT
Brainstorming has been a popular technique organized individually or collaboratively
for idea generation in many fields. While a number of studies have been reported on
the productivity of group idea generation, the effectiveness of collaborative
brainstorming for generating ideas as pre-writing techniques have not received deep
concern. This thesis reports on a qualitative action study that emerged from reflective
teaching practice in an intermediate English class. The research investigated the
effectiveness of collaborative brainstorming training on students’ idea performance in

writing papers and on students’ learning of writing skills through in-depth interviews,
observations, students’ writing papers and students’ journals. The study indicates that
collaborative brainstorming training with additional rules can significantly improve
quantity and quality of ideas in paragraph writing, but not in letter writing. Besides,
training has had positive effects on students’ learning of writing skills. The findings of
the study, therefore, make important contributions to the implementation of
collaborative brainstorming in the English language teaching practice.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE
DECLARATION............................................................................................................................. i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS........................................................................................................ ii
ABSTRACT.................................................................................................................................. iii
LIST OF TABLES, FIGURES AND ABBREVIATIONS............................................... viii
PART A: INTRODUCTION....................................................................................................... 1
1. Rationale..................................................................................................................................... 1
2. Aims and research questions.................................................................................................. 3
3. Significance of the study......................................................................................................... 4
4. Scope of the study..................................................................................................................... 4
5. Methodology.............................................................................................................................. 5
6. An overview of the research report....................................................................................... 8
PART B: DEVELOPMENT...................................................................................................... 10
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW............................................................................... 10
1.1.Process approach to teaching writing.............................................................................. 10
1.1.1. What is process approach?............................................................................................. 10
1.1.2.Advantages of the process approach............................................................................ 11

1.1.3.Criticism of the process approach................................................................................. 12
1.2. Group work........................................................................................................................... 13
1.3. Collaborative brainstorming (group brainstorming)................................................... 14
1.3.1. The effectiveness of group brainstorming.................................................................. 15
1.3.2. Productivity loss due to group brainstorming........................................................... 15
1.3.3. Ways to improve group brainstorming........................................................................ 16
1.4. Related studies..................................................................................................................... 22
1.4.1. Summary of previous studies........................................................................................ 22
1.4.2. Research gap..................................................................................................................... 25
CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY........................................................................................... 26
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2.1. Research methodology....................................................................................................... 26
2.1.1. Research design................................................................................................................ 26
2.1.2. The participants................................................................................................................ 27
2.2. Research instruments.......................................................................................................... 29
2.2.1. Interviews.......................................................................................................................... 29
2.2.2. Students’ writing papers................................................................................................. 31
2.2.3. Group brainstorming training procedures.................................................................. 31
2.2.4. Classroom observations.................................................................................................. 34
2.2.5. Students’ journals............................................................................................................. 35
2.3. Data collection procedures................................................................................................ 36
2.3.1. Stage 1................................................................................................................................ 36
2.3.2. Stage 2................................................................................................................................ 37
2.4. Data analysis procedures................................................................................................... 39
2.4.1. Sorting and categorizing data........................................................................................ 39
2.4.2. Analyzing data for meaning.......................................................................................... 40
CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION.................................................................... 42
3.1. Stage 1.................................................................................................................................... 42

3.1.1. Research question 1:....................................................................................................... 42
3.1.2. Research question 2:....................................................................................................... 44
3.2. Stage 2.................................................................................................................................... 46
3.2.1. Research question 3:....................................................................................................... 46
3.2.2. Research question 4:....................................................................................................... 61
3.3. Conclusion............................................................................................................................ 68
PART C: CONCLUSION.......................................................................................................... 70
1. Synthesis of major findings of the study........................................................................... 70
2. Contributions of the study.................................................................................................... 73
2.1. Methodological contributions........................................................................................... 73
2.2. Theoretical contributions................................................................................................... 73
2.3. Pedagogical contributions................................................................................................. 74

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3. Limitations of the study......................................................................................................... 74
4. Suggestions for further studies............................................................................................ 75
APPENDIXES............................................................................................................................... I
APPENDIX 1................................................................................................................................. I
APPENDIX 2A........................................................................................................................... III
APPENDIX 2B............................................................................................................................ IV
APPENDIX 2C........................................................................................................................ VIII
APPENDIX 2D.1...................................................................................................................... XII
APPENDIX 2D.2.................................................................................................................... XIV
APPENDIX 2E........................................................................................................................ XVI

