Shuichiro Ogawa
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Notes · updated 2026-07-21

An Academic Map of Methods for Reframing Problems: From Abduction-2 to Problem Structuring

A literature map that surveys the methods of problem setting, problem framing, and reframing across peer-reviewed research and canon from design methodology, cognitive science, and systems thinking.

Contents (11)
  1. Before a Method Solves a Problem, It Remakes the Problem
  2. Cognitive Science: Reframing a Problem Is First of All Reframing Its Representation
  3. Problem Finding and Problem Construction Are Measurable Abilities
  4. Design Reasoning: Arranging Abduction as a Logic Proper to Design
  5. Moving the Problem Space and the Solution Space at the Same Time
  6. Problem Structuring: Institutionalizing the “Debate over Problem Setting” for Ill-Structured Problems
  7. Changing How the Problem Is Seen According to the Type of Complexity
  8. Structured Ideation: Exhausting the Problem Space and Placing Contradiction at the Core
  9. Where in the Design Studio Does Reframing Happen
  10. The Blank Spaces of This Map
  11. Footnotes

Before a Method Solves a Problem, It Remakes the Problem

Methods for solving problems are many. But the methods that come before them, the ones that reframe the problem itself, are scattered under different names and belong to unrelated lineages. The design studio calls it “reframing,” cognitive science calls it “representational change,” and operations research calls it “problem structuring.” It is not only the names that differ; the empirical base each rests on and its theoretical standing differ too.

What this map gathers is the academic provenance of that scattered body of methods. The starting point is fixed at one thing. It is the inference that Dorst called abduction-2 (frame creation), which discovers an answer and a working principle at the same time1. Against abduction-1, which searches for an unknown answer while holding the working principle fixed, abduction-2 includes the invention of the frame itself: “if we view the situation through this lens, this kind of value comes into being”2. The methods of problem setting, problem framing, and reframing can be read as attempts to make this leap repeatable.

Read that way, we begin to see that bodies of method from unrelated lineages share a single question. The diagnosis is that the framing of a problem cannot be fixed by analysis alone. This note organizes the methods that share this diagnosis into five lineages: cognitive science, design reasoning, problem structuring, complexity frameworks, and structured ideation. Because an existing literature map treated the inside of design research (from Rittel to Dorst)3, this note extends to the outside of it, namely to cognitive science, OR, and systems thinking.

Cognitive Science: Reframing a Problem Is First of All Reframing Its Representation

When a problem cannot be reframed, cognitive science locates the cause on the side of representation. In 1945 Duncker demonstrated experimentally the functional fixedness by which an existing functional schema obstructs the re-representation of a problem4. Adamson reproduced this across three experiments and confirmed that having a tool used first for its typical purpose strengthens the fixedness5. Fixedness is not an exceptional failure but the normal condition in which knowledge pre-empts the representation of a problem, this is the diagnosis.

Ohlsson formulated the escape from fixedness as the theory of representational change6. Insight is not the product of continuous search; it arises when the problem representation is restructured after an impasse. Kaplan and Simon traced this restructuring in verbal protocols on the mutilated checkerboard problem7. The attainment of insight depends on the discovery of an effective problem representation, and the availability of the generators and constraints that guide that discovery is a predictor of it.

The quality of a problem representation is also an index of expertise. Chi and colleagues showed that experts classify physics problems by their deep structure (principles) while novices classify them by surface features8. Expertise can be read as, more than possessing better answers, being able to re-represent a problem in deeper units. This lineage, running from functional fixedness through representational change to the expert’s representation, grounds reframing at the level of cognition.

Problem Finding and Problem Construction Are Measurable Abilities

If the power to reframe a problem is an ability, it should be measurable. Creativity research has, from this premise, treated the quality of problem setting as a predictor of outcomes. In a longitudinal study of art students, Getzels and Csikszentmihalyi showed that the quality of problem finding before making predicts the success or failure of later creative work9.

