title: Discovery-Oriented Behavior and Problem Solving.
abstract: Discovery-oriented behavior during the presolution stage of a problem-solving task was explored by videotaping and scoring the behavior of 60 male and female college students. They were presented with 14 different objects and told they would later have to suggest novel and useful combinations of three or more objects taken together. Behavioral variables that reflected touching and transformation of the objects were generated from the videotapes and correlated with number of solutions produced. Touching variables had high positive (significant) correlations with the criterion for females, but low positive (nonsignificant) correlations for males. Transformation variables had moderate negative correlations with the criterion for males (significant), but low negative (nonsignificant) correlations for females. Discovery-oriented behavior appears to be worthy of further study in the problem-solving domain.
authors.affiliation: a University of Minnesota , USA.
authors.forename: Thomas J
authors.initials: TJ
authors.lastname: Bouchard
authors.affiliation: a University of Minnesota , USA.
authors.forename: Gail
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Drauden