5 Questions with Blaine Horton, Incoming Assistant Professor of Management
Q: You earned a B.A. in Literature before pursuing management science and psychology. How has your humanities background shaped your approach to research and analysis?
Literature was actually one of the paths that led me to management science and psychology. As a literature student, I was drawn to writers who seemed to be part artist, part philosopher and part proto-psychologist—people asking questions about identity, attention, motivation, social life and what makes an experience meaningful.
My humanities background taught me that ideas do not matter only because they are true. They matter because of how they are framed, felt, remembered and shared. That perspective still shapes how I conduct research. I am interested not only in whether something works, but in why it captures attention, how it changes perception and what it reveals about human behavior. The humanities helped me ask those questions. Psychology and management science gave me tools for testing them.
Q: You have said that your interests can be summarized by the quote, “Life is too short not to try new things and be yourself.” In what ways has this philosophy influenced your approach to research and your academic career?
That philosophy shows up in almost everything I study. Much of my research is about creativity, self-presentation and the social life of ideas: how people come up with new possibilities, how they decide which ideas are worth pursuing and how they persuade others to help bring those ideas into the world.
Trying new things matters because creativity rarely comes from a single source. It comes from accumulated experiences, unexpected combinations and the willingness to let different parts of your life speak to each other. Being yourself matters because ideas do not move through the world on their own. Ideas are carried by people: in how clearly they explain them, how much courage they have to share them and whether others trust them enough to listen. For me, research is partly about where good ideas come from and partly about how people build the human connections that allow those ideas to matter.
Q: You spent ten years as a research assistant at Columbia University. Is there a project or experience from that time that was especially meaningful to you?
One project I remain especially proud of is a series of studies on artificial intelligence and artwork that I conducted before large language models had entered the public conversation in the way they have now. We examined how people evaluate creative work when it is attributed to a human versus an AI system and what those judgments reveal about the value people place on human creativity.
What I still appreciate about that project is that it offered a more hopeful way to think about technological change. AI will certainly continue to reshape creative work, education and organizations. But our findings suggested that people still care deeply about human intention, effort and expression. In that sense, AI does not have to diminish human value. If used thoughtfully, it can also help us see more clearly what we value about human creativity in the first place. Put another way, sometimes new technologies not only show us what might change. They also show us what we are not willing to lose.
Q: Given your expertise in creativity, what strategies or practices do you use to maintain inspiration in both your teaching and daily activities?
I sometimes joke that I am “terminally artistic.” I have never met an art form I did not want to learn about. I play music almost daily (usually ukulele or Irish flute). I write poetry. I enjoy live theater. I read widely. All of these practices help me stay curious because they are rooted in exploration. I like to think they make me a better researcher, teacher and colleague.
They certainly shape how I teach. A lecture, at its best, is another form of art: a careful effort to direct attention. Like a poem, a song, or a scene on stage, a good class asks people to notice something they may have overlooked and to feel why it matters. That does not mean making class less rigorous. It means remembering that students are not filing cabinets. They remember ideas better when those ideas have shape, feeling, consequence and a reason to stay. My goal is not just for students to remember a concept for an exam, but for them to carry it into how they see themselves, their work and the people around them; that is what the best art does.
Q: Looking ahead, what are you most looking forward to in your research, teaching or within the University at Albany community?
Looking ahead, I am excited to keep learning and to see what becomes possible. One of my favorite parts of this job is taking in a lot of information—research, conversations, student questions, changes in the world—and distilling it into something useful for others. Teaching and research both depend on that kind of synthesis: noticing what is changing, asking why it matters and helping people make sense of it.
That feels especially important now, when the world of work is changing in ways that are both exciting and unsettling. Students are asking real questions about AI, creativity, careers and what it means to do meaningful work in a shifting world. Those questions are not separate from organizational behavior; they are at the heart of it. New ideas change organizations, but organizations also shape which ideas survive, spread and matter. Over the next few years, I am excited to keep exploring those questions in my research and teaching and to help students develop the curiosity, judgment and confidence to navigate whatever comes next.