Fundamental Studies of Generating Concepts Through Design-by-Analogy

该项目旨在调查、开发、测试和部署创新的设计方法，通过类比产生概念。类比设计是一种想法产生的领域，在这个领域中，来自一个给定领域的经过验证的解决方案为另一个问题领域的使用提供了视觉、美学、几何或功能上的相似性。这个地区的存在被记录在整个历史中。例如，最早的蒸汽机车就是基于对马车的类比。虽然类比作为创意设计灵感的存在是众所周知的，但在类比设计中使用的认知过程，特别是在工程等复杂问题上，还远未被理解。研究中的这一空白为工程学和心理学这两个学科之间的合作提供了一个独特的机会。通过这种合作，类比设计的工作将开发基本的实验数据、原理和技术，以提高设计师和行业的创造和创新能力。本研究涉及一系列类比设计的实验，实验对象均具有工程背景。在第一阶段，将进行三个并行实验。这些实验将确定类比的潜在基础域的适当表示（如物理产品、图表和/或单词描述），优选的类比描述，如识别可能的类比的功能，以及概念生成媒体，如表达类比设计思想的操作符。这些实验的结果，以原理的形式，将被整合成一个系统的设计方法，以提高设计的质量。用这种方法的实验将探索其对个人和团队的有效性。概念生成的学习模块将在一些美国大学创建和评估。评估将跨越种族、性别和经济界限进行。结果将分发给一般学术使用，并将与工业界共享，以插入经过测试的方法，以改进及时的创新。

This project seeks to investigate, develop, test, and deploy innovative design methods for generating concepts through analogies. Design-by-analogy is the area of idea generation in which proven solutions from a given domain provide visual, aesthetic, geometric, or functional similarity for use in another problem domain. The existence of this area is noted throughout recorded history. The first steam locomotives, for example, were based on analogies to the horse-drawn stagecoach. While the existence of analogies as inspiration for creative design is well known, the cognitive processes used in design-by-analogy, especially for complex problems such as in engineering, is far from understood. This gap in the research provides a unique opportunity to form a collaboration between two disciplines, engineering and psychology. Through this collaboration, the work on design-by-analogy will develop fundamental experimental data, principles, and techniques for enhancing both designer's and industry's ability to create and innovate.The research involves a series of experiments in design-by-analogy using subjects with an engineering background. In the first phase, three parallel experiments will be executed. These experiments will determine the appropriate representations for potential base domains for analogies (such as physical products, diagrams, and/or word descriptions), preferred depictions of analogies, such as functions for identifying possible analogies, and concept generation media, such as manipulatives for expressing design-by-analogy ideas. The results of these experiments, in the form of principles, will be integrated into a systematic design method to enhance the quality of the designs. Experiments with this method will explore its efficacy both with individuals and teams. Learning modules for concept generation will be created and assessed at a number of U.S. Universities. Assessments will be performed across ethnic, gender, and economic boundaries. Results will be distributed for general academic use and will be shared with industry to interject tested approaches for improving timely innovation.