publications
Blending popular culture and design theory, framed by a decade of scholarly research, this book highlights how play and humor fuel innovation. Now, more than ever, we are in need of creative solutions to global problems, but creative skills and abilities decline over time without intervention and practice. Sparking Creativity provides empirically supported methods for embracing the often-trivialized domains of play and humor to increase our creativity. It shows that topical examples, such as Seinfeld's humor, the Apples to Apples board game, and the Adventure Time cartoon series, are more closely related to innovation than you might first think.
Written in a humorous and accessible style, this book is aimed toward creative-minded entrepreneurs, designers, engineers, industry leaders, parents, educators, and students. It encourages a playful approach throughout a design process to produce truly innovative solutions.
Book
Kudrowitz, B. (2023). Sparking Creativity: How Play and Humor Fuel Innovation and Design. Routledge.
Book Chapters
Kudrowitz, B., Rush, M., & Johnson, K. (2021). Community of Practice in Design Education. Reviewed contribution for Collegial Design: Thinking and Making at a Community-Engaged University. Modern Press
Kudrowitz, B. (2021). Designing Developmentally Appropriate Toys. In D. Bergen (Ed), The Handbook to Developmentally Appropriate Toys. Rowman & Littlefield.
Kudrowitz, B. (2014). Emerging Technology in Toy Design. In J. Follett (Ed), Designing for Emerging Technologies. (237-254) O’Reilly Media.
Refereed & Peer Reviewed Journal Publications
Kudrowitz, B. & Rush, M. (accepted). Renaissance Queen: An Exploration of the Creative Interdisciplinary Nature of Drag via RuPaul's Drag Race. Fashion Practice.
Kwon. J.G & Kudrowitz, B. (2022). Concept evaluation dilemma: Presentation effect on product concept evaluation in the new product development (NPD) process. International Journal of Design Creativity and Innovation (TDCI).
Hwang, S. G, Alfalah, S. G, Kwon, J. G & Kudrowitz, B. (2021). Familiarity Trumps Playfulness: Exploring Children’s Preferences for Playful Design of Vegetables. International Journal of Food Design.
Schifferstein, H.N.J., Kudrowitz, B. & Breuer, C. G (2020). Food Perception and Aesthetics – Linking Sensory Science to Culinary Practice. Journal of Culinary Science & Technology
Tran, K. U, Kudrowitz, B. & Koutstaal, W. (2020). Fostering Creative Minds: What Predicts and Boosts Design Competence in the Classroom? International Journal of Technology and Design Education.
Kwon. J. G & Kudrowitz, B. (2018). Good Idea! Or Good Presentation? Examining the Effect of Presentation on Perceived Quality of Concepts. Artificial Intelligence for Engineering Design and Manufacturing: Special Issue on Design Creativity. 32(4). 380-389.
Leeds, A. U & Kudrowitz, B. (2018). Mapping Idea Space: Exploring Divergent Thinking through Mind Mapping. International Journal of Design Creativity and Innovation. 7(1-2), 16-29.
Kudrowitz, B. & Dippo, C. U (2014). When Does a Paper Clip become a Sundial? Exploring the Progression of Novelty in the Alternative Uses Test. Journal of Integrated Design and Process Science: Special Issue on Applications and Theory of Computational Creativity. 17(4), 3-18.
Kudrowitz, B., Te, P. U, & Wallace, D. (2012). The Influence of Sketch Quality on Perception of Product-Idea Creativity. Artificial Intelligence for Engineering Design and Manufacturing: Special Issue on Sketching. 26(3), 267-279. Most downloaded of AI EDAM 2012.
Kudrowitz, B. & Wallace, D. (2012). Assessing the Quality of Ideas from Prolific, Early-Stage Product Ideation. Journal of Engineering Design: Special Issue on Design Creativity. 24(2), 120-139.
Ludden, G., Kudrowitz, B., Schifferstein, H., & Hekkert, P. (2012). Surprise and Humor in Product Design. Humor: The International Journal of Humor. 25(3), 285–309.
Kudrowitz, B. & Wallace, D. (2010). The Play Pyramid: A Play Classification and Ideation Tool for Toy Design. The Journal of Arts and Technology. 3(1), 36-56.
Refereed and Peer Reviewed Conference Papers
Hwang, S. G & Kudrowitz, B. (2021). When is a Potato too Ugly? Understanding the Complexity of Aesthetics in Produce towards the Reduction of Food Waste. IASDR 2020 [With Design].
Kudrowitz, B. & Davel, R. U (2021). First Impressions Matter (Maybe More than Prior Design Experience): The Predictive Power of Soft-Skills on Student Performance in a Team-Based Design Course. IASDR 2020 [With Design].
Hwang, S. G, Alfalah, S. G, Kwon, J. G & Kudrowitz, B. (2021, August). Playful Design and Children’s (dis)Liking of Plant-Based Vegetable Food Products. Creative Tastebuds.
Kwon, J. G & Kudrowitz, B. (2019, July). The Creative Cookie Challenge: The Impact of Creativity, Typicality, and Aesthetics on Consumer’s Choice. Southern Oregon University Creativity Conference, 2019.
