Analogy and Design 1 Modality and Representation in Analogy

Abstract:  Analogy and Design 2 Design-by-analogy is a powerful part of the design process across the wide variety of modalities used by designers such as linguistic descriptions, sketches and diagrams. We need tools to support people?s ability to find and use analogies, and a deeper understanding of the cognitive mechanisms underlying design and analogy is a crucial step in developing these tools. This paper presents an experiment that explores the effects of representation within the modality of sketching, the effects of functional models, and the retrieval and use of analogies. We find that the level of abstraction for the representation of prior knowledge and the representation of a current design problem both affect people?s ability to retrieve and use analogous solutions. A general semantic description in memory facilitates retrieval of that prior knowledge. The ability to find and use an analogy is also facilitated by having an appropriate functional model of the problem. These studies have a number of implications for the development of tools to support design-by-analogy.