Why Wargaming Works

Summary:
by Matthew Haines

       Dr. Perla and Dr. McGrady outline what wargaming is and how it can be both successful and unsuccessful in its attempt to inform and instruct its players. They both agree that wargaming has a significant impact on its players’ decisions outside of the simulation and they propose a combination of reasons for this. They begin by comparing a games narrative to that of literature and the effect it has on a reader. That while reading prose the reader builds an imaginary space, that encompasses the work of fiction, but is perceived as real in the moment. This literary term is called the l’entre deux, or the “between place”. This phenomenon is what ties the emotional response a reader has towards problems that a fictional narrative is proposing. The author’s use President Clinton’s fear of the repercussions of biological terrorism.
Dr. Perla and Dr. McGrady then outline the neuroscience behind this idea. That when reading a fictional work that applies suspense and emotion to otherwise historical facts, a person must pause and remember what is factual and what is not. They site a study done on participants who were given a factual “cut and dry” recounting of President George Washington’s campaign, and a narrative that painted a scenario that the race was down to the wire. After the study participants were asked if George Washington became the first president of the United States, and the participants that read the “cut and dry” piece answered significantly quicker than those that read the other piece. The authors state that this place between is heightened even further in wargaming.
They state that wargaming does not only create a narrative designed to build emotion and suspense, but it is also influenced by the players’ actions. Therefore, wargaming is the closest place that a person can get to the “between space”, thus intensifying the effects it has on the players. The author’s state that these effects can be both good or bad depending on the design of the game. A well designed game can be used to
       
        help players learn how better to balance the equation between the cost of preparing for the
        uncertain future and the risk of not doing so; can help enlighten players about the fact that
        unexpected and unpredictable events, including embarrassing ones, do happen and that there are
        real consequences when they do.


However, a poorly designed game can under or over estimate the effects variables have on an outcome, and create a false sense of reality for the player. Wargaming is also hindered by its inability to account for unknown unknowns. This can make it extremely ineffective when dealing with problems that are outside the scope of a game designer’s cognitive biases.

Critique:

        What this article shows is that if wargaming can even be described as an analytical/forecasting tool it is a very poor and dangerous one. The authors were able to show that wargaming and simulation are one of the best ways to make the problems simulated a top priority for participants. This is just another way of creating a bias. To use these simulations, as described above, for intelligence purposes is a bad idea. More biases do not allow for best possible intelligence products. That said the article does highlight some good points for using wargaming as a teaching tool. If wargaming is used in conjunction with brainstorming processes, decision trees, and unique factors then it could be used in a more effective way.

Source:

http://eds.b.ebscohost.com/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=2&sid=0cb67813-c777-4daa-a98f-8b2af3c1a712%40sessionmgr101 

Wargaming: Training, Educational Tool for the Future

Colonel Thomas M. Lafleur examines the use of wargaming as a strategic  tool. One of the first questions he posed was the ability to transfer results of a war game conducted in earlier years to a later time period. Later in the study, he found elements of maneuvers in war games can be transferred to any strategy in later periods, but if the gaps between time periods is large enough, the maneuvers themselves cannot be due to changes in circumstances.

To ensure a complete transference of a war game to strategy, Colonel Lafleur presents three things to be done: a nuanced scenario must be in place. The nuances mentioned are a realistic scenario with leaders who know the scenario extremely well. Second, the participants in the war game must have specific and detailed knowledge of how to proceed in the war game as well as skill sets relating to the war game. Third, examine the qualities developed out of the scenario as possible solutions for future problems.

Critique:
Colonel Lafleur does a good job examining the ability to transfer strategies developed in war games to actual military strategies. He goes into detail on what is needed for an effective war game.

Citation: Lafleur, Thomas M. http://www.arcic.army.mil/App_Documents/UQ/Wargaming.pdf.

