Informing the design of computer-based environments to support creativity

This paper addresses the problem of creating a human-centered computer-based support environment to facilitate innovation and creative work. It focuses on key factors to be considered in the design and development of any such user support environment regardless of the specific domain for which it may be implemented. The paper reviews psychological literature on how creativity, insight and innovation occur and how they can be fostered in working environments. Based on this discussion the paper then describes a generic set of user or functional requirements intended to apply to any domain-specific computer-based working environment for support of creative activities. The paper proposes the conceptual model of a Virtual Workbench as a way of capturing some of these requirements and as a way of organizing thinking about the design of creative problem solving environments (CPSEs) in general. Finally, the paper proposes one possible translation of the Virtual Workbench and some of the functional requirements into a view of a generic model for CPSEs by describing three component sets of functions that would be a subset of those needed in almost any domain-specific CPSE.