Curiosity, a valuable but underestimated qualification

What a lot of people don't know is that there are different types of curiosity.

• Firstly, there is Perceptual Curiosity. This can be defined as the interest in novel perceptual stimuli and motivation for visual and sensory inspection. Very often, perceptual curiosity declines with continued exposure.
• On the opposite site of Perceptual Curiosity, we can find Epistemic Curiosity, which is the desire to obtain new knowledge expected to stimulate intellectual interests. This, however, is a very broad trait and it involves two basic, separate types of curiosity:
  • Diversive Curiosity, which is less goal-directed and interest-motivated. It reflects the desire to explore and to seeking novel simulation to avoid boredom.
  • Specific Curiosity is more targeted and competence-motivated. It reflects the desire for a particular piece of information, is goal-oriented and problem-focused. Specific curiosity can drive employees to examine distinct problems in order to understand them better and identify potential solutions.

Several ways a company can stimulate the curiosity of employees:

• Value and reward curiosity
• Allow and teach them to ask quality questions
• Teach skepticism by asking the employees to question "why" more often, and to search for additional evidence before accepting someone's claims as being true
• Create opportunities for more curious and less curious individuals to work together in project-based learning

SOURCE: https://www.raps.org/news-and-articles/news-articles/2019/7/curiosity-one-of-lifes-most-valuable-commodities