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LIST OF TABLES, FIGURES AND ABBREVIATIONS
List of tables
Table 4.1. Students’ Idea Generation before Intervention
Table 4.2. Extracts of Students’ Writing Before and After Intervention
Table 4.3. Students’ Perception of Effectiveness of Group Brainstorming in Paragraph
Writing Lessons
Table 4.4. Students’ Perception of Effectiveness of Group Brainstorming in Letter
Writing Lessons
List of figures
Figure 4.1. Average number of total ideas, main ideas and supporting ideas in
students’ paragraph writing papers
Figure 4.2. The highest number of ideas (High) in students’ paragraph writing papers

Figure 4.3: The lowest number of ideas (Low) in students’ paragraph writing papers
Figure 4.4: Ideas in students’ letter writing papers
List of abbreviations
USSH

: University of Social Sciences and Humanities

ESL

: English as a Second Language

EFL

: English as a Foreign Language

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PART A: INTRODUCTION
The first part covers the current problem in reality and in researching as the rationale
for the study. Also, the aims, significance, scope and methodology of the study are
included in this part. In addition, the main elements of the study considered as the
guidelines for the whole paper are identified here.
1. Rationale
At intermediate English level, many students may feel that they are no longer making
progress like at previous levels (Oxenden et al, 2006). This was true to the situation of
teaching and learning English at intermediate level at our school, University of Social
Sciences and Humanities (USSH).
Non majored students at the university attend the intermediate English course of
integrated skills. A topic is covered in a unit in which students can practise reading,
listening, speaking and writing skills. The syllabus is designed based on the text
book, and different types of writing can be taught in different units. To be specific, in
a semester, students have 22.5 class hours for writing . To intermediate level, writing
skills were becoming more challenging to students as besides familiar writing forms
like letters, they needed to learn new types like stories, film reviews and articles. In a
meeting held for teachers who were teaching current intermediate English classes in
the semester in October 2013, the middle of the second semester, academic year
2013-2014, the teachers including my colleagues and I shared concerns about the
teaching and learning and discussed actions to improve students’ learning outcomes.
In terms of writing skills, most teachers agreed that many students had produced
incomprehensible pieces of writing, which was due to lack of ideas, poor vocabulary
and grammar structures. More importantly, a lot of students had problems generating
ideas and/or arranging ideas logically for the writing. In fact, I had tried to suggest
my students, and even provided them with guiding ideas

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to write. However, despite such efforts I made in class writing lessons, I still
encountered frustration from checking my students’ writing papers.
From my observations in my class and from communicative practice with my
colleagues, I came to realize that it was time to critically study my own pedagogical
actions. Hence, on coming across action research, I found that it would be a tool for
me to carefully and systematically explore the classroom issues. I would conduct a
study to find what could be done to improve my practice as a teacher in my class. To
be more specific, this thesis reports a process of making changes in my teaching
along with research practice. In the study, my students’ needs and perspectives were
investigated, and students’ responses to the pedagogical actions were taken into
considerations. The research is believed to be a useful experience for my real
teaching career and my colleagues.
The research started with an exploration into the students’ idea generation for writing
in my class through semi-structured interviews with nine students. The results of the
interview made me highly surprised to realize that there were many drawbacks in
what I did to prepare students for their writing. Few of them appreciated warm-up
games for the writing lessons, and many of them said that the idea preparation
activities organized by teacher did not encourage them to think of their own ideas.
They would prefer chances to work with their peers before consulting the teacher.

Students’ perspectives motivated me to search for solutions to the class. I read about
idea generation in groups, and became interested in group brainstorming.
Brainstorming allows writers to quickly generate a large numbers of ideas and have
good ideas to write because students can create lists of words or ideas related to a
topic, and then choose ideas for their writing (Berne, 2009). However, some
researchers argue that group idea generation could be less effective than individual
(Mullen et al, 1991). Many studies have been carried out to explain for the

2

productivity loss in this type of group work and to search for solutions (Diehl &
Stroebe, 1987; Mullen et al, 1991; Brown & Paulus, 1996; Brown & Putman, 2006;
Putman & Paulus, 2009). Especially, there has been a module to train people to
generate more ideas and higher quality of ideas in problem solving (Baruah & Paulus,
2008). Regarding training my students to generate ideas for writing topics, I supposed
that there would be similarities to the literature of group brainstorming, yet changes
should be made to suit the students and the teaching context.
With all reasons above, I developed procedures to train my students on collaborative
brainstorming, and investigated influences of collaborative brainstorming on the
ideas expressed in their writing. The training sessions and the techniques were
applied in writing letters and articles, the two main genres of writing at this level. The
training sessions were also observed and critically reflected by a colleague of mine.