DYNAMIC COMPETITIVE SIMULATION: WARGAMING AS A STRATEGIC TOOL

Summary and Critique by: Jared Leets

Summary:

The authors, Treat, Thibault, and Asin, begin by explaining what wargaming is in business. In a wargame, teams of the managers from a company role play their own company, their top competitors, and the marketplace. Then a control team plays all other competitors that can affect the industry. This simulates possible real life business outcomes and can provide guidance for the company’s future strategies. Teams lay out objectives, decide on what strategies to take, and what and where to invest. Teams from the company, such as the market team, will review market reactions and decide where to move next. In addition, the finance team can provide feedback and tell teams, taking part in the wargame, where the profits and losses would occur if the company goes in a certain direction.

The authors describe ideal situations for using wargaming for competitive intelligence. The first situation occurs when there is a competitive dynamic in a certain industry. The second situation deals with the market reaction and its unpredictability due to constant change, emergence of new technology, or a change in market demands. Typically a deterministic model will not be able to predict that and will likely be useless. Another ideal situation would be when simulations are the only viable way of gaining insight, when not much information is available of the competitor, or when there exists an excessive amount of dimensions to the problem.

Next they describe how traditional planning does not work as well as wargaming. According to the authors, wargaming works because it confronts concerns about planning in isolation and dealing with discontinuities, and it is a holistic enterprise. Strategy can be easily dismantled, if one removes one element from the strategic plan it can fall apart and then all that is left are tactics which simply relate to the execution of the strategy. That is the main difference between wargaming and traditional planning is that wargaming demands a team to look at the entirety of the plan, while traditional planning has the team look at certains parts to the plan. Wargaming simulations are able to complete paradigm shifts and promote "out of the box thinking" due to the fact that it investigates the implications of changes in strategy with no real negative risks involved. Usually any typical strategic analysis will not work because it will interpret what happened in the past and use that to forecast the future. In this case the past never truly repeats itself. Scenario planning uses historical planning to predict future outcomes and analysis cannot predict how a competitor will react to changing conditions, for example with a new product being released. The authors state that scenarios tend to be guesses at the future which makes it relatively easy to become biased. 

They conclude by stating how wargaming is much more beneficial than traditional planning. Wargaming improves strategic capability thinking for managers in a company and the feedback from those who have participated claim that it forced them to keep strategic issues at the forefront. Those that partook in the wargaming simulation focused more on their competitors plans and how to counter them.

Critique:

Treat, Thibault, and Asin explain, in great detail, what wargaming is in the business world and how it can be effectively used. Their description of it and what the ideal situations are for when a company should use it were phenomenal and they went in depth comparing it to other traditional forms of planning. Not only did they explain why traditional planning does not stack up well against wargaming, but they provided quality examples to help comprehend it all. While they did an impressive job of telling why wargaming simulation is much better for businesses, they did not do enough to explain what the potential drawbacks of using wargaming might be. Overall the article argued its point well.

Source: Treat, J. E., Thibault, G. E., & Asin, A. (1996). Dynamic competitive simulation: wargaming as a strategic tool. Strategy, Management, Competition, (Second Quarter), 46-54. http://hershbine.net/wp-content/uploads/20-DYNAMIC-COMPETITIVE-SIMULATION-WARGAMING-AS-A-STRATEGIC-TOOL.pdf

 

Ex Ante Strategy Evaluation: The Case for Business Wargaming

By: Michael Pouch

Summary:

The purpose of Jan Schwartz research is to introduce wargaming as a useful tool for ex-ante strategy evaluation for the business world. He lists some important benefits of business wargaming as an ex-ante tool such as assessing a particular strategy, by simulating reality, the consequences with respect to the organizational environment (especially its competitors), and with respect to the future impact on the strategy and the future of that strategy.

The author begins to lay out several advantages of using wargaming in the business world to test a particular strategy. First, while using participants, wargaming provides not only the use analyzation of a market or a competitor but the simulation an industry, market, or competition over time. This so-called experience or simulation provides a preview of how a strategy might fare.

