Integrating Creative Problem Solving into the Field of Fashion Education

Fashion professionals these days agree that changes in the fashion business are essential and highly value creativity as a genuine source for generating new ideas in fashion products as well as fashion business practices. As fashion professionals deal with problems of which solutions do not exist or that need innovative solutions for brand or product differentiation in the fast-paced environments, interest in creativity and creative problem solving in the field has increased; therefore, fashion educators have realized that there has been an increasing need for incorporating creativity or creative problem solving into the fashion curriculum. In this study, the researcher intended to review previous research on the use of creative problem solving in classrooms in various disciplines including the field of fashion education to provide insights and suggestions for fashion educators to integrate creative problem solving into the fashion education curriculum. Previous attempts to apply creative problem solving to solve issues in fashion classrooms have mostly limited to promoting divergent thinking techniques. It is suggested for fashion educators as well as fashion students to consider creative problem solving as a process consisting of the four distinct stages in which both divergent and convergent thinking techniques should be properly utilized stimulating various thinking strategies.