Creativity in the marketing and consumer behavior literature: a structured review and a research agenda

Creativity is one of the most studied concepts in social sciences. Its relevance in disparate disciplines has stimulated the production of a plethora of contributions. Not surprisingly, marketing and consumer behavior scholars have devoted significant efforts to the study of creativity and have offered a relevant though fragmented corpus of contributions that needs a synthesis to guide further research on such a pervasive, yet crucial, concept. This article presents and discusses a structured review of studies on creativity published in eight major marketing and consumer behavior journals. We classify previous research upon a popular alliterative model—the 4Ps of creativity, person, process, product, and press—to present a comprehensive view of the state of research on creativity. The review is instrumental to the identification of eight research directions, two for each of the 4Ps areas, for future research that marketing and consumer behavior scholars can pursue to produce novel and meaningful contributions on one of the most elusive constructs in social sciences.