Research on problem construction decomposed problem finding into a measurable process. Mumford and colleagues divided problem construction in ill-structured domains into stages of information gathering, constraint setting, and goal setting, and developed a scale that operationally measures their quality10. Reiter-Palmon and Robinson reviewed this lineage and confirmed that problem identification and problem construction are strong predictors of creative output11. The psychology of problem finding and problem construction brings reframing down from “talent” to a “measurable process.”

Design Reasoning: Arranging Abduction as a Logic Proper to Design

Design research has formulated the reframing of problems as a form of inference. In 1976 March positioned design as a productive science that is neither deductive nor inductive, and located its logic in abduction12. Roozenburg took this up and showed through logical analysis that innovative design proceeds by a pattern of productive abduction distinct from established logic13.

At the center of this lineage stands Dorst’s abduction-2. Expert designers begin by probing the central paradox (why solving this problem is hard), and only once the nature of that paradox is settled do they move to constructing a solution1. Kolko reread design synthesis as abductive sensemaking, situating framing within the process of constructing meaningful patterns from complex data14.

The lineage is supported not only by logical analysis but by empirical work. Cramer-Petersen and colleagues analyzed the verbal protocols of five teams and showed that reasoning in idea generation proceeds dominantly by an “abduction-then-deduction” pattern15. The theoretical claim of a productive science was thereby confirmed with micro-level reasoning data.

Moving the Problem Space and the Solution Space at the Same Time

If abduction is a form of inference, then the relation between problem and solution can be formulated as the structure of spaces. Hatchuel and Weil’s C-K theory formalized design as the mutual expansion of a concept space (C) and a knowledge space (K)16. A concept is a proposition whose logical status cannot be judged in the existing K, and design is the expansion of such undecided concepts through a back-and-forth with knowledge. In this framework, problem setting becomes “the search for a concept that is undecidable in the existing K.”

Research on co-evolution describes the same dynamic as the mutual updating of problem space and solution space. Maher and Tang formulated the co-evolution of problem space and solution space from both computational and cognitive angles17. Wiltschnig and colleagues extended this to the team level and showed through qualitative analysis that episodes of co-evolution appear coupled with analogy and mental simulation18. The co-evolution of problem and solution shows that problem definition is not a prior stage separated from the search for solutions, but a process updated in parallel with that search.

Problem Structuring: Institutionalizing the “Debate over Problem Setting” for Ill-Structured Problems

In a different place from design research, operations research also faced the indeterminacy of problems. Ackoff conceived of social problems as a mess of interdependent problems and criticized the reductionism that treats a problem as an isolated puzzle19. Rittel and Webber’s wicked problems formulated ten properties of problems that have no definitive formulation and stated that the formulation of the problem is itself the problem20.

Against this diagnosis, British OR institutionalized problem structuring as a methodology. Checkland’s soft systems methodology (SSM) reframed the problem as a “situation” and gave a procedure for debating change through rich pictures, CATWOE, and the comparison of conceptual models21. In a thirty-year retrospective, Checkland set out how SSM developed into a methodology-driven Mode 1 and a situation-driven Mode 222. Eden’s cognitive mapping externalizes how individuals and groups see a problem as a map, and became the foundational technique of SODA (Strategic Options Development and Analysis)23.

These bodies of method were systematized as problem structuring methods (PSM). The standard text by Rosenhead and Mingers collected SSM, SODA, strategic choice, and robustness analysis in one book and positioned them as methods for dealing with complexity, uncertainty, and conflict24. Mingers and Rosenhead surveyed these cases of practice25, and Rosenhead looked back on PSM as a departure from the scientific-rationality paradigm of hard OR26. This is a lineage that, outside design, put the debate over problem setting itself onto a methodology.

