Bounded creativity in design science research

Abstract

Although the importance of creativity in design science research projects has been widely acknowledged, efforts to facilitate this creativity while ensuring rigor, have been largely overlooked. This paper presents a more thorough understanding of creativity in design science research, balancing it with scientific rigor and addressing practical problems. With this objective, we analyze creativity within design science research and find that, although creativity is generally associated with "outside the box" thinking, creativity can also be effectively applied within the constraints of problem-solving. We develop a framework explicating how bounded creativity supports both, the design process, as well as the development of innovative artifacts. The framework is evaluated using a design science research project that develops a method for designing creative pervasive games. This research makes a novel contribution by demonstrating how creativity can be induced within the structure of the design science research methodology.