On the Benefits and Pitfalls of Analogies for Innovative Design: Ideation Performance Based on Analogical Distance, Commonness, and Modality of Examples

Abstract

Drawing inspiration from examples by analogy can be a powerful tool for innovative design during conceptual ideation but also carries the risk of negative design outcomes (e.g., design fixation), depending on key properties of examples. Understanding these properties is critical for effectively harnessing the power of analogy. The current research explores how variations in analogical distance, commonness, and representation modality influence the effects of examples on conceptual ideation. Senior-level engineering students generated solution concepts for an engineering design problem with or without provided examples drawn from the U.S. Patent database. Examples were crossed by analogical distance (near-field vs. far-field), commonness (more vs. less-common), and modality (picture vs. text). A control group that received no examples was included for comparison. Effects were examined on a mixture of ideation process and product variables. Our results show positive effects of far-field and less-common examples on novelty and variability in quality of solution concepts. These effects are not modulated by modality. However, detailed analyses of process variables suggest divergent inspiration pathways for far-field vs. less-common examples. Additionally, the combination of far-field, less-common examples resulted in more novel concepts than in the control group. These findings suggest guidelines for the effective design and implementation of design-by-analogy methods, particularly a focus on far-field, less-common examples during the ideation process.

Design-by-analogy: experimental evaluation of a functional analogy search methodology for concept generation improvement

“…This problem was chosen because it is a real world, need-driven problem with great breadth of possible solutions that a mechanical engineer with the participants' knowledge base would feel comfortable attempting to solve. This problem has been used in similar earlier studies (Chan et al 2011;Fu et al 2013a, b).…”

“…Design-by-analogy has been shown to be an effective means in achieving innovation and novelty in design outcomes, where one such approach is the use of functional analogies (Chan et al 2011;Linsey et al 2008). The following sections review function representations and functional modeling and their roles in design-by-analogy.…”

“…During Phase 2 of the experiment, the analogy groups were presented the four patents corresponding to their respective group and given 10 min to study the patents (Chan et al 2011). They were given the patent abstract as well as a representative figure from the patent.…”

“…Selections of four (4) patents were chosen from each set of search results based on both near-field and far-field analogies to the design problem as given in Table 3 (Chan et al 2011;Fu et al 2013). The patents are selected from the search engine results based on both the relevancy score as well as the analogical distance as evaluated by a subject-matter expert.…”

Fostering Innovative Skills Within the Classroom: A Qualitative Analysis from Interviews with 60 Innovators

“…Researchers have shown, for example, that novel solutions are rarely retrieved from memory, but rather by an analogy with a solution to a (distantly) related problem. 5 Furthermore, designers can have much better success in analogical retrieval if they are able to capture the problem in the right representation format. 6  Engineering educators have focused on understanding the innovation processes by studying teams and individuals participating in design activities.…”