2. Aims and research questions
The study is divided into two stages: the first one is investigation and the second is
intervention. Therefore, aims of each stage are different.
Firstly, the research aims at exploring how students generate ideas for writing and
investigate the effectiveness of idea generating activities employed in the class under
students’ perceptions. To be specific, the objective of the first stage is to answer the
two questions:
1. How do students generate ideas for writing?
2. How do students perceive the effectiveness of idea-generating activities employed

in the class?
After the results of the first stage are analyzed and problems identified, training
procedures on group brainstorming are developed. When strategies of idea
3

generation and idea construction are implemented in the class, it is essential to study
effectiveness of the group brainstorming activities and influences of group
brainstorming on quantity and quality of ideas in students’ writing papers. In
addition, students’ responses to group brainstorming activities are investigated. The
questions for the second stage are following:
3. How does group brainstorming influence the quality and quantity of ideas in

students' writing papers?
4. How do students perceive the effectiveness of group brainstorming activities?

3. Significance of the study
First and foremost, the study is an important experience in my own teaching practice
and doing research. It provided chances for me to critically reflect the way I taught
my students. After that, solutions were searched and implemented in my class with a
firm theoretical basis, experiments and critical feedback. I was happy when my
students had been working enthusiastically with the idea generation training
activities, and they were more motivated in learning writing.
The study might be practical for teachers in terms of pedagogical lessons and their
research practice. It will give an alternative to teachers’ support of students’ idea
construction, which will help to develop learner autonomy or independence. Besides,
teachers can understand more about students’ strengths and preferences in idea
generation to create and apply appropriate pre-writing techniques.
4. Scope of the study
The research focuses on one type of group work at pre-writing stage in my class - an
Intermediate English class. The class is typical for intermediate classes in my school,
with both males and females students of different majors.

4

To better writing, one needs to improve idea generation, idea organization and
importantly language (structures, lexical items) to express the ideas. As my students
reported that they had difficulties generating ideas for the topic and they supposed
that they would benefit from group discussion for ideas, I started this study on idea
generation at the pre-writing stage. While group brainstorming was implemented in
my class, the procedures needed to be critically reflected by the students and my
colleague who observed the class. Also, the study focuses on the effectiveness of
group brainstorming on students’ generation of ideas for writing, but not ambitiously
on overall writing skills improvements.
5. Methodology
5.1. Research design
The design used for this study is action research.
The participants for this study are the researcher and twenty students of three males
and seventeen females in one English class at intermediate level. The students are of
different majors at the university.
The study has typical features of action research as it was conducted by me, the
researcher as a practitioner. In the research, I explored classroom issues, intervened to
improve practice and reflected on the process. To be specific, the research began with
an investigation of idea generation for writing in my class, and training procedures on
group idea generation skills were developed aiming at improving the class. After the
interventions, observation of the results, data analysis and discussions, there would be
implications for futher study, which have made the teaching and learning on-going
cycles of searching solutions to problems.
5.2. Data collection instruments

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In order to find out the results, these following data collection instruments were used:

Stage 1: Investigation
Interviews
The pre-intervention interviews were conducted with nine students in my class to
investigate students’ ways of generating ideas for writing at intermediate level and
students’ perceptions on the effects of idea generating activities in the class.
Students’ pre-intervention writing test papers
The students did a written test without discussion with their peers. Then, the test
papers were collected to serve as data of the research.
Stage 2: Intervention
After the students were trained on group brainstorming with my procedure, they did
real practice on group brainstorming and did a written test.
Then, some other instruments were used to collect data:
Classroom observations
A colleague was invited to observe the class and take notes of the process. Before the
observation day, I discussed with her my research plan and the lesson plan when the
process took place.
Besides, the conversations of the groups brainstorming for the test were recorded.
The conversations would be analyzed to compare with the training procedure given.
Students’ post-intervention writing papers

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The students’ post-intervention writing papers were collected to compare with the
pre-intervention ones.
Students’ journals
Students were asked to write a small reflection about 100 words in Vietnamese on
group brainstorming activities they had participated in class.
Post-intervention interviews

