The doctoral dissertations of the former Helsinki University of Technology (TKK) and Aalto University Schools of Technology (CHEM, ELEC, ENG, SCI) published in electronic format are available in the electronic publications archive of Aalto University - Aaltodoc.
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Idea Generation in Engineering Design: Application of a Memory Search Perspective and Some Experimental Studies

Matti Kalevi Perttula

Dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Science in Technology to be presented with due permission of the Department of Mechanical Engineering for public examination and debate in Auditorium K216 at Helsinki University of Technology (Espoo, Finland) on the 24th of November, 2006, at 12 noon.

Overview in PDF format (ISBN 951-22-8431-6)   [678 KB]
Dissertation is also available in print (ISBN 951-22-8430-8)

Abstract

Emphasis on creativity and innovation differentiates product design from many other organizational tasks. Designers need to be creative on demand, since design projects involve several occasions where a design team faces the challenge of finding a novel solution for an identified design problem. Thus, the ability to solve design problems productively by means of divergent idea generation is a precondition for finding appropriate solutions. At the same time, procedures and methods for idea generation are often based on intuitive belief systems rather than empirically validated theory. The general aim of this thesis was to address this knowledge gap between theory and practice.

A prerequisite for designing better procedures for idea generation is to achieve a basic understanding on how ideas actually come into being through conceiving the characteristics of the cognitive processes and structures that underlie this endeavor. The general approach taken here was to apply concepts and theories from psychology to the study of idea generation in the specialized discipline of engineering design. The research framework includes discussing psychological concepts, such as, creativity, memory search, and knowledge representation, along with describing an objective technique for assessing performance in terms of the number and variety of ideas produced during a session.

A specific objective of the study was to demonstrate and explain how and why externally-imposed examples may affect performance in design idea generation. Example exposure is conceptually similar to idea exchange that takes place in group idea generation meetings, therefore this issue was found relevant for research and practice. Recent theory and empirical evidence propose that idea exposure may both stimulate and interfere with generative processes underlying idea generation. A series of experimental studies was performed to study the extent to which these effects influenced performance in design idea generation. Contrary to prior studies, examples were shown to have very little effect on total performance, after considering some structural and temporal patterns that emerge in design idea generation.

This study shows that idea generation is not a random process governed solely by an individual's personal trait, but a relatively structured process that can be explained in terms of memory cognition. A new model of the idea generation process is proposed here, formed from the perspective of internal memory search. The model conceptualizes idea generation as a repeated search process which includes three main phases: problem interpretation, memory search, and knowledge adaptation, as well as two decision gates.

This thesis consists of an overview and of the following 6 publications:

  1. Perttula, M., Krause, C., and Sipilä, P., 2006, Does idea exchange promote productivity in design idea generation?, International Journal of CoCreation in Design and the Arts, Volume 2, Number 3, pages 125-138.
  2. Perttula, M., and Sipilä, P., 2006, The idea exposure paradigm in design idea generation, Journal of Engineering Design, in press.
  3. Perttula, M., and Liikkanen, L., 2006, Structural tendencies and exposure effects in design idea generation, In: Proceedings of the 2006 ASME International Design Engineering Technical Conferences, CD-ROM.
  4. Perttula, M., and Liikkanen, L., 2006, Exposure effects in design idea generation: Unconscious plagiarism or a product of sampling probability?, In: Jonsson, M. and Unnporsson, R. (Eds.), Proceedings of NordDesign 2006, Reykjavik: University of Iceland, pages 42-55.
  5. Perttula, M., and Liikkanen, L., 2005, Cue-based memory probing in idea generation, In: Gero, J. S. and Maher, M. L. (Eds.), Proceedings of the International Conference of Computational and Cognitive Models of Creative Design VI, Australia: University of Sydney, pages 195-210.
  6. Liikkanen, L., and Perttula, M., 2006, Contextual cueing and verbal stimuli in design idea generation, In: Gero, J. S. (Eds.), Proceedings of Design Computing and Cognition '06, Springer, pages 619-632.

Keywords: idea generation, memory search, design cognition, example exposure

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© 2006 Helsinki University of Technology

Last update 2011-05-26