Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-28T03:28:22.026Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

CROWDSOURCING ENGINEERING DESIGN PROBLEMS: LEARNING FROM EXPERIENCES

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 June 2023

Chijioke C. Obieke ,
Jelena Milisavljevic-Syed  and
Ji Han
Chijioke C. Obieke
Affiliation:
University of Liverpool;
Jelena Milisavljevic-Syed
Affiliation:
Cranfield University;
Ji Han*
Affiliation:
University of Exeter
*
Han, Ji, University of Exeter, United Kingdom, [email protected]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

The availability of digital data in the fourth industrial revolution brings different trends with new opportunities and challenges for the engineering design community. As an opportunity, these trends would impact engineering design. However, the challenge is finding applications for these trends in engineering design. Crowdsourcing is one of the trends inspired by digital data. It is outsourcing an individually performed task to be mass-performed. This paper explores the application of crowdsourcing in identifying engineering design problems. Identifying an engineering design problem is an aspect of engineering design considered challenging but necessary for inventions. Secondary data from 63 invention-related cases and an interview with a renowned UK inventor are presented. The data contains scenarios on how the engineering design problems solved to qualify for a UK patent grant or application are identified. Lessons from the case studies are presented and discussed, especially regarding crowdsourcing engineering design problems. These seem to be promising ways of supporting the identification of new engineering design problems with inventive benefits once solved.

Keywords

Design engineeringCrowdsourcingEarly design phasesDigital DataProblem-exploring
Type
Article
Information
Proceedings of the Design Society , Volume 3: ICED23 , July 2023 , pp. 1107 - 1116
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
Copyright
The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press

