A review of creativity principles applied to engineering design

There is a very large amount of literature in the field of creativity outside the field of engineering that has potential for application to engineering design. This paper presents a review of the salient literature and identifies how creativity principles that are based on well-founded research may be applied to engineering design. The scope of the paper includes understanding creativity, creative style, invention and innovation, certain creativity tools and an understanding of the combinations of people, products, creative process and environment that are required to achieve high levels of creativity. A discussion of the application of creativity principles to engineering design is given.