Teaching Creative Process across Disciplines

While there is great interest in higher education about teaching creative process, there have been relatively few studies of how courses can facilitate the development of creative skills. The goal of this study was to document how college instructors structure courses intended to develop students’ creative processes. The study data included interviews from instructors and students using a critical case sample of fifteen courses at a single U.S. University. A qualitative analysis of the transcripts yielded a set of 14 pedagogical elements appearing across courses. Common elements were open‐ended projects and skill‐building activities, and less frequently, risk taking experiences and self‐reflection. The sample included undergraduate courses in engineering, education, the liberal arts, and the arts, and the elements observed were often shared across courses from different disciplines. These findings provide a diverse set of pedagogical approaches and opportunities for building creative process skills within undergraduate courses.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/148345/1/jocb158.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/148345/2/jocb158_am.pd

Organizational Influences on Interdisciplinary Interactions during Research and Design of Large-Scale Complex Engineered Systems

The design of large-scale complex engineered systems (LaCES) such as an aircraft is inherently interdisciplinary. Multiple engineering disciplines, drawing from a team of hundreds to thousands of engineers and scientists, are woven together throughout the research, development, and systems engineering processes to realize one system. Though research and development (R&D) is typically focused in single disciplines, the interdependencies involved in LaCES require interdisciplinary R&D efforts. This study investigates the interdisciplinary interactions that take place during the R&D and early conceptual design phases in the design of LaCES. Our theoretical framework is informed by both engineering practices and social science research on complex organizations. This paper provides preliminary perspective on some of the organizational influences on interdisciplinary interactions based on organization theory (specifically sensemaking), data from a survey of LaCES experts, and the authors experience in the research and design. The analysis reveals couplings between the engineered system and the organization that creates it. Survey respondents noted the importance of interdisciplinary interactions and their significant benefit to the engineered system, such as innovation and problem mitigation. Substantial obstacles to interdisciplinarity are uncovered beyond engineering that include communication and organizational challenges. Addressing these challenges may ultimately foster greater efficiencies in the design and development of LaCES and improved system performance by assisting with the collective integration of interdependent knowledge bases early in the R&D effort. This research suggests that organizational and human dynamics heavily influence and even constrain the engineering effort for large-scale complex systems

Evidence-based design heuristics for idea generation

How do product designers create multiple concepts to consider? To address this question, we combine evidence from four empirical studies of design process and outcomes, including award-winning products, multiple concepts for a project by an experienced industrial designer, and concept sets from 48 industrial and engineering designers for a single design problem. This compilation of over 3450 design process outcomes is analyzed to extract concept variations evident across design problems and solutions. The resulting set of patterns, in the form of 77 Design Heuristics, catalog how designers appear to introduce intentional variation into conceptual product designs. These heuristics provide ‘cognitive shortcuts’ that can help designers generate more, and more varied, candidate concepts to consider in the early phases of design

The role of predictive features in retrieving analogical cases

Access to prior cases in memory is a central issue in analogical reasoning. Previous research accounts for access in terms of overall similarity between complete new exemplars compared to complete stored instances and stresses the relative importance of surface-level similarities in access to complete cases (Gentner & Landers, 1985; Rattermann & Gentner, 1987). However, for cross-domain remindings, abstract similarities capture the important commonalities between cases ( Schank, 1982; Seifert, McKoon, Abelson, & Ratcliff, 1986). Therefore, models of analogy must account for structural-level remindings when they do occur in terms of abstract similarities. In planning and problem-solving tasks, a stored exemplar may be more useful if accessed before the new pattern is complete, when past experience can bring to bear possible solutions or warn of potential dangers while the outcome is yet undetermined. Further, different partial sets of abstract features may result in differing access to analogous cases. Features that predict when prior cases might be useful to problem solving could serve as better retrieval cues than other abstract cues that are equally similar, yet less distinctive to the specific problem situation. To test these hypotheses, several experiments were conducted using thematic stories in a modification of the reminding paradigm developed by Gentner and Landers (1985). By examining the relative effectiveness of subsets of features in accessing relevant cases, it was found that a subset of abstract cue features predicting when a planning failure might occur led to more reliable access to complete prior analogies than did a subset of abstract features expressing specific information about planning decisions and outcomes. Further experiments show that how distinctly the feature sets characterize the conditions leading up to the planning decision point, and not differences in the overall similarity to the case, determines access based on abstract cues.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/29825/1/0000172.pd