References

Arifin, Z. (2019), “How is utility firm dealing with disruptive technologies? An empirical research of Indonesia Electricity Company”, 2019 IEEE Technology & Engineering Management Conference (TEMSCON), 2019, IEEE, pp. (1–8).Google Scholar
Atenstaedt, R. (2017), “Word cloud analysis of the BJGP: 5 years on”, British Journal of General Practice, 67, 231–232.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barrington, L., Ghosh, S., Greene, M., Har-Noy, S., Berger, J., Gill, S., Lin, A. Y.-M. and Huyck, C. (2011), “Crowdsourcing earthquake damage assessment using remote sensing imagery”, Annals of Geophysics, 54.Google Scholar
Brem, A. and Voigt, K.-I. (2009), “Integration of market pull and technology push in the corporate front end and innovation management—Insights from the German software industry”, Technovation, 29, 351–367.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brinkmann, S. and Kvale, S. (2018), Doing interviews, SAGE Publications Ltd, London.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clark, T., Foster, L., Sloan, L. and Bryman, A. (2021), Bryman's social research methods, Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Crawford, M. (2018), “How industry 4.0 impacts engineering design”. [Online] ASME Available at: (https://www.asme.org/engineering-topics/articles/manufacturing-design/industry-40-impacts-engineering-design ) (Accessed November 22, 2022).Google Scholar
Darbellay, F. (2020), ”Serendipity”, In: S, PRITZKER. & M, RUNCO. (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Creativity (Third Edition), Academic Press, Oxford, pp. (470-474). https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-809324-5.23791-7Google Scholar
Dawes, H., Dawes, C., Martin, G. and Macfarlane, A. (2006), “Making Things from New Ideas”, History of Technology Volume 26, 2005: Including Special Issue: Engineering Disasters, 26, 1.Google Scholar
Ding, R., Han, Q., Li, R., Li, T., Cui, Y. and Wu, P. (2019), “Unconscious versus conscious thought in creative science problem finding: Unconscious thought showed no advantage!”, Consciousness and cognition, 71, 109–113. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2019.03.010CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Du Preez, G. T. and Pistorius, C. W. (1999), “Technological threat and opportunity assessment”, Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 61, 215–234.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Einstein, A. and Infeld, L. (1938), The evolution of physics, Simon & Schuster, New York.Google Scholar
Fallis, D. (2008), “Toward an epistemology of Wikipedia”, Journal of the American Society for Information science and Technology, 59, 1662–1674.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fischer, G. (1994), “Turning breakdowns into opportunities for creativity”, Knowledge-Based Systems, 7, 221–232. https://doi.org/10.1016/0950-7051(94)90033-7CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Forbes, H., Han, J. and Schaefer, D. (2020), “A crowdsourcing data-driven approach for innovation”, The International Journal of Systematic Innovation, 6, 9–19.Google Scholar
Forbes, H., Schaefer, D., Panchal, J. and Han, J. (2019), “A design framework for social product development”, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, 69, 302–313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gall, M. D., Borg, W. R. and Gall, J. P. (1996), Educational research: An introduction, Longman Publishing, NY.Google Scholar
Gao, R., Wang, L., Teti, R., Dornfeld, D., Kumara, S., Mori, M. and Helu, M. (2015), “Cloud-enabled prognosis for manufacturing”, CIRP annals, 64, 749–772.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Getzels, J. W. (1979), “Problem finding: A theoretical note”, Cognitive Science - A Multidisciplinary Journal, 3, 167–172. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15516709cog0302_4CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grigorenko, E. L. (2019), “Creativity: a challenge for contemporary education”, Comparative Education, 55, 116.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Han, J., Park, D., Forbes, H. and Schaefer, D. (2020), “A computational approach for using social networking platforms to support creative idea generation”, Procedia CIRP, 91, 382–387.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harris, S. D. and Zeisler, S. (2002), “Weak signals: Detecting the next big thing”, The Futurist, 36, 21.Google Scholar
Heikkilä, J. and Heikkilä, M.(2017), “Innovation in Micro, Small and Medium Sized Enterprises: New Product Development, Business Model Innovation and Effectuation”, Bled eConference, 2017, pp. (36).Google Scholar
Hossain, A., Wahab, J. A. and Khan, M. S. R. (2022), “A Computer-Based Text Analysis of Al Jazeera, BBC, and CNN News Shares on Facebook: Framing Analysis on Covid-19 Issues”, Sage Open, 12, 21582440211068497.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howe, J. (2008), Crowdsourcing: How the power of the crowd is driving the future of business, Crown, New York.Google Scholar
Hubbell, M., Hard, S., Boots, M., Clarke, M. A. and Smith, J. E. (2010), “Pitch Stability of an Unpowered Ground Effect Vehicle”, ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, 2010, pp. (191–199).Google Scholar
Ioniță, D. and Onișor, L.-F. (2016), “Crowdsourcing and Outsourcing: Friends or Foes?”, Journal of Emerging Trends in Marketing and Management, 1, 52–61.Google Scholar
