This is a ZIP archive file (.zip) containing both portable document format (.pdf) and comma-separated values (.csv) files: > The pdf file contains the annotated sketches that participants generated during an ideation session. This file type allows the non-digital data to be saved in a digital document format. The ideas from each group are stored into different files, whose naming corresponds to the experimental conditions reported in the publication (To copy or not to copy: the influence of instructions in design inspiration and fixation experiments). > The csv file contains the evaluation for all ideas generated by all participants in the experiment. This file type allows data to be saved in a table structured format. In the table, the column headings are self-explanatory, provided you also have the corresponding publication (To copy or not to copy: the influence of instructions in design inspiration and fixation experiments) as a reference. The data was collected in January 2015 from 168 undergraduate students in engineering at the University of Cambridge, UK. Participation in the experiment was part of the students’ education, and was aimed at collecting data that could later be used to introduce them to the concept of design fixation. No demographic data was collected from the participants, but as first year undergraduate students they were broadly similar in age and design experience, drawn from a cohort with a male-female ratio of 3:1. No consent form was required for this experiment.

This research data supports “To copy or not to copy: the influence of instructions in design fixation experiments” which will be published in “DCC16: Design Computing and Cognition 2016”. Therefore, this record will be updated with publication details.