Development and Validation of Design Ideation Models for Conceptual Engineering Design

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The objective of this research project is to produce the knowledge needed to evaluate the effectiveness of engineering design idea generation methods and to distinguish between their necessary and superfluous components. This research will combine the highly controlled lab experiments and atomic process models from cognitive science with design experiments from design research. Instead of conducting experiments by using an idea generation method in its entirety, each method will be decomposed into its key "ideation" components and its overall effectiveness predicted by testing the effectiveness of its components and their mutual interactions. Lab experiments will be directed at studying key ideation components individually, while the design experiments will examine interaction between components and their relation to outcome by mutating their constituent components. Explanations for why and how ideation components are effective will be researched from accepted models of atomic processes and structures already available in cognitive science. Effectiveness will be evaluated in terms of four measures: fluency, quality, variety, and novelty of design concepts generated. The results of the study will be consolidated into a model of design ideation by combining and modifying several elements from existing models. The proposed ideation model will be validated through final experiments in industry settings.Two important results should emerge from this research: (1) data from the empirical studies that can be interpreted in terms of both theory and applied practices, and (2) a system for pursuing additional research questions about ideational aspects of conceptual design theory. An understanding of the relationship of ideation processes to design outcome will help companies determine which method to use under given conditions and how to constitute design teams. This work will also help educators in finding better ways of teaching design synthesis.