Lillien Ellis

When do thieves prefer to steal ideas — early or late in development? A new study by UVA Darden's Lillien M. Ellis explores the psychology of idea theft and finds a mismatch between when creators think their ideas are most vulnerable to theft and when idea thieves actually prefer to strike.

As AI blurs the lines between human-made and AI-generated creative output, it raises important questions: What counts as “real” creative output in the age of AI? Does using AI in the creative process change how leaders should manage creative teams? Lillien Ellis, assistant professor at UVA Darden, delves into these questions in a new case.

It turns out that people perceive idea theft as a greater transgression than money theft and judge it more harshly, according to new research from Darden Professor Lillien Ellis. Further, people perceive the theft of creative ideas as worse than the theft of practical ones.