Changing How the Problem Is Seen According to the Type of Complexity

Where problem structuring supplies a procedure, Cynefin has one first discern the type of problem situation. Kurtz and Snowden divided situations broadly into ordered and unordered systems and, drawing on complexity theory and narrative, set out that the legitimate modes of problem perception and decision making differ across each domain27. The practitioner version by Snowden and Boone explained that a misclassification of the domain, such as treating a wicked problem as merely a complicated one, produces failures of problem setting28. The claim of Cynefin is a demand one step earlier: before reframing a problem, determine what kind of problem situation one is in at all.

Structured Ideation: Exhausting the Problem Space and Placing Contradiction at the Core

Another route to reframing a problem is to structure the problem space systematically. Zwicky’s general morphological analysis (GMA) structures a multidimensional problem exhaustively as a matrix of parameters and options29. Ritchey applied this to wicked problems and gave a framework that makes a non-quantitative problem complex visible through decomposition and combination, and prunes the solution space through constraint satisfaction30.

On the engineering side, TRIZ places the core of a problem in contradiction. From the analysis of several hundred thousand patents, Altshuller formulated the removal of technical and physical contradictions as the essence of invention, and provided forty inventive principles and the contradiction matrix31. Cavallucci and colleagues extended this contradiction model to complex problems (OTSM-TRIZ)32 and connected contradictions to the laws of engineering-system evolution, integrating problem definition with the prediction of directions of development33. This operation of framing a problem as “contradiction” can be read as an engineering variant of reframing.

Lateral thinking states this lineage as the most general cognitive strategy. De Bono distinguished lateral thinking from vertical thinking in terms of information processing, and presented a strategy of deliberately interrupting existing patterns to search for new ones34. GMA widens the problem space, TRIZ places contradiction at the core, and lateral thinking prompts the switching of patterns. In each case, instead of deepening the answer inside a given frame, they recompose the frame itself.

Where in the Design Studio Does Reframing Happen

Granting that theory and method preach the reframing of problems, where in practice does it happen? Design research has confirmed this through observation. Valkenburg and Dorst applied Schön’s reflective practice to design teams and demonstrated by observation the cycle of framing, moving, evaluating, and reflecting35. Reframing arises not only as individual introspection but as team interaction (the cognitive mechanisms and practical techniques that activate it are organized in Activating Reframing in Design).

What is the trigger? From interviews with fifteen practicing designers, Paton and Dorst showed that briefing with a client is a situated practice that induces reframing through the exchange of frames36. Stompff and colleagues found, in a qualitative analysis of multidisciplinary teams, that unexpected surprise becomes a principal trigger of reframing37. The reframing of a problem can be read as an event that arises not from quiet thought but from negotiation with others and the confounding of expectation.

The Blank Spaces of This Map

The five lineages share the diagnosis that the framing of a problem cannot be fixed by analysis alone. Even so, the lineages are almost never connected to one another.

Representational change in cognitive science and abduction-2 in design describe the same movement, “from impasse to frame shift,” in different vocabularies, but whether the two are the same cognitive mechanism has not been examined theoretically. Peer-reviewed research that directly compares or integrates problem structuring methods (SSM or SODA) with design’s frame creation scarcely exists. Morphological analysis and TRIZ have a track record in policy analysis and engineering, but the “structuring of non-quantitative problem complexes” they handle there has not been taken into the toolkit of design practice. There are also methods, such as Jobs-to-be-Done, which are widely used in industry yet have almost no academic formulation, being practice-originated38.

These blank spaces come not from a shortage of methods but from the thinness of the theory that bridges methods to one another. This note has merely laid the lineages side by side and leaves that bridging open.

References

The source material is source/review/problem-definition-methods/papers.md (a repository-internal, unpublished corpus). Each work is given with DOI/URL/ISBN. Works whose bibliography is unconfirmed or whose full text was not reached carry [primary-source verification needed].

Method (Abduction-2, Frame Creation)

  • Dorst, K. (2011). The Core of ‘Design Thinking’ and Its Application. Design Studies 32(6):521–532. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2011.07.006
  • Dorst, K. (2015). Frame Innovation: Create New Thinking by Design. MIT Press. ISBN 9780262324311.

