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The Creative Process pp 181–207Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

The Creative Process in Engineering: Teaching Innovation to Engineering Students

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Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Creativity and Culture ((PASCC))

Abstract

This chapter reports on three pedagogical experiments related to training engineering students to be creative and innovative. After briefly introducing epistemological and business foundations, basic methodological blocks of innovation engineering are reviewed. Observations reported in Study 1 suggest that a constructivist process with a strong focus on user needs and a weak focus on technical constraints may increase student’s creativity. These recommendations are tested in Study 2, which highlights a new set of innovation drivers (e.g., mentorship, group composition) and some limitations in the implementation of user studies. To overcome them, an original Need-seeker method is presented and evaluated in Study 3. The 3 experiments result in a set of insights on engineers’ creative process and on innovation training for students.

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Acknowledgements

Study 1 was partly funded by ANR-CREAPRO project . We are very grateful to the experts who participated in study 1 and study 2 and of course to the 112 engineering students from 3 different schools who composed our experimental population.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. LINEACT-CESI, Paris, France

    Stéphanie Buisine

  2. Paris Descartes University, Paris, France

    Samira Bourgeois-Bougrine

Authors
  1. Stéphanie Buisine
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  2. Samira Bourgeois-Bougrine
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Stéphanie Buisine .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Paris Descartes University, Paris, France

    Todd Lubart

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Buisine, S., Bourgeois-Bougrine, S. (2018). The Creative Process in Engineering: Teaching Innovation to Engineering Students . In: Lubart, T. (eds) The Creative Process. Palgrave Studies in Creativity and Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-50563-7_7

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