EFFECTS OF LISTENING TO MUSIC ON DESIGNER’S CREATIVE IDEAS IN IDEA GENERATION PHASE

• Main Authors: Chi-Meng Liao, 廖繼盟
• Other Authors: Wen-Chih Chang
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2016
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/46999725168038690441

博士 === 國立臺灣科技大學 === 設計研究所 === 104 === People get in touch with music all the times in their daily life. Past studies have shown the effects of music listening in many domains; however, studies related to music and design are rarely seen. A pilot study at Stage 1, questionnaire surveys of 538 subjects were conducted. The results demonstrated that most designers have the habit of listening to music in their design routines, indicating that there are close relationships between music and design. Moreover, most participants considered music listening is helpful for design, especially in the idea development stage. They agreed that music would trigger associations, particularly they highly agreed with the associations from specific types of music. At Stage 2, retrospective reports were adopted in which designers were invited to do lamp design under listening to music related and unrelated to design project. The results indicated that while listening to music related to the design project, most designers could generate more ideas. The numbers of lamp sketches and wording elements were significantly larger compared with those under the situation of listening to music not related to the design project. With music related to the design project, designers could associate more features and generate scenarios related to the project title from the trigger of their episodic memories in their experience. However, in the situation where music not related to the design project was playing, subjects tended to develop their ideas based upon the design elements required for lamp design. The results demonstrated that listening to music related to the design project could offer hints for guiding the direction of idea development. At Stage 3, designers were invited to develop ideas under the situations of listening to fast-tempo and slow-tempo music and without listening to music so as to explore the effects of music tempo on designer’s idea generation. The experimental results showed that in listening to fast-tempo music, the subjects had better fluency and flexibility in their sketches. To the contrast, designers had a better originality and feasibility of the idea sketches when listening to slow-tempo music. Similarly, designers had a better idea elaboration in fast-tempo music and non-music situations. From this phenomenon, it is concluded that designer’s behavior and emotion activation might be connected and influenced by music tempo. From the survey and two sketch experiments, it is confirmed that listening to music will influence designer’s creativity in idea development. When listening to music, designers will pay attention to the messages delivered from the music according to the characteristics of design jobs or they may be motivated from the music, triggering responses related to the music and consequently guiding their design behaviors. Therefore, it is suggested that in design education, teachers can play some proper music to help students generate more ideas and enhance their interest in learning. In design practice, instead of listening to random music, designers are suggested to listen to music related to their design projects in that such kind of music may offer hints and help guide their idea generation. In the case where a large number of ideas should be worked out in a limited period of time, music of fast tempo is suggested. On the contrary, when breaking-through ideas are needed, slow-tempo music is a better choice for expectation.