Second, Schwartz provides an argument that wargaming can be used to challenge the mental models of participants. Wargaming allows participants to think and act like their competitors, thereby forecasting what their competitors will likely do. In addition, war-gaming provides a simplified version of strategic planning that allows participants to test strategies but a form strategic planning.

Third, war-gaming can offer a means of fostering organizational learning. When the comparison between situations or moves within the business wargame or with mental models become communal the knowledge derived from a business wargame will be transferred when a similarly structured situation occurs outside the simulation.

Fourth and last, the intense competition that is involved within war-gaming, forces participants to rigorously examine the situation from several perspectives. The benefits that come along with the competition gives the participants the ability to convey a deeper understanding of the competitive situation and an awareness of the participant’s or a team’s strategy will play out, and especially how the industry will develop.

On the whole, a well-designed and conducted business wargame is important to test of strategy that sheds light on competitor’s motives and actions and ultimately see your strategies play out but also the likely results when implemented.  As shown in figure 1, wargaming provides many benefits were as other methods are limited to certain actions. 

 Figure 1: Characteristics of Business Wargaming

Critique:

Overall, the advantages that come with wargaming in business outweigh the limitations.  Although wargaming takes up a lot of resources, preparation, and participant demand, the results allow you to come out of the simulation with many external and internal perspectives in mind. Another limitation implies a human element where the simulation might not have the right participants or the participants willingness to engage in the exercise. By and large, it is an essential exercise that needs to be designed, prepared, and well-executed for a successful simulation.

Reference:

Schwarz, Jan Oliver. (2011). Ex Ante Strategy Evaluation: The case for Business Wargaming. Business Strategy Series. 12. 122-135.

The Do’s and Don’ts of Course of Action (COA) Wargaming

This article sets COA Wargaming in context, describes its aim and – briefly – the processes involved, and shows when it is best used. Most importantly, it suggests some do’s and don’ts that have been shown to significantly increase the benefits derived from COA Wargaming. 

According to the article, there is no formal definition or aim for COA wargaming. Although there have been several attempts to define it, those definitions are lacking in precision. It defines wargaming as a systematic method of analyzing a plan in a conscious attempt to visualize the ebb and flow of an operation or battle. A Wargame is a staff tool designed to visualize the battlefield and the possible interaction between opposing forces. By wargaming, commanders and staffs attempt to foresee the dynamics of action, reaction, and possible counteraction of battle.

COA wargaming is one instance in the professional wargaming tool-set. COA wargaming is primarily characterized by conflict or opposition to fully test the forming plan. Also, another important characteristic is that COA Wargaming will, almost certainly, be carried out under significant time pressure; this impacts how and when it is best conducted.

The paper continues to answer important questions like the aim of wargaming, characteristics, inputs, outputs, methods, participant, and when it should occur. It focuses on do’s and don’ts of the wargaming. 

The paper concludes that with well executed COA Wargaming can significantly enhance the decision-making process. If used, the do’s and don’ts suggested, it would go a long way in ensuring that the potential benefits offered by COA Wargaming are realized.

Critique: This article provides really good information regarding COA wargaming. Having a good understanding of COA wargaming is crucial in developing sound decision-making skills and good judgement. The ability to visualize possible scenarios in wargaming is a vital aspect to this process. It answers a lot of “what ifs” and helps for better preparedness – in learning to formulate a viable plan, acting, and reacting. It’s almost like a simulated foreshadowing of the battle and creates immense advantages that should not be overlooked. 

The application of wargaming concept in the ever-changing business world has huge benefits. It can help to anticipate competitors reactions and strategies in response to changes that may occur over the course of time.

Link: http://lbsconsultancy.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/The-dos-and-donts-of-COA-Wargaming.pdf

Improving Operational Wargaming: It’s All Fun and Games Until Someone Loses a War

Summary and Critique by Claude Bingham

Summary 

As part of an initiative to reinvent wargaming in the Department of Defense, Lt. Col. Matthew E. Hanson wrote this monograph to explore the strengths and pitfalls of wargaming. Wargames have ten pathologies, or elements of a wargame that are subject to failure. They are: objectives, scenario, database, models, rules and procedures, infrastructure, participants (including players, controllers, and observers), analysis, culture and environment, and audiences.

