This paper provides a critical examination of the current state and future possibility of formal cognitive theory for insight problem solving and its associated "aha!" experience. Insight problems are contrasted with move problems, which have been formally defined and studied extensively by cognitive psychologists since the pioneering…

This article is concerned with how computer science, and more exactly computational complexity theory, can inform cognitive science. In particular, we suggest factors to be taken into account when investigating how people deal with computational hardness. This discussion will address the two upper levels of Marr's Level Theory: the computational…

Insight problem solving is characterized by restructuring. We hypothesized that the difficulty of rebus puzzles could be manipulated by systematically varying the restructurings required to solve them. An experiment using rebus puzzles varied the number of restructurings (one or two) required to solve a problem and the level at which the…

In November 