Isaksen, S. G. and Treffinger, D. J. (1985), Creative problem solving: The Basic Course, Bearly, NY.Google Scholar
Ishikawa, A. (2010), “Discovery, invention and serendipity”, Chinese Business Review, 9, 61.Google Scholar
Kershaw, T. C., Bhowmick, S., Seepersad, C. C. and Hölttä-Otto, K. (2019), “A decision tree based methodology for evaluating creativity in engineering design”, Frontiers in psychology, 10, 32.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lee, J. and Seo, D. (2016), “Crowdsourcing not all sourced by the crowd: An observation on the behavior of Wikipedia participants”, Technovation, 55, 14–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lee, L., Yu, R., Kan, J. and Gero, J. S.(2018), “Exploring the Differences Between Designing and Describing Designing”, Design Theory Research Symposium 12, 2018,pp.Google Scholar
Makris, C., Pispirigos, G. and Simos, M. A. (2020), “Text Semantic Annotation: A Distributed Methodology Based on Community Coherence”, Algorithms, 13, 160.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mednick, S. (1962), “The associative basis of the creative process”, Psychological review, 69, 220.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Molecke, G. and Pache, A.-C. (2019), “How do we know when social innovation works? A review and contingencymodel of social impact assessment”, Handbook of Inclusive Innovation, 83–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Naderi, B. (2018), Motivation of workers on microtask crowdsourcing platforms, Springer, Switzerland.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neiat, A. G. and Bouguettaya, A. (2018), Crowdsourcing of sensor cloud services, Springer, Switzerland.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
NIPO - Norwegian Industrial Property Office. (2022), What can be patented? [Online]. Patentstyret. Available at: www.patentstyret.no/en/services/patents/what-can-be-patented (02.02.2022).Google Scholar
Obieke, C., Milisavljevic-Syed, J. and Han, J. (2020), “Supporting Design Problem-exploring with Emergent Technologies”, Procedia CIRP, 91, 373–381. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procir.2020.02.189CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Obieke, C. C., Milisavljevic-Syed, J. and Han, J. (2021), “Data-driven creativity: computational problem-exploring in engineering design”, Proceedings of the Design Society, 1, 831–840. https://doi.org/10.1017/pds.2021.83CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Obieke, C. C., Milisavljevic-Syed, J., Silva, A. and Han, J. (2023), “A computational approach to identifying engineering design problems”, Journal of Mechanical Design, 145, 041406. https://doi.org/10.1115/1.4056496CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Olewnik, A., Yerrick, R., Simmons, A., Lee, Y. and Stuhlmiller, B. (2020), “Defining open-ended problem solving through problem typology framework”, International Journal of Engineering Pedagogy (IJEP ), 10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Revell, T. and Andersen, K. (2021), “The Telling of Things: Imagining Through, With and About Machines”, In: M, ROZENDAAL. MARENKO, C., & ODOM, B., W. (Ed.), Designing Smart Objects in Everyday Life: Intelligences, Agencies, Ecologies, Bloomsbury, London, pp. (57 - 71).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Saad, I. and Chakhar, S.(2010), “Aggregation procedure based on majority principle for collective identification of firm's crucial knowledge”, World Summit on Knowledge Society, 2010, Springer, pp. (346–352).Google Scholar
Sutherland, B. R. (2019), “Lighting Policies Spur Global Innovation”, Joule, 3, 639–640.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thaler, S. (2020), “The creativity machine paradigm”, In: CARAYANNIS, E. G. (Ed.), Encyclopedia of creativity, invention, innovation, and entrepreneurship, Springer Nature Switzerland AG, pp. (650 - 658).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Treffinger, D. J. (1995), “Creative problem solving: Overview and educational implications”, Educational Psychology Review, 7, 301–312.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vale, J., Gordon, K., Kirkscey, R. and Hill, J. (2020), “Student and Faculty Perceptions of Capstone Purposes: What can Engineering Learn from Other Disciplines?”, Proceedings of the Canadian Engineering Education Association (CEEA). https://doi.org/10.24908/pceea.vi0.14149CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vianna, F. R. P. M., Graeml, A. R. and Peinado, J. (2020), “The role of crowdsourcing in industry 4.0: A systematic literature review”, International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing, 33, 411–427.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wang, K., Nickerson, J. and Sakamoto, Y. (2018), “Crowdsourced idea generation: The effect of exposure to an original idea”, Creativity and Innovation Management, 27, 196–208.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wattenberg, M. and Viégas, F. B. (2008), “The word tree, an interactive visual concordance”, IEEE transactions on visualization and computer graphics, 14, 1221–1228.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wood, D.(2013), “Fichtes Conception of Infinity in the Bestimmung des Menshcen”, 2013, State University of New York Press, pp.(155–171).Google Scholar
Xue, L., Leung, X. Y. and Ma, S. D. (2022), “What makes a good “guest”: Evidence from Airbnb hosts' reviews”, Annals of Tourism Research, 95, 103426.CrossRefGoogle Scholar