game changer: structural folds with cognitive distance in video game development

1
game changerstructural folds with cognitive
distance in video game development
david starkcolumbia university
2
My research collaborators Balazs VedresCo-PI,
Central European University Mathijs de VaanPhD
candidate, Columbia University This project
supported by a grant from the National Science
Foundation.
3
Innovationis recombinationproduced by the
collision of evaluativeprinciples.
4
Innovationat the overlap
5
(No Transcript)
6
Structural FoldsGenerative Disruption in
Overlapping Groups
Vedres and StarkAm J Soc 2010
7
Innovationat the overlap
Brokerageat the gap
Structural fold
Structural hole
8
(No Transcript)
9
(No Transcript)
10
(No Transcript)
11
(No Transcript)
12
(No Transcript)
13
This project brings these analytic moments
together, combining attention to structural
features
14
This project brings these analytic moments
together, combining attention to structural
features and attention to cultural
practices.
15
Network analysts have tended to assume that
cognitive distance mirrors social distance. We
relax that assumption.
16
What matters in explaining creative success?
The diversity of the cognitive/cultural elements
or the structural folding of group
membership?
17
Russian semiotician Yuri Lotman
Semiosphere not as a code But as multiplicity of
codes
18
Russian semiotician Yuri Lotman
Semiosphere not as a code But as multiplicity of
codes
19
Russian semiotician Yuri Lotman
Semiosphere not as a code But as multiplicity of
codes
The more difficult the translationof the
non-intersecting, the more valuablethis
paradoxical communication becomes. The tension
of two tendencies.
20
(No Transcript)
21
Data
22
16,507 video games139,727 individuals
Global video game production, 1979-2009
23
We operationalize cognitive distance and group
structure by studying team formation. How does
the history of a teams makeup shape its
creative success?
24
How to do historical network analysis when the
units of analysis are fleeting episodic projects?
25
It is not the history of the team per se that is
of interest. Instead, we gather very detailed
data on the histories of the team members. With
these we can reconstruct the cognitive distance
and the community memberships for every project
team.
26
(No Transcript)
27
(No Transcript)
28
(No Transcript)
29
(No Transcript)
30
(No Transcript)
31
For 139,727 individuals in 16,507 production
teams across 30 years
32
Analysis
33
Cognitive diversity Videos games differ in their
stylistic elements. Each game has been coded
for the presence or absence of 105 different
stylistic (cognitive) elements.
34
As they move through the project space,
individuals are exposed to various cognitive
elements
35
allowing us to construct a cognitive profile
for every individual and from these to compute
for every team and for all communities within a
team a measure of cognitive distance.
36
Group structure Videos games differ in their
group structure depending on the cohesive ties
that are formed as members worked with each other
in the past. Through these cohesive structures
members acquire informal codes of work and tacit
knowledge of each other.
37
As they move through the project space,
individuals have opportunities to work together
with others
38
As they move through the project space,
individuals have opportunities to work together
with others
39
allowing us to reconstruct for every team the
distinctive cohesive groups to identify the
cognitive distance across these groups and to
identify, in particular, whether these groups
are isolated, brokered, or structurally
folded.
40
(No Transcript)
41
We then test whether cognitive distance and
structural folding contribute to creative
success. We expect to find significant positive
effects for cognitive folding, i.e., when
cognitively distant groups are structurally
folded.
42
Dependent variables Our dependent variables
recognize that cultural products can be
innovative without being successful (and vice
versa). Therefore...
43
Three dependent variables 1) A project can be
innovative it can be stylistically
distinctive. 2) A project can be critically
successful. 3) But a project will be a game
changer only when it is innovative and critically
successful.
44
Findings
45
(No Transcript)
46
(No Transcript)
47
(No Transcript)
48
(No Transcript)
49
(No Transcript)
50
(No Transcript)
51
The effects of structural folding are compounded
when cohesive groups are not only overlapping but
also cognitively distant. Such cognitive
folding mobilizes a productive tension of rules,
roles, and categories that promotes successful
innovation.