Any one, or multiple, of these can fail to be designed correctly, balanced properly, or evaluated accurately. Wargames are often underspecified in their inclusion of existing doctrine into game design and inconvenient outcomes can be rejected or disregarded. The most important idea from this study is that military doctrine often diverges from wargaming and neglects to integrate lessons learned into living doctrine.

Game Element Analysis, or GEA and wargame failure modes can be used to develop wargames and evaluate wargame outcomes and doctrine. Instead of choosing the United States' plan for Midway, Lt. Col. Hanson chose Japan's because of evident failures to evaluate results of their wargame plan. Hanson explains wargaming as a "synthetic experience" to test decision-making and strategy in an environment with limited information. He also states that a good wargame not only proves or disproves the effectiveness of evaluated strategies, but also reveals flaws and gaps in those strategies. A bad wargame will fail to push a strategy far enough.

Japan's loss at the Battle of Midway was not only affected by poor wargaming, but also Japan's early naval successes during WWII. Planning suffered because of an unwillingness to challenge that momentum procedurally. Additionally, wargame outcomes that were seen as undesirable were completely disregarded. This confidence led to a wargame scenario that left Midway's attacking battle group underpowered and a verbal order to keep bombers in reserve was unheaded.


Critique 

This study did an excellent job showing both the value and pitfalls of a wargame scenario. It also used quotes from Japanese officers that speak to their realization of what went wrong. Like in most cases, wargames are affected greatly by human error, especially that which underestimates the ability of an adversary to fight back. I feel that this research was missing an important piece, however. It does not recommend absolute dedication to recording all procedural discussions during a wargame's development, Course-of-Action, or post-mortem. That appears to be a must. No stone can be left unturned.

Summary of Findings: Free Association (1.5 Stars Out of 5)

Note: This post represents the synthesis of the thoughts, procedures and experiences of others as represented in the articles read in advance (see previous posts) and the discussion among the students and instructor during the Advanced Analytic Techniques class at Mercyhurst University in September 2017 regarding Free Association as an Analytic Technique Modifier specifically. This technique was evaluated based on its overall validity, simplicity, flexibility and its ability to effectively use unstructured data.

Description:

Free association is a technique used in psychoanalytic therapy to help patients learn more about what they are thinking and feeling. Within intelligence analysis, it is limited to idea generation activities where it can be a stand alone modifier or used in conjunction with other idea generation techniques such as Nominal Group Technique. While it likely is successful in helping generate more ideas, there is limited evidence to suggest that the ideas are better or improve forecasting accuracy. The technique also has application when attempting to map out lexical knowledge regarding a number of words that can be used to visually map out word associations.

Strengths:

• Useful as a divergent thinking technique when solving for ill-structured problems
• Powerful as a lateral thinking tool to create new avenues for analysis
• It has applicability to a large number of fields
• Can be helpful for brainstorming and Nominal Group Technique
• Can visually map out associations of common words in a region or culture
• Provides a mental model that helps streamline undiscovered nodes

Weaknesses:

• Does not show the strength of the relationship between two words, only the presence of a relationship
• At times the questions asked from the analyst can lead to answers the analyst desires
• Does not produce an estimate, it is more of a modifier
• Is mainly a divergent thinking technique; does not use convergent thinking which is needed for an accurate analysis
• Limited quantitative evidence of technique quality or validity
• It depends on the participant’s willingness to be fully vested in the process
• Interpretation can be constrained by tact, timing, or ambiguity of the process

How-To:

