Modelling the Dynamics of Influence on Individual Thinking during Idea Generation in Co-design Teams

Social influence is not evenly distributed in teams. Some individuals, referred to here as influencers, become more influential than others. Consequentially, these influencers play a significant role in shaping project performance. The current work simulates the presence of influencers during idea generation in co-design teams to better understand emergent socio-cognitive phenomena. Besides providing, a novel approach for modelling learning in concept generation the model highlights the results related to individual cognition during idea generation. Idea quality and exploration of design space are affected by the presence of influencers in design teams. Teams with no well-defined influencers produce solutions with high general exploration but less quality. In contrast, the agents in the teams with only one influencer produce solutions high quality than those teams with no influencers.