{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,2]],"date-time":"2026-08-02T23:34:24Z","timestamp":1785713664407,"version":"3.56.0"},"reference-count":60,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"3","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,2,22]],"date-time":"2025-02-22T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1740182400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"Leverhulme Research Project Grant","award":["2023-278"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["2023-278"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Systems"],"abstract":"<jats:p>In this paper, I argue against the prevailing cognitivist view of creativity, proposing instead a systemic approach, and illustrate how from such a systemic perspective, creative problem-solving can be investigated under laboratory conditions. A cognitivist approach explains creativity from an ideation ground zero and assumes a diffusion model of ideas. In such a model, the explanandum is an initial idea, formed at a given moment in time, a position that implicitly promotes creative exceptionalism (to explain so-called Big-C creativity compared to little-c creativity) and the concomitant quest to discover the equally exceptional neural substate that \u2018explains\u2019 it. Borrowing from science and technology studies, I propose instead a translation model of ideas that proceeds on the basis of interactivity and prototyping. In this model, the explanandum is the resulting dialogue between people and prototypes (treated symmetrically as actants in a system of creation). I outline a methodology that emphasises the co-determination of ideation and the material enactment of ideas in generating creative solutions, illustrated by a study of insight problem-solving. This approach shifts the focus from exceptional cognitive abilities to the material and interactive processes that underpin creative problem-solving.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/systems13030150","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,2,24]],"date-time":"2025-02-24T05:36:47Z","timestamp":1740375407000},"page":"150","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":13,"title":["Systemic Creative Problem-Solving: On the Poverty of Ideas and the Generative Power of Prototyping"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"13","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-9554-5294","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric","family":"Vall\u00e9e-Tourangeau","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Psychology, Kingston University, Penrhyn Road, Kingston upon Thames KT1 2EE, UK"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,2,22]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","unstructured":"Bijker, W.E., and Law, J. 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