In-depth interviews were conducted with nine students in my class to find out
students’ perspectives on influences of group brainstorming on writing. In addition,
my colleague who observed my class was interviewed to reflect on the process.
To sum up, in the first stage, interviews were important because they were used to
investigate problems and test my observations of the class. In the second stage,
intervention stage, multiple sources of data were used for triangulation. The two
writing papers of students were compared to see the influences of group
brainstorming on student’s idea production. Audio records were to check if students
worked well with the training procedures. The critical colleague helped to observe the
class and could give comments on the lessons. Students’ journals provided
opportunities for all the students in the class to freely give their feelings, thoughts and
feedback on the group brainstorming activities. Post-intervention interviews were to
check the reliability of the journals and observations, as well as for the interviewees
to add any issues that they did not mention before.
1.5.3. Data analysis
The data collected were processed by using qualitative methods. In the first stage,
data were sorted, categorized and analyzed. The nine students’ interviews and the
students’ test papers were compared to see differences in the quality and quantity of
ideas between pre-intervention and post-intervention. The transcriptions of recorded
7


conversations, students’ journals, and interviews with the colleague were also
analyzed qualitatively to critically reflect on the processes.
6. An overview of the research report
The research is divided into three parts:
Part A: Introduction
In the first part, the researcher will give the reason why this topic is chosen based on
the practical context. The research aims, questions and methods will be also included
in this part.

Part B: Development
Chapter 1: Literature Review
The first chapter deals with key terms related issues about the research problem,
which found the theoretical basis of the research. Previous studies are also reviewed
in this chapter.
Chapter 2: Methodology
Reasons for choosing participants for the research will be explained in the second
chapter. Next, data collection instruments, procedure and analysis will be also
carefully described in this chapter.
Chapter 3: Results and Discussion
The third chapter will analyze results from the interviews, observations, students’
writing papers and students’ journals and then some possible comments on those
results will be made.
Part C: Conclusion

8


The last part will synthesize findings of the study. It also discusses contributions,
limitations of the research and suggestions for further study.

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PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter discusses some key terms and related issues about collaborative
brainstorming. It gives a brief view on process approach to teaching writing and
group work in classroom, as the research problem is one type of group work at a
stage of the writing process. Besides, comprehensive literature on group

brainstorming is reviewed in this chapter. Finally, previous and related studies are
summarized and reflected, based on which the research gap is found.
1.1. Process approach to teaching writing
1.1.1. What is process approach?
The process approach is an approach to teaching writing to language learners in
which the process of writing a text is highly focused before the final product is
achieved (Brown, 2001). Under the process approach, learners have opportunities to
think thoroughly and critically and write until they complete their final written
version (Brown, 2001). As noted in Hyland (2003), the process approach has
significant influences on the teaching and learning of writing skills.
As a process, the approach involves many steps which compose a repeated procedure
of prewriting, drafting, sharing and responding, revising and editing, and publishing
(Hyland, 2003; Unger & Fleischman, 2004). In short, there are three main stages
which are prewriting, drafting, and revising. Of the stages, pre-writing, or planning
what is going to be written, is an essential step in the writing process (Unger &
Fleischman, 2004). It may take even good writers a lot of time to organize and plan
what is going to be written (Hillocks, 1986). In language teaching, to help students
generate ideas at the pre-writing stage, teachers can help students practise some
strategies such as free-writing and brainstorming (Berne, 2009).

10


1.1.2. Advantages of the process approach
Language learners should need a lot of training and practice to achieve language
proficiency, especially in writing skills (Pugh et al., 2000). Unger (2004) indicates
that writing process is an effective method to train students to be good writers. Under
this approach, students are taught and have opportunities to share and communicate
their ideas (Unger, 2004). In classroom, students share ideas for the writing, write
their draft, and then exchange their writing with peers through writing conferences or

peer editing. There, peer learning/teaching contributes to developing writing skills
for individuals.
In fact, since the 1980s, the process approach has been applied into writing classes
because of its effectiveness for learners (Raime, 1983; Nunan, 1991; Brown, 2001).
The effectiveness can be demonstrated in some main ways. First, the process
approach provides learners opportunities to refine their written product (Hyland,
2003). Students are instructed to develop their abilities to define writing topics, plan
to write then come up with the first writing version (Hyland, 2003). Teachers can
assist learners to move on to the next stage of the writing process by providing
responses to their first draft by giving feedback or organizing peer editing sessions.
Commenting and rewriting may be repeated some more times before the final
version is handed in (Hyland, 2003). Second, the process approach can improve
thinking skills and boost cognitive abilities for learners (Brown, 2001; Michelon,
2006). Brown (2001) states that the process approach lets students manage their own
writing by giving students chances to think as they write. In this way, students can
practise critical thinking skills through the stages of the writing circle of writing,
sharing, revising, and editing. Cognitive abilities are complex matters, and can
improve if exercised (Michelon, 2006). The stages of the writing process may help
learners to improve such abilities through writing and self and/or peer reflecting.
Third, the process approach can enhance language learning motivation (Raimes,
1983; Nunan, 1991; Brown, 2001). According to Brown (2001), the

