Enhancing creativity in the concept generation phase: Implementation of black box as a tool for analogical reasoning

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Tezin Türü: Yüksek Lisans

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, Mimarlık Fakültesi, Endüstriyel Tasarım Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2007

Öğrenci: ÖZGE ERTOPTAMIŞ

Danışman: NAZ AYŞE GÜZİDE Z. BÖREKÇİ

Özet:

In recent years, the field of design has met new grounds with the growing awareness among design researchers of the potential relationships between cognitive studies of creativity and computational modeling. The turn of the studies has given rise to the emergence of a new paradigm of modeling and understanding mental processes in creative design. This study tries to gain further insight into the creative occurrence by blending virtual experiences with designer actions in a model of creative thinking in concept generation phase based on the Geneplore Model by Finke et al. (1995) and supported by analogy construction incorporating the implementation of a computer based tool (Black Box) running on PC platform as a potential immanent part of the concept generation phase. Black Box is devised in such a way that the core of the constructive process of the analogy relies on the designer’s expressional, perceptual and conceptual actions which are presented in the traditional methods of sketching and writing, whereas the change and expansion of the design space is realized through the virtual worlds the tool offers via the computer screen. The research method is based on the development of Black Box tool and its subsequent implementation in a study with eight experienced design consultants, utilizing a procedure composed of preliminary interview, observational protocol analysis, questionnaire and retrospective interview. Through encoding actions of individual designers by means of their maps in the computational tool, the study yields significant results in revealing differing thinking maps of different designers which have been used to propose a general creative thinking map of concept generation in Black Box presented in a way to be adapted for further studies. Moreover, the study provided insight on the methods used to assist creativity in concept generation by different designers, on the selection of inspirational material and on the integration of analogies as knowledge transformers to evoke design concepts.