1. Decide on the generic, ill-defined problem or concept for the participant(s) to discuss.
2. Gather participants and design how participants will respond and the manner in which results will be interpreted
3. Arrange results into a data set displaying the number of times each response was associated to the initial word or words
4. Utilize the data to visually display the relationship between the initial words and the participant’s responses, although a visual map is not required

Application of Technique:

The class received handouts with three questions after being divided into two groups. The first group (Control group) was asked to think as a 9 to 14 year old. The second group (experiment group) was instructed to think according to their actual ages. The first question was to think of a positive adjective that began with the first letter of our first names and what event or act was associated with that adjective. The second question was to think of a negative adjective also beginning with the first letter of our first names with an event or act associated with it. After writing down the answers, members of Group 1 exchanged answers with members of Group 2 and discussed their answers. Group 2’s words were interpreted by Group 1 to expand upon Group 2’s initial thought process.

For Further Information:

1. Free Association - Wiki
2. Free Association In Therapy

Remarks On The Problem Of Free Association

Remarks On The Problem Of Free Association

Summary and Critique By Kevin Muvunyi
 

Free association is a powerful yet deteriorating psychoanalysis technique in need of improvement, argues Fromm in his article “Remarks On The Problem of Free Association”. Prior to a thorough investigation of the technique as applied in psychoanalysis today, the author provides us with an understanding of the methodology as practiced by Freud. According to Fromm, there are two essential components to Freud’s grand discovery of the said method. The first part being the fundamental discovery of the unconscious, and the second being the discovery of a method to recognize the unconscious. To fathom the approach used to discern the unconscious, the author explains that one has to first understand a paramount concept brought forth by Freud, which states that there are two intrinsic and distinct identities in each individual. Namely the official identity or in other words the rational and conventional persona, and on the other hand the dissociated identity or the hidden and unobservable persona. These two identities basically fuse to create the character of an individual. Nonetheless, Fromm contends that the dissociated identity or personality has a more pervasive effect on the way we think and act on a daily basis. 

While investigating Freud’s approach to detecting the unconscious, the author points to the brilliancy in the former’s technique. According to Fromm, Freud recognized that a person could reveal his unconscious identity without neither being asleep nor on drugs. The famous neurologist discovered that while conscious, a series of steps could be used to influence a person into engaging in an unconventional thinking process. As mentioned in the article, Freud would tap on his patient’s forehead and instruct them to say what was on their mind at that very moment, thus, ensuring that what they said was spontaneous. From these free and spontaneous mental associations, the neurologist would be able to make sense of the patient’s unconscious identity. Unfortunately according to Fromm, Freud’s technique has become ritualistic and inefficient throughout the years. He disputes that the free association technique as used presently has lost its most essential component spontaneity. Based on the way patients are treated today, whereby the patient sits on couch and is told to state what he is thinking at that time by a therapist sitting silently near him, Fromm contends that it does not ensure spontaneous thinking, even though no thought might be omitted in the process. 

The author suggests numerous ways to improve and stimulate the free association methodology. He states that rather than telling a patient “tell me what comes to mind”, one ought to say “tell me what is in your mind right now”. Fromm argues that this is similar to Freud’s tap on the forehead. Furthermore, the author states that to ensure more spontaneous thinking, a patient for example can be given a picture of his father and told to focus on it and say the first thing that comes to his mind, that way the therapist is able to uncover the unconscious identity of the patient. Though Fromm provides multiple example on ways to assure that the free association method doesn’t become a sterile ritual, the essence of his remarks on the subject is that without the element of spontaneity the technique is meaningless.

Critique

Fromm does a great job in providing solutions as to how we ought to ensure that the free association methodology remains efficient and relevant. Nonetheless, one flow with his article is that he fails or forgets to demonstrate in a comprehensive manner how a therapist is able to make sense of the spontaneous thoughts of his patients. Put practically, if an individual is shown a picture of his father, and the first thing he says is “car” because his dad is leaning against one instead of perhaps the word “mean”, then how does one discern the profound feelings the individual has towards his father. 

