Capturing characteristics of the conceptual ideation process of master crafts persons to inform design education: a comparative study of rural craft practitioners in Indonesia and in the UK

At the very early stage of idea generation, allegedly, a master craftsperson encounters cognitive dissonance to maintain beliefs/mindsets from various conceptual stimuli. We aim to capture the underlying form of cognition by examining the structure of thoughts collected from the subjective conceptualisation. A Think-Aloud Protocol was employed to obtain verbalised thoughts of both Indonesian and UK master craftsmen. The keywords of verbalised thoughts were evaluated and extracted using a list of typical mindsets. The evaluated keywords were then analysed by means of a conceptual network to reproduce a model of the individual’s mental state. This study discovered that Indonesian master craftsmen’s conceptualisation is greatly influenced by the strong typical mindsets of Object-attribute that emphasise Rationale and Mastery, which stimulates a pragmatic viewpoint. Furthermore, UK master craftsmen’s conceptualisation greatly considers strong typical mindsets of Object-attribute that emphasise Wisdom and Passionate, which indicates a rigorous mind. This paper reveals that both pragmatic and rigorous mindsets can create potential or barriers for creative cognitive resources.

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