How Researchers Manage Ideas

TY - GEN

T1 - How Researchers Manage Ideas

AU - Inie, Nanna

AU - Frich, Jonas

AU - Dalsgaard, Peter

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2022 ACM.

PY - 2022/6

Y1 - 2022/6

N2 - Research ideas are pivotal in research practice. While research domains, topics, and methods are often outlined by specific research fields, the process of capturing and developing research ideas is less categorical. Conceiving and developing research ideas requires continuous creative thinking, usually supported by various different tools, each more or less carefully selected by a researcher to fulfill a specific purpose. In this paper, we investigate the creative work practices of academic researchers, with a focus on the workflows and tools they employ to manage ideas. Through a qualitative survey (n=51) and in-depth interviews (n=18) with researchers from a wide range of fields, we identify and describe typical processes of managing research ideas, different types of research ideas (a research question or problem, a method, a hypothesis or antithesis, and a theory), properties of good research ideas, as well as potentials for tools and technology to support idea management for researchers.

AB - Research ideas are pivotal in research practice. While research domains, topics, and methods are often outlined by specific research fields, the process of capturing and developing research ideas is less categorical. Conceiving and developing research ideas requires continuous creative thinking, usually supported by various different tools, each more or less carefully selected by a researcher to fulfill a specific purpose. In this paper, we investigate the creative work practices of academic researchers, with a focus on the workflows and tools they employ to manage ideas. Through a qualitative survey (n=51) and in-depth interviews (n=18) with researchers from a wide range of fields, we identify and describe typical processes of managing research ideas, different types of research ideas (a research question or problem, a method, a hypothesis or antithesis, and a theory), properties of good research ideas, as well as potentials for tools and technology to support idea management for researchers.

KW - cognition

KW - creativity

KW - idea management

KW - idea types

KW - research ideas

KW - science of science

KW - tools

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85133398625&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1145/3527927.3532813

DO - 10.1145/3527927.3532813

M3 - Article in proceedings

AN - SCOPUS:85133398625

SP - 83

EP - 96

BT - C&C '22: Creativity and Cognition

PB - Association for Computing Machinery

T2 - 14th ACM Creativity and Cognition Conference, C and C 2022

Y2 - 20 June 2022 through 23 June 2022

ER -