Cognitive Science (Functional Fixedness, Insight, Problem Representation)

  • Duncker, K. (1945). On problem-solving. Psychological Monographs 58(5), Whole No. 270. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0093599
  • Adamson, R. E. (1952). Functional fixedness as related to problem solving: a repetition of three experiments. Journal of Experimental Psychology 44(4):288–291. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0062487
  • Ohlsson, S. (1992). Information-processing explanations of insight and related phenomena. In M. T. Keane & K. J. Gilhooly (Eds.), Advances in the Psychology of Thinking, Vol. 1, 1–44. Harvester Wheatsheaf, Hemel Hempstead. (Book chapter; no chapter DOI. ISBN unconfirmed.)
  • Kaplan, C. A. & Simon, H. A. (1990). In search of insight. Cognitive Psychology 22(3):374–419. https://doi.org/10.1016/0010-0285(90)90008-R
  • Chi, M. T. H., Feltovich, P. J. & Glaser, R. (1981). Categorization and representation of physics problems by experts and novices. Cognitive Science 5(2):121–152. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15516709cog0502_2

Problem Finding and Problem Construction (Creativity Psychology)

  • Getzels, J. W. & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1976). The Creative Vision: A Longitudinal Study of Problem Finding in Art. Wiley, New York. ISBN 9780471014867. https://archive.org/details/creativevisionlo0000getz
  • Mumford, M. D., Baughman, W. A., Threlfall, K. V., Supinski, E. P. & Costanza, D. P. (1996). Process-based measures of creative problem-solving skills: I. Problem construction. Creativity Research Journal 9(1):63–76. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15326934crj0901_6
  • Reiter-Palmon, R. & Robinson, E. J. (2009). Problem identification and construction: what do we know, what is the future? Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts 3(1):43–47. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0014629
  • Mumford, M. D., Reiter-Palmon, R. & Redmond, M. R. (1994). Problem construction and cognition: applying problem representations in ill-defined domains. In M. A. Runco (Ed.), Problem Finding, Problem Solving and Creativity, 3–39. Ablex, Norwood, NJ. ISBN 9780893919756. https://openlibrary.org/works/OL3289536W

Design Reasoning (Abduction)

C-K Theory and Problem-Solution Co-Evolution

Wicked Problems and Problem Structuring Methods (PSM / Soft OR)

Complexity Frameworks (Cynefin)

Structured Ideation (Morphological Analysis, TRIZ, Lateral Thinking)

Unverified Items ([primary-source verification needed])

Bibliographic reachability was confirmed and ISBNs fixed (2026-07-21), and the initially unconfirmed ten items were largely resolved. The remaining reservations are as follows.

  • Ohlsson (1992): editors, publisher, and page range confirmed to agree across multiple sources. Only the host book’s ISBN is unconfirmed.
  • Altshuller: the first English translation is confirmed as 1984, Gordon & Breach (ISBN 9780677212302) (the initial “1988” notation was a conflation with a reprint year). The exact publication year of the Routledge reissue (ISBN 9780367580360) is unconfirmed.
  • Ritchey (2013): the publishing journal Acta Morphologica Generalis is confirmed to be a self-published journal of the Swedish Morphological Society, non-peer-reviewed and not registered with CrossRef (noted here as the academic standing of the content). The PDF is reachable.
  • Cavallucci & Khomenko (2007): the authors are confirmed to be only two (Morel was a conflation with a co-author of a different paper, “Towards inventive design through management of contradictions”). DOI confirmed.