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process approach is beneficial to students in language learning because when
students are creators of language, they need to take responsibility for their work, and
their motivation for writing will be increased. Raimes (1983) indicates that the
writing process is a process of discovery for the students. Through thinking and
editing, students are able to discover new ideas and new language forms to express

their ideas. Obviously, the process of discovery would engage students more in
language learning. Nunan (1991) also affirms that the process approach also
encourages collaborative work among learners as a way of enhancing motivation and
developing positive attitudes towards writing. Therefore, the process approach is
advantageous to students.
1.1.3. Criticism of the process approach
However, there are concerns about the process approach in teaching and learning
writing. For example, Leki (1992) indicates three main problems existing with the
process approach: many EFL teachers lack specific training to teach writing, many
ESL/EFL teachers tend to associate with traditional views (of using product
approach, for example), and there are teachers and researchers considering the
process approach to overemphasize on personal experience. In addition, Horowitz
(1986) believes that the process approach is impractical because it may create a gap
between practice and performance in academic exams. In exams students are not able
to go through as many drafts as when they practise in class. Therefore, students may
lack skills of producing single writing under restricted time. The writing process
approach can also be time-consuming in class, as lot of time should be spent on the
stages of revising or editing (Horowitz, 1986).
Criticism like above should be considered. However, language skills, particularly
writing skills may require a lot of training for development (Pugh et al., 2000); and
students are targeted to develop language skills but not just skills for taking exams.
Regarding the problems mentioned by Leki (1992), the first two can be solved by

12


increasing training for teachers and encourage them to renovate their teaching
practice. Other problems can be solved with teachers’ creativity and flexibility. For
example, teachers can assign students to work more with each other at home or
create online conferences outside class to save in-class time. Moreover, these days,

the process approach has been applied specifically with different writing task types,
or combined with the so-called genre-based approach to teaching writing. In other
words, changes and techniques have been made to the process approach to improve
its effectiveness in teaching and learning writing skills.
1.2. Group work
Group work is briefly reviewed because collaborative brainstorming is a kind of
group work organized in a language classroom.
In my research, group work refers to learning groups in a language classroom. In
classroom group work, students will work together towards the learning goals of the
group (Nation, 1989; Blatchford et al, 2003). Therefore, each student should consider
himself/herself an essential part of the group so that he/she will make best
contribution to the group as a whole (Blachford et al, 2003). During students working
in group, the teacher may be a facilitator and group members actively exchange
information and complete the tasks. (Blatchford et al, 2003).
Group work yields many advantages to students (Totten et al, 1989; Gillies, 2003;
Blatchford et al, 2003; Dooly, 2008). Firstly, students can benefit from different
perspectives of group members when sharing and negotiating ideas (Nation, 1989;
Gillies, 2003) and their knowledge will be widened as a result of this. In comparison
with individual learners, students working in groups are able to concentrate more on
the lesson, thus achieve better outcome (Dooly, 2008). Secondly, working in group
can motivate students and make students more interested in the lesson (Dooly, 2008).
This may be due to the influences of the working spirit of group members on each
individual. Also, that students are
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working with their peers can make them relaxed to express their ideas. Thirdly,
participating in discussion with different people and taking responsibility for their
work, students can improve their critical thinking (Totten et al, 1989). Gillies (2003)
summarizes that students working in group are capable of developing their learning