Opportunism and Learning

There is a tension in the world between complexity and simplicity. On one hand, we are faced with a richness of environment and experience that is at times overwhelming. On the other, we seem to be able to cope and even thrive within this complexity through the use of simple scripts, stereotypical judgements, and habitual behaviors. In order to function in the world, we have idealized and simplified it in a way that makes reasoning about it more tractable. As a group and as individuals, human agents search for and create islands of simplicity and stability within a sea of complexity and change.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/46870/1/10994_2004_Article_422944.pd

Making the connection: Generalized knowledge structures in story understanding

Six experiments examined the connections in memory between two stories describing the same action sequence. The action sequences represented script-like MOP structures such as eating at a restaurant, like those proposed by Schank (1982. Dynamic memory: A theory of reminding and learning in computers and people. New York: Cambridge University Press). In the experimental procedure, subjects read a long list of stories, and then, after reading all the stories, they were presented with a list of phrases for which they were required to make old/new recognition judgments. Connections among the stories in memory were examined with pairs of phrases placed in the test list such that a priming phrase immediately preceded a target phrase. When a priming phrase was from the same story as its target phrase, responses to the target were facilitated. When a priming phrase was from another story of the same MOP as the target, responses were facilitated only if the test phrases were related to the MOP; there was no significant facilitation if the test phrases were not related to the MOP. In the case where the phrases were related to the MOP, there was as much facilitation when the phrases were from different stories as when they were from the same story. These results are shown to contradict previously proposed models of memory for script-like sequences, and a new, limited encoding, model is proposed.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/27673/1/0000056.pd

The social psychology of seatbelt use

Two studies examined interventions to increase compliance with seat belt laws. Both studies included physical reminder objects and social influence elements. The first study with a lower base rate (and lower SES profile) showed a 20% improvement in compliance in the 2 weeks following the intervention. The second study had a higher initial base rate (85%), which increased to approximately 90% in the 2 weeks following the intervention. The improvement was significant for the larger (white) samples in the study, but only for drivers (not passengers). Because the physical reminder objects were rarely present in the cars on subsequent observation, it appears the social influence manipulations were responsible for the increase in compliance. Further study is needed to determine whether knowledge of future monitoring for the behavior, or simply knowledge of social comparison information, is responsible for these effects.U.S. Department of Transportation/NHTSA; Office of Behavioral Safety Research (OBSR)http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/86095/1/102761.pd

Design Heuristics in Engineering Concept Generation

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/94902/1/j.2168-9830.2012.tb01121.x.pd

Design by taking perspectives: How engineers explore problems

BackgroundProblem exploration includes identifying, framing, and defining design problems and bounding problem spaces. Intentional and unintentional changes in problem understanding naturally occur as designers explore design problems to create solutions. Through problem exploration, new perspectives on the problem can emerge along with new and diverse ideas for solutions. By considering multiple problem perspectives varying in scope and focus, designers position themselves to increase their understandings of the “real” problem and engage in more diverse idea generation processes leading to an increasing variety of potential solutions.Purpose/HypothesisThe purpose of this study was to investigate systematic patterns in problem exploration in the early design phases of mechanical engineers.Design/MethodThirty‐five senior undergraduate students and experienced designers with mechanical engineering backgrounds worked individually following a think‐aloud protocol. They explored problems and generated solutions for two of four randomly assigned design problems. After generating solutions, participants framed and rewrote problem statements to reflect their perspectives on the design problem their solutions addressed. Thematic analysis and a priori codes guided the identification of problem exploration patterns within and across problems.ResultsThe set of patterns in engineers’ problem exploration that emerged from the analysis documents alternative strategies in exploring problems to arrive at solutions. The results provide evidence that engineering designers, working individually, apply both problem‐specific and more general strategies to explore design problems.ConclusionsOur study identified common patterns in the explorations of presented problems by individual engineering designers. The observed patterns, described as Problem Exploration Perspectives, capture alternative approaches to discovering problems and taking multiple problem perspectives during design. Learning about Problem Exploration Perspectives may be helpful in creating alternative perspectives on a design problem, potentially leading to more varied and innovative solutions. This paper concludes with an extended example illustrating the process of applying Problem Exploration Perspectives to move between problem perspectives to generate varied design outcomes.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/149675/1/jee20263_am.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/149675/2/jee20263.pd