Iterative transformations for deeper exploration during concept generation

Abstract

Engineering designers often generate multiple concepts to increase novelty and diversity among early solution candidates. Many past studies have focused on creating new concepts “from scratch;” however, designers at every level become fixated on their initial designs and struggle to generate different ideas. In line with prior work on design transformations, we propose a concept generation process of iterative transformation to create new ideas by intentionally introducing major changes in form, nature, or function to an existing concept. A study of this concept generation process recruited beginning engineering students likely to benefit from an alternative to "blank slate" generation. Working alone in a single test session, students generated an initial concept for a presented design problem. Then, they were instructed to generate another concept by transforming their initial design into a new concept and repeated this process to create three more concepts. In a second design round, students were asked to consider 7 Design Heuristics strategies to prompt possible transformations for their concepts. Beginning again with their initial concept, each student generated another set of four transformed concepts using iterative transformation. The analysis considered 60 initial concepts and 476 transformed concepts with and without the use of Design Heuristics. We created Design Transformation Diagrams to observe links (sequential, non-sequential, or both) between transformed concepts within each set of four concepts and between the two sets. Three patterns across the diagrams were identified: Fully Sequential, Sequential with Deviation, and Divergent. When aided by Design Heuristics, transformations included more non-sequential links, suggesting synthesis, refinement, and extension of other prior concepts, and resulting in more varied and distinct transformations. This iterative transformation process may support more diversity in concepts generated through a deeper exploration of related concepts without requiring an escape from the influence of existing concepts. Concept generation strategies like Design Heuristics may support engineering students as they learn to expand their early exploration of design concepts.