Large-Scale Group Brainstorming and Deliberation Using Swarm Intelligence and Generative AI

Louis Rosenberg, Hans Schumann, Christopher Dishop, Gregg Willcox, Anita Woolley, Ganesh Mani

2025

Abstract

Conversational Swarm Intelligence (CSI) is an GenAI-based method for enabling real-time conversational deliberations among networked human groups of potentially unlimited size. Based on the biological principle of Swarm Intelligence and modelled on the decision-making dynamics of fish schools, CSI has been shown in prior studies to enable thoughtful conversations among hundreds of real-time participants while amplifying group intelligence. It works by dividing a large population into a set of subgroups that are woven together by real-time AI agents called Conversational Surrogates. The present study focuses on the use of a CSI platform called Thinkscape to enable real-time brainstorming and prioritization among groups of 75 networked users. The study employed a variant of a common brainstorming intervention called an Alternative Use Task (AUT) and compared brainstorming using a CSI platform to a traditional text-chat environment. This comparison revealed that participants significantly preferred using CSI, reporting that it felt (i) more collaborative, (ii) more productive, and (iii) was better at surfacing quality answers. In addition, participants using CSI reported (iv) feeling more ownership and more buy-in in the top answers the group converged on and (v) reported feeling more heard as compared to a traditional chat environment. Overall, the results suggest that CSI is a promising GenAI-based method for brainstorming and prioritization at large scale.

Paper Citation

in Harvard Style

Rosenberg L., Schumann H., Dishop C., Willcox G., Woolley A. and Mani G. (2025). Large-Scale Group Brainstorming and Deliberation Using Swarm Intelligence and Generative AI. In Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems - Volume 1: ICEIS; ISBN 978-989-758-749-8, SciTePress, pages 867-872. DOI: 10.5220/0013379800003929

in Bibtex Style

@conference{iceis25,
author={Louis Rosenberg and Hans Schumann and Christopher Dishop and Gregg Willcox and Anita Woolley and Ganesh Mani},
title={Large-Scale Group Brainstorming and Deliberation Using Swarm Intelligence and Generative AI},
booktitle={Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems - Volume 1: ICEIS},
year={2025},
pages={867-872},
publisher={SciTePress},
organization={INSTICC},
doi={10.5220/0013379800003929},
isbn={978-989-758-749-8},
}

in EndNote Style

TY - CONF

JO - Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems - Volume 1: ICEIS
TI - Large-Scale Group Brainstorming and Deliberation Using Swarm Intelligence and Generative AI
SN - 978-989-758-749-8
AU - Rosenberg L.
AU - Schumann H.
AU - Dishop C.
AU - Willcox G.
AU - Woolley A.
AU - Mani G.
PY - 2025
SP - 867
EP - 872
DO - 10.5220/0013379800003929
PB - SciTePress