Adopting Seeker and Peer Feedback in Ideation Contests: An Anchoring Effect Perspective

Solution-seeking firms (seekers) can use online ideation contests to engage agents (solvers) in the crowd to generate ideas for addressing specific problems. An integral aspect of these contests is the solvers’ use of feedback during ideation. In this study, we examine solvers’ use of developmental feedback in their ideas by considering the anchoring heuristic that affects their decision-making. During contests, solvers can receive feedback from different sources (i.e., seekers or peers) and of different levels of practicality (i.e., the extent that the feedback is helpful and appropriate). In our theorizing, we formulate distinct expectations about how solvers anchor their ideas to seeker feedback and peer feedback, which we use to hypothesize the impact of feedback source and practicality on solvers’ feedback use. In our first experiment, we show that solvers use feedback from seeker and peer differently. Specifically, solvers use low-practicality seeker feedback 1) about as much as they use high-practicality seeker feedback and 2) much more than they use low-practicality and high-practicality peer feedback. Such solver behaviors indicate a potential drawback of encouraging seeker feedback, which is prevalent on contest platforms. In our second experiment, we test a mechanism to address the downsides arising from the anchoring on feedback, particularly the overuse of low-practicality seeker feedback and underuse of high-practicality peer feedback. Our findings provide (i) insights into the scope of the anchoring effect and solvers’ use of feedback and (ii) suggestions to better engage the crowd in ideation contests.