Functional fixedness… and Zen
So much of what is talked about in HCD/UCD and Design Thinking is overcoming what in Psych terms is referred to as ‘functional fixedness’. Ie: ‘knowing things’ about a subject. This is reflected in assumptions – which need to be constantly re-examined to see if they are still relevant/valid. And it is reflected in choice of analysis methods. Indeed – any aspect of a problem – once it is ‘known’, I would suggest, ceases to be a tool for innovation – which in a slightly different permutation, is related to the cognitive bias known as the ‘Curse of Knowledge‘.
All the methods suggested by various design schools such as IDEO or Stanford:
- Looking at extreme cases
- Brainstorming
- Interdisciplinary knowledge
- Empathy
…are all just tools for overcoming functional fixedness. To my mind this sounds so very much like the ‘beginners mind’ of Zen practice. Zazen.
Zen Mind, Beginners Mind. David Suzuki, 1970.
A monk asked Tozan when he was weighing some flax: `What is Buddha?’
Tozan said: `This flax weighs three pounds.’
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Lovely post Dan. I very much appreciate you cutting through the ‘design speak’ with fundamentals from another field. I am very much guilty of design speak myself so I look forward to more schooling 😉 But in all seriousness being able to articulate which fields design is related to and what methods it borrows and why, helps design as a discipline build its credibility and stop being perceived as the postures of the beret wearing set.
Thanks Erietta!
Just for the record though, all those methods I mention (apart from brainstorming – but that’s another story) I think are totally valid ways of trying to break the ‘set’ of our cognitive ruts. And hey – Psych just has it’s own jargon too. 🙂