Inspiring Design: Bridging Human Behavior, Neurocognition, and AI in Engineering Design
Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering, UC Berkeley
When: October 9, 2025 | 9:30 – 11:00 AM
Location: CEME Building, room 2202 (6250 Applied Science Lane, Vancouver)
Zoom: https://ubc.zoom.us/j/64790058293?pwd=wbU2Ec5GspsKYnRibQGH1FChcOqf8q.1
(Meeting ID: 647 9005 8293 | Passcode: 609062)
The Department of Mechanical Engineering’s Distinguished Colloquium series invites leading researchers to share their expertise on a variety of topics with our academic community.
Abstract
What can the study of human behavior and cognition reveal about design? And how might advances in artificial intelligence reshape the ways humans interact with design tools? This seminar mostly examines these questions through my prior research on creativity and inspiration in engineering design. The talk will primarily focus on investigations of analogical reasoning in engineering design and HCI contexts, combining behavioral and neuroimaging approaches to explain why certain sources of inspiration lead to better design outcomes. Building on these foundations, I will share how these insights, supported by computational methods, have informed the development of new systems that expand how designers engage with inspiration across modalities such as text, sketches, CAD models, and immersive environments. The talk will close by considering how work spanning behavior, cognition, and computation can intersect to enable a new era of design.
Biography
Dr. Kosa Goucher-Lambert is an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Design Innovation at the University of California, Berkeley, where he directs the Cognition and Computation in Design (Co-Design) Lab. He is Affiliate Faculty in the Jacobs Institute for Design Innovation, the Berkeley Institute of Design, and the Berkeley Human-Computer Interaction Group, and serves as Associate Director of the UC Berkeley MDes program. Dr. Goucher-Lambert received his B.A. in Physics from Occidental College (2011) and his M.S. (2014) and Ph.D. (2017) in Mechanical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University. His research advances engineering design theory, methods, and automation, integrating computational analyses of human behavior with cognitive and neuroscience models of design. He is the recipient of an NSF CAREER Award, the 2022 ASME Design Theory and Methodology Young Investigator Award, the 2019 Excellence in Design Science Award, and several best paper awards from venues including the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and the Design Society.