Source: http://www.fromm-gesellschaft.eu/images/pdf-Dateien/1955d-e.pdf  

"The University of South Florida free association, rhyme, and word fragment norms" 

Summary and Critique by Samuel Farnan

Summary

University of South Florida researchers Douglas Nelson and Cathy McEvoy along with University of Kansas colleague Thomas Schreiber set out to gather what is the largest data regarding free association by using more than 6,000 participants that produced close to a million different responses to roughly 5000 stimulus words. Ultimately, offer 72,000 word pairs along with numerous other statistics and data points to aid in research of word association, for free.

The authors propose that free association can be useful to researchers for several reasons. They stipulate that "Free association norms offer a means for constructing maps of the lexical knowledge that is most accessible to people sharing a language and a cultural heritage. Understanding the organization of word knowledge continues to be a significant problem". Additionally, free association and the data it gathers can be utilized for linguistic analysis via categorization for future retrieval. Furthermore, free association research can be used for indexing and evaluating semantic representation.

Below is a sample of the results.

Despite collecting one of the largest, if not the largest data set on word associations, the authors admit that free association has its limitations. For example, free association provides a relative index of strength versus an absolute measure. The authors say that although "read" is produced by 43% of participants for the cue "book", this does not show how strong this response is in an absolute sense, only that it is stronger than "study" that was only 5.5%.Finally, although not a fault of the method itself, the authors hypothesize that free association may produce different results across various regions. They write that "associates to apple may be different in Florida than in other locations where apple trees and traditions of apple pie and picking apples are more frequent. Although Floridians know about apples, many have never seen or climbed a real apple tree, and their most frequent response is red, with tree and pie given infrequently".

Critique

Free association in the sense it was studied above, is useful for creating potentially large visual maps of word associations relatively quickly, despite the difficult work and large amounts of participants needed. However, their criticisms are on point in that words in different regions may be associated with different things. This problem can also be magnified with people who speak a language that isn't their primary language. I believe in order for this to be utilized as an intelligence method, this would best be employed either by linguists or social media analysis. The above study is in my opinion a highly respectable exercise in data collection versus actual analysis.

Reference: https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.3758/BF03195588.pdf

Free Association and the Fundamental Rule - Lynn Cunningham, PhD LICSW

Summary and Critique by Evan Garfield

Summary 

Free association is a psycho analysis method of exploring a person's unconscious by eliciting words, thoughts, and memories. Patients are invited to relate whatever comes into their minds during the analytic session, and not to censor their thoughts. This is known as the "fundamental rule." This technique is intended to help the patient learn more about what he or she thinks and feels, in an atmosphere of non-judgmental curiosity and acceptance. The method  has no planned agenda and seeks to draw out linkages which may lead to new personal insights and meanings. Its goal is not to unearth specific answers or memories, but to instigate a journey of co-discovery which can enhance the patient's integration of thought, feeling, agency, and self-hood.

According to the author, some analysts question whether the fundamental rule currently reflects the evolving nature of psychoanalysis or if it is still essential to the psychoanalytic process. The author examines and discusses the Scientific Meetings presentation by Shierry Nicholson, PhD. Nicholson reviewed "the sometimes polemical pluralism of the contemporary psychoanalytic landscape and discovered how different psychoanalysts thought about the patient's associate activity." According to Nicholson, Freud elaborated on what interfered with the patient's associate activity, such as transference, resistance, the repetition compulsion, and the death instinct. Busch highlights the rule's emphasis on overcoming patient resistances, rather than analyzing them. Furthermore, Bush points to how the rule promotes passivity rather than strengthening the ego for future analysis.

