Improving Selection of Analogical Inspirations through Chunking and Recombination

Analogies can be a powerful source of new ideas; however, creators often fail to recognize and harness potentially beneficial analogical leads, especially from other problem domains. In this paper, we introduce AnalogiLead, an interactive interface designed to reduce premature dismissal of analogies by facilitating playful exploration of analogical leads. Drawing on cognitive mechanisms of conceptual chunking and recombination, AnalogiLead scaffolds users to engage with meaningful chunks of problems and analogies and recombine them into inspiring brainstorming questions. In a within-subjects experiment, participants (N=23) who used AnalogiLead dismissed analogies 4x less often, with 12x fewer decision changes, compared to a baseline interface with no chunking or recombination. This reduction in premature dismissal was associated with ~64% longer processing time. Through qualitative analysis of video and think-aloud data, we describe how the chunking and recombination mechanisms facilitated playful engagement with analogies. These findings highlight opportunities and challenges for improving analogical innovation through careful theory-driven design of interfaces for selecting analogical leads.