performance as well as interpersonal skills.
1.3. Collaborative brainstorming (group brainstorming)
For decades, people have used brainstorming to generate ideas, and to come up with
creative solutions to problems. Madison Avenue advertising executive Alex Osborn
developed the original approach to brainstorming (Osborn, 1953). Since then,
brainstorming has been a popular activity in many organizations and in various fields
for generating ideas (Paulus, 2000).
In language learning, specifically writing, Bauer (2009) states that brainstorming is
the way a writer visually organizes information for the writing. It expresses free
associations with the topics through words, phrases or possible perspectives. In
brainstorming, the writer conducts exploration of the topic. According to Berne
(2009), brainstorming is similar to free-writing in that they aim at taking away the
barriers that keep people from thinking creatively. This technique relies on either
verbal or written lists of components. In brainstorming, students create lists of words
or ideas related to a topic, and then choose ideas among the generated ideas for their
writing (Bern, 2009).
Brainstorming is considered a useful strategy to prepare learners to write (Berne,
2009). Brainstorming could be applied individually or collaboratively (in group –
group brainstorming). However, some literature has revealed that the effectiveness of
group brainstorming on idea productivity should be taken into consideration (Diehl &
Stroebe, 1987; Diehl & Stroebe, 1991; Mullen et al, 1991; Paulus et al, 1995; Nijstad
& Stroebe, 2006, Brown &Paulus, 2002; Putman & Paulus, 2008).

14


1.3.1. The effectiveness of group brainstorming
There are a number of researchers who believes that group brainstorming could
enhance idea productivity. Osborn (1963), known as the founder of group
brainstorming, claims that a group brainstorming collaboratively can produce more

ideas than a group with the same number of people brainstorming individually if they
follow four rules: “(i) criticism is ruled out, (ii)‘free-wheeling’ is welcomed,
(iii) quantity is wanted, (iiii) combination and improvements are sought” (Osborn,

1963, p. 109, 110). In fact, the rules are to instruct group members to feel free to
express any ideas, not to deduct ideas of others, increase quantity of ideas and
develop previous ideas (Putman & Paulus, 2009). With such rules, group members
are encouraged to increase quantity as well as quality of ideas. It is explained that
collaborative brainstormers can benefit from different perspectives and abilities of
their peers because people in a group can cognitively stimulate each other to generate
ideas (Osborn, 1957; Paulus et al, 1998). Other researchers like Paulus et al (1995)
report that most people believe that group brainstorming is effective; Baruah &
Paulus (2008) state that group idea generation is beneficial in terms of quantity and
quality of ideas generated.
1.3.2. Productivity loss due to group brainstorming
On the other hand, a number of studies examine the hypothesis that brainstorming
groups could outperform individuals (Mullen et al, 1991) and the results are negative.
Some researchers have explained that interactive brainstorming is counterproductive
(Diehl & Stroebe, 1987; Mullen et al, 1991). According to Mullen et al (1991), there
are three factors that cause productivity loss in group brainstorming: people
interrupting each other, the effect of the group on the individuals, and free riding. In
their research, the three mechanisms are examined using several aspects including
group size, experimenter presence, response mode and types of groups. Similarly,
Diehl and Stroebe (1987, 1991) identify the major

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causes of productivity loss in brainstorming groups that are free riding, evaluation
apprehension and blocking.

In fact, literature has revealed at least four factors that may cause productivity loss in
collaborative brainstorming. First, free riding happens when group members feel that
their individual contributions to the group are less significant than they work alone
(Diehl & Stroebe, 1991). Hence, the feeling that their ideas add little to the group
outcome demotivates group members to produce ideas. Moreover, in collaborative
brainstorming, brainstormers may not be confident or comfortable to speak out their
ideas because of their concern about possible evaluations of their peers (Diehl &
Stroebe, 1991). In this case, evaluation apprehension can limit their contributions to
the group, which causes group productivity loss. Next, production blocking refers to
opportunities for group members to raise their ideas. In group, one member can speak
at a time; but when waiting for their turn, people may forget the ideas at the time the
ideas occur in their mind. If a person tries to keep the ideas in his/her mind, he/she
may not think of further ideas. Both individual and group productivity in idea
generation will be reduced as a result of this (Diehl & Stroebe, 1991). Last,
performance matching is the comparison of performance level of group members.
When brainstorming in a group, individuals may not want to outperform others
(Brown & Paulus, 1996). Therefore, they may decrease their performance of raising
their ideas if they perceive that other members are not working as hard as them.
Consequently, the group productivity may be affected. These factors are of high
importance to understand the nature of collaborative brainstorming, accordingly to
find how to improve group brainstorming techniques.
1.3.3. Ways to improve group brainstorming
The finding that group brainstorming is less effective than individual has stimulated
much research investigating the causes and ways to improve group brainstorming
(Nijstad & Stroebe, 2006).

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