Kwon, J. G & Kudrowitz, B. (2019, August). The Sketch Quality Bias: Evaluating Descriptions of Product Ideas with and without Visuals. ASME International Design Engineering Technical Conferences. Anaheim, CA.
Kwon, J. G, Bromback, L. U & Kudrowitz, B. (2017, August). Divergent Thinking Ability + Interest = Creative Ideas: Exploring the relationships between cognitive creativity assessments and product design idea generation. ASME International Design Engineering Technical Conferences. Cleveland, OH.
Wang, X. G & Kudrowitz B. (2016, November). Language Ability in Creativity Assessment. Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Design Creativity (4th ICDC). Atlanta, GA.
Leeds, A. U & Kudrowitz B. (2016, November). Exploring How Novel Ideas are Generated in Mind Maps. Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Design Creativity (4th ICDC). Atlanta, GA.
Kudrowitz, B., Free, A. U & Hough, L. (2016, November). Identification of Personality and Cognitive Indicators of Creative Potential. Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Design Creativity (4th ICDC). Atlanta, GA.
Kudrowitz, B., Alfalah, S. G, & Dippo, C. U (2016, September). The Mary Poppins Effect: Exploring a Relationship Between Playfulness and Creativity with the Alternative Uses Test. International Conference on Design and Emotion. Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Alfalah, S. G, Kudrowitz, B., & Vickers, Z. (2015, November). Playful Design and Children’s (dis)Liking of Vegetables. Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Food Design. New York, NY.
Pilgrim-Rukavina, N. U & Kudrowitz, B. (2015, November). Exploring the Effects of Warm-up Games, Criticism and Group Discussion on Brainstorming Productivity. IASDR InterPlay 2015. Brisbane, Australia.
Johnson, K. U. & Kudrowitz, B. (2015, November). A Relationship between Physical Construction Play as Children and Adult Creativity Scores. IASDR InterPlay 2015. Brisbane, Australia.
Dippo, C. U & Kudrowitz, B. (2015). The Effects of Elaboration in Creativity Tests as it Pertains to Overall Scores and How it Might Prevent a Person from Thinking of Creative Ideas During the Early Stages of Brainstorming and Idea Generation. ASME Proceedings of the 27th International Conference on Design Theory and Methodology 2015. Boston, MA.
Kudrowitz, B., Oxborough, A. U, Stover, E. G & Choi, J. (2014, June). The Chef as Designer: Classifying the Techniques that Chefs use in Creating Innovative Dishes. Design Research Society Conference 2014. Umea, Sweden.
Kudrowitz, B. & Dippo, C. U (2013, August). Getting to the Novel Ideas: Exploring the Alternative Uses Test of Divergent Thinking. ASME International Design Engineering Technical Conferences 2013. Portland, OR.
Kudrowitz, B., Te, P. U, & Wallace, D. (2011, October). The Influence of Sketch Quality on Perception of Product-Idea Creativity. IASDR2011, the 4th World Conference on Design Research. Delft, Netherlands. Reviewer’s Favorite
Kudrowitz, B. & Wallace, D. (2010, October). Improvisational Comedy and Product Design Ideation: Making Non-Obvious Connections between Seemingly Unrelated Things. International Conference on Design and Emotion. Chicago. Nominated for Best Paper.
Kudrowitz, B. & Wallace, D. (2010, August). Assessing the Quality of Ideas from Prolific, Early-Stage Product Ideation. ASME International Design Engineering Technical Conferences. Montreal, Canada. 381-391.
Kudrowitz, B. & Wallace, D. (2008, July). The Play Pyramid: A Play Classification and Ideation Tool for Toy Design. International Toy Research Association 5th World Congress 'Toys and Culture'. Nafplio, Greece.
Gutowski, T., Taplett, A., Kudrowitz, B, et al. (2008, May). Environmental Lifestyle Analysis (ELSA). IEEE International Symposium on Electronics and the Environment. San Francisco, USA.
Refereed and Peer Reviewed Conference Posters/Abstracts
Kudrowitz, B. & Rush, M. (2024, April). Renaissance Queen: An Exploration of the Creative Interdisciplinary Nature of Drag via RuPaul's Drag Race. Fashion And Play 2024 Symposium. Minneapolis, MN.
Schwartzman, R. & Kudrowitz, B. (2024, April). Everyday Exaggeration: Caricature as Design. Fashion And Play 2024 Symposium. Minneapolis, MN.
Tran, K. U, Kudrowitz, B. & Koutstaal, W. (2019, August). When Value Adds Value: Assessing the Predictive Power of Creative Test Dimensions for a Real-World Design Challenge. American Psychological Association 2019 Convention. Chicago, IL.
Tran, K. U, Kudrowitz, B. & Koutstaal, W. (2019, September). Boosting real-world creative problem-solving. International Convention of Psychological Science (ICPS). Paris, France.
Tran, K. U, Kudrowitz, B. & Koutstaal, W. (2018). What Cognitive and Personality Factors Predict Creative Performance on a Real-World Design Challenge? Association for Psychological Science 30th Annual Convention. San Francisco, CA.