Shierry claims the concept of "free" in free association requires further reexamination. Of course the patient's thoughts may roam freely, but the unconscious selects what is spoken and thus, revealed. Furthermore, while the analyst's reverie is experienced as free, "an interpretation may be constrained by tact, timing, ambiguity, and not-knowing."Andre Green claims a breaking off of free association is actually a psychic impulse that often occurs in patients when ego is threatened with traumatic effect.When conflict arises between representation and the impulse of avoidance, the analyst must become more receptive to a complex network of connections. Shierry concludes that the fundamental rule  may be less direct than Freud imagined. However, she still sees its benefit in helping analysts understand and handle the difficulties that patients and the analytic process may present. I

Critique
The author does a good job discussing the fundamental rule of free association and the evolving nature of the psychoanalytic process. I agree with her point that the concept of free in free association is not actually entirely free. Patients may roam through their thoughts freely, but it is their unconscious that selects what is spoken. Analysts must understand their interpretation of patients may be constrained or influenced by tact, timing, or ambiguity of the process. Furthermore, analysts must recognize that a breaking off of free association within the patient is a psychic impulse to be expected when patients feel their ego is threatened. Analysts, thus, must be prepared to be more receptive.

I personally think analysts must take a balanced approach with the free association method. It is not as direct or straightforward as Freud may have initially seen. I share Jean-Luc Donnet's opinion:

"The fundamental rule is a safeguard between theory and clinical practice:to ensure that theory does not subordinate what is actually happening in the room; but also to ensure that there is indeed a game that is being played, a game that has rules."

Source: https://npsi.us.com/uploads/documents/Free-Association-and-The-Fundamental-Rule.pdf

Exploring a Free Association Methodology to Capture and Differentiate Abstract Media Brand Associations: A Study of Three Cable News Networks

Summary and critique by: Ian Abplanalp

Summary

Walter S. McDowell conducted a study to compare three  24-hour cable new networks (Fox, CNN, MSNBC) and how their brands differentiated based on customer opinion of what they watched. This comes from the brand equality theory that customers need more than one brand of similar product to meet the needs of everyone. McDowell pursued a way to measure this among media outlets, with free association as a methodology, allowing media outlets to more accurately see how they have "branded" themselves for their viewers. Free association is whenever individuals are provided a prompt and asked to respond with the first word or a phrase that comes to mind in relation to that prompt. Free association was chosen for the methodology as it allows for a free structure of experimentation in which bias could be limited and with the on the spot type approach it takes it can force participants to bring up inhibited thoughts. 

McDowell, constructed two free association questions in order to measure the brand differentiation, to avoid biases the questions pertained to only one new network. The two free association questions were asked of each participant: 

1. When I say the word CNN (or Fox News Channel or MSNBC), what thoughts and feelings come to mind? 

2. Among the three 24-hr cable news channels. Fox News, MSNBC, and CNN, how do you see CNN (or Fox News or MSNBC) as being different than the others?  

The respondents were required to provide three responses for the first questions and the researcher would record them in order that they were mentioned. The second question was a more structured free association comparison of the given network in regards to the other two but it had to match the network in the first question. So if asked about CNN in question one, individuals would be asked about CNN in question two. 

The results (Below) that were found were encouraging to the researcher as they all provided a different responses to each new network all while using a free association technique. 

Critique:

McDowell's study does use free association in a unique way in which it takes a psychology practice in nature and repurposes it for a business use. Through this unique use it shows that the methodology as whole is very versatile and can be repurposed for different uses. However, despite the usefulness of the free association in other fields there is little crossover potential to an analytic practice. As it is free association in an analytic field could be used more a mental modeling exercise grouped with nominal group technique to brain storm on how a group is thinking about a problem. Another potential aspect of crossover that exists is through a collections lens where an analyst would receive information about the thoughts that group of people have about a certain topic. 

Effect of Problem Solving Support and Cognitive Styles on Idea Generation: Implications for Technology-Enhanced Learning

Summary and Critique by Keith Robinson Jr.