Footnotes

  1. Dorst, K. (2011). The Core of ‘Design Thinking’ and Its Application. Design Studies 32(6):521–532. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2011.07.006 ↩ ↩2

  2. Dorst, K. (2015). Frame Innovation: Create New Thinking by Design. MIT Press. ISBN 9780262324311. ↩

  3. The lineage internal to design research (from Rittel to Dorst) is organized in the literature map of design as reframing exploration. The catalogue of types treating Problem Definition as a mode of thinking is organized in Thinking in Problem Definition: Rereading the Game Board of Existing Research. ↩

  4. Duncker, K. (1945). On problem-solving (L. S. Lees, Trans.). Psychological Monographs 58(5), Whole No. 270. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0093599 ↩

  5. Adamson, R. E. (1952). Functional fixedness as related to problem solving: a repetition of three experiments. Journal of Experimental Psychology 44(4):288–291. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0062487 ↩

  6. Ohlsson, S. (1992). Information-processing explanations of insight and related phenomena. In M. T. Keane & K. J. Gilhooly (Eds.), Advances in the Psychology of Thinking, Vol. 1, 1–44. Harvester Wheatsheaf, Hemel Hempstead. (Book chapter; no chapter DOI. Only the host book’s ISBN is unconfirmed.) ↩

  7. Kaplan, C. A. & Simon, H. A. (1990). In search of insight. Cognitive Psychology 22(3):374–419. https://doi.org/10.1016/0010-0285(90)90008-R ↩

  8. Chi, M. T. H., Feltovich, P. J. & Glaser, R. (1981). Categorization and representation of physics problems by experts and novices. Cognitive Science 5(2):121–152. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15516709cog0502_2 ↩

  9. Getzels, J. W. & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1976). The Creative Vision: A Longitudinal Study of Problem Finding in Art. Wiley, New York. ISBN 9780471014867. https://archive.org/details/creativevisionlo0000getz ↩

  10. Mumford, M. D., Baughman, W. A., Threlfall, K. V., Supinski, E. P. & Costanza, D. P. (1996). Process-based measures of creative problem-solving skills: I. Problem construction. Creativity Research Journal 9(1):63–76. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15326934crj0901_6 ↩

  11. Reiter-Palmon, R. & Robinson, E. J. (2009). Problem identification and construction: what do we know, what is the future? Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts 3(1):43–47. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0014629 ↩

  12. March, L. (1976). The logic of design and the question of value. In L. March (Ed.), The Architecture of Form (Cambridge Urban and Architectural Studies, No. 4), 1–40. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 052120528X. https://archive.org/details/isbn_052120528x ↩

  13. Roozenburg, N. F. M. (1993). On the pattern of reasoning in innovative design. Design Studies 14(1):4–18. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0142-694X(05)80002-X ↩

  14. Kolko, J. (2010). Abductive thinking and sensemaking: the drivers of design synthesis. Design Issues 26(1):15–28. https://doi.org/10.1162/desi.2010.26.1.15 ↩

  15. Cramer-Petersen, C. L., Christensen, B. T. & Ahmed-Kristensen, S. (2019). Empirically analysing design reasoning patterns: abductive-deductive reasoning patterns dominate design idea generation. Design Studies 60:39–70. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2018.10.001 ↩

  16. Hatchuel, A. & Weil, B. (2009). C-K design theory: an advanced formulation. Research in Engineering Design 19(4):181–192. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00163-008-0043-4 ↩

  17. Maher, M. L. & Tang, H. H. (2003). Co-evolution as a computational and cognitive model of design. Research in Engineering Design 14(1):47–64. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00163-002-0016-y ↩

  18. Wiltschnig, S., Christensen, B. T. & Ball, L. J. (2013). Collaborative problem–solution co-evolution in creative design. Design Studies 34(5):515–542. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2013.01.002 ↩

  19. Ackoff, R. L. (1974). Redesigning the Future: A Systems Approach to Societal Problems. Wiley, New York. ISBN 9780471002963. https://openlibrary.org/books/OL5049582M ↩

  20. Rittel, H. W. J. & Webber, M. M. (1973). Dilemmas in a general theory of planning. Policy Sciences 4(2):155–169. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01405730 ↩

  21. Checkland, P. B. & Scholes, J. (1990). Soft Systems Methodology in Action. Wiley, Chichester. ISBN 9780471927686. https://www.abebooks.com/9780471927686/Soft-Systems-Methodology-Action-Import-0471927686/plp ↩

