Leaving the Beaten Tracks in Creative Work –A Design Theory for Systems that Support Convergent and Divergent Thinking

摘要

Existing knowledge is a vital prerequisite for creativity. It provides a central source of inspiration for new ideasnand determines the pathways available for creative problem solving. Notwithstanding its indisputable role,nknowledge may also compromise creativity. The human mind is prone to reproduce what it is used to, and thenprovision of explicit knowledge constitutes a potential inhibitor of imagination. Hence, IT systems supportingncreative work have to support creative individuals by extending their personal knowledge while, at the samentime, preventing them from merely walking down beaten tracks. In this article, grounded in theory on humanncognition and literature on creativity support, we propose a design theory for IT systems that support bothnconvergent and divergent thinking, that is, the central cognitive processes in creative work. We provide detailsnon a prototypical implementation, discuss an illustrative case from the creative industries in order tondemonstrate the design’s applicability, and outline plans for an empirical evaluation of the proposed designntheory