Summary

The authors, Slavi Stoyanov and Paul Kirschner, investigated the effect of two problem-solving techniques anchored by free association: free association with a direct reference to the problem or direct for short, and free-association with a remote and postponed reference to the problem, otherwise called remote. The study reported research exploring the impact of these two problem-solving support techniques and their interaction with learner cognitive style on idea generation and creativity in ill-structured problem scenarios--problems that have unclear goals and incomplete information. The primary purpose of the study was to provide the foundation for teaching students how to solve ill-structured problems, investigating the question "What is the effect of direct and remote problem solving techniques on idea generation in an ill-structured problem-solving situation?"

The study compared results of two experimental and one control group, testing after the activity. The activity required students provide solutions to a change-management problem in higher education. The varying techniques prescribed different brainstorming rules as instruction in supporting idea generation. The direct technique, implemented to stimulate flow of ideas and bypass dominant thinking, postponed criticism, encouraged free-wheeling, piggybacking off ideas, preferred quantity of ideas, and required combination and improvement. The remote technique, supposed to provoke divine inspiration, supported idea generation by applying forced relationships between the problems and unrelated to the problem personal experience.

Additionally, the study investigated the interaction between the proposed techniques and cognitive styles: adaptive and innovative. Previous empirical evidence found that cognitive style is conceptually independent from constructs such as knowledge and intelligence; people with similar intellect and performing on the same level can approach problems differently. Adaptive styles adhere to structure while innovators tend to solve problems outside of a specific structure. While adaptors produce fewer solutions, solutions are more feasible. In contrast, innovators propose more and unusual ideas, but often produce more risky and non-practical solutions.

The sample selected students from a  members organization representing different departments, 57 of which were actively involved in a debate lasting several months on the issue of "How can we make our university a top university?" Students received information about the purpose of the study, but were not introduced to the problem. 34 students agreed to participate; 19 third-year students and 15 fourth-years. Experimental design controlled for the possible effect of problem solving cognitive style. The results revealed that both direct and remote free association and cognitive styles (innovators and adaptors) are key determinants of ill-structured problem-solving and should be acknowledged when crafting instruction aimed at guiding students in approaching ill-structured problems.

Remote free association yielded the highest scores on originality of ideas, as applying forced relationships between domains contributes most to breaking dominant thinking patterns. As estimated, the direct group produced the highest quantity of ideas; however, the authors noted, that quantity does not necessarily indicate originality of ideas and certainly does not always lead to quality. Ultimately, the research indicated that the most effective way of instructing how to deal with ill-structured problems is through remote free association--"referring to a domain that is different from the original problem before the requirement for connecting two domains" (pg. 59).

Based on the results, the authors summarized four implications for designing/developing technological arrangements for instructing how to tackle ill-structure problems:

1. Involve students in real-life simulations to learn how to solve ill-structured problems.
2. Provide students with both domain-specific and domain-generic knowledge and skills for analysis of problem scenarios, generating ideas, selecting ideas, and implementing the ideas in practice.
3. Give remote or postponed references to the problem to promote more creative solutions.
4. Provide guidelines on how to manage the diversity of cognitive styles


Critique

This is a well-researched article that deserves further elaboration of its study. The article has properties that can be applied to the field of intelligence, especially regarding intelligence collection and collaboration, considering intelligence questions often entail solving for ill-structured scenarios. On a spectrum, intelligence analysts in collaboration aim at finding the happy medium between group think and dominant thinking patterns (convergent thinking) and divergent thinking. It would be interesting to see this study enacted upon real world professionals. The study is lacking in that it leaves out what type of individuals the students in the members organization are. What type of students involved in the group is undetermined and could possibly play a role in their input. Are they honors students? From what departments did students come from? These factors may have had an effect on the results. It would also be interesting to see from what students in what departments did the majority of insightful, original solutions come from. Perhaps different subjects require different critical thinking and analytic skills than others, something which may effect the way in which students arrive at certain solutions.

Reference:

Stoyanov, S., & Kirschner, P. (2007). Effect of Problem Solving Support and Cognitive Styles on Idea Generation: Implications for Technology-Enhanced Learning. Journal Of Research On Technology In Education, 40(1), 49-63.