  22. Checkland, P. B. (2000). Soft systems methodology: a thirty year retrospective. Systems Research and Behavioral Science 17(S1):S11–S58. https://doi.org/10.1002/1099-1743(200011)17:1+<::AID-SRES374>3.0.CO;2-O ↩

  23. Eden, C. (1988). Cognitive mapping. European Journal of Operational Research 36(1):1–13. https://doi.org/10.1016/0377-2217(88)90002-1 ↩

  24. Rosenhead, J. & Mingers, J. (Eds.) (2001). Rational Analysis for a Problematic World Revisited: Problem Structuring Methods for Complexity, Uncertainty and Conflict (2nd ed.). Wiley. ISBN 9780471495239. ↩

  25. Mingers, J. & Rosenhead, J. (2004). Problem structuring methods in action. European Journal of Operational Research 152(3):530–554. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0377-2217(03)00056-0 ↩

  26. Rosenhead, J. (2006). Past, present and future of problem structuring methods. Journal of the Operational Research Society 57(7):759–765. https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.jors.2602206 ↩

  27. Kurtz, C. F. & Snowden, D. J. (2003). The new dynamics of strategy: sense-making in a complex and complicated world. IBM Systems Journal 42(3):462–483. https://doi.org/10.1147/sj.423.0462 ↩

  28. Snowden, D. J. & Boone, M. E. (2007). A leader’s framework for decision making. Harvard Business Review 85(11):68–76. (Practitioner magazine, not peer-reviewed.) https://hbr.org/2007/11/a-leaders-framework-for-decision-making ↩

  29. Zwicky, F. (1969). Discovery, Invention, Research Through the Morphological Approach. Macmillan. ↩

  30. Ritchey, T. (2013). Wicked problems: modelling social messes with morphological analysis. Acta Morphologica Generalis 2(1). ISSN 2001-2241. (Self-published journal of the Swedish Morphological Society; non-peer-reviewed; not registered with CrossRef.) https://www.swemorph.com/pdf/wp.pdf ↩

  31. Altshuller, G. S. (1984). Creativity as an Exact Science: The Theory of the Solution of Inventive Problems (A. Williams, Trans.). Gordon & Breach, New York. ISBN 9780677212302. (Russian original Tvorchestvo kak tochnaya nauka, 1979.) https://searchworks.stanford.edu/view/1223823 ↩

  32. Cavallucci, D. & Khomenko, N. (2007). From TRIZ to OTSM-TRIZ: addressing complexity challenges in inventive design. International Journal of Product Development 4(1/2):4–21. https://doi.org/10.1504/IJPD.2007.011530 (Both authors confirmed via CrossRef. Morel is a co-author of a different paper.) ↩

  33. Cavallucci, D., Rousselot, F. & Zanni, C. (2009). Linking contradictions and laws of engineering system evolution within the TRIZ framework. Creativity and Innovation Management 18(2):71–80. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8691.2009.00515.x ↩

  34. de Bono, E. (1969). Information processing and new ideas: lateral and vertical thinking. Journal of Creative Behavior 3(3):159–171. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.2162-6057.1969.tb00124.x ↩

  35. Valkenburg, R. & Dorst, K. (1998). The reflective practice of design teams. Design Studies 19(3):249–271. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0142-694X(98)00011-8 ↩

  36. Paton, B. & Dorst, K. (2011). Briefing and reframing: a situated practice. Design Studies 32(6):573–587. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2011.07.002 ↩

  37. Stompff, G., Smulders, F. & Henze, L. (2016). Surprises are the benefits: reframing in multidisciplinary design teams. Design Studies 47:187–214. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2016.09.004 ↩

  38. The practice-side (industry) methods and their origins, along with the gap between academia and industry, are organized in A Genealogy of Practitioner Methods for Reframing Problems: Who Made Them, Traced to Their Origins. ↩

Author: Shuichiro Ogawa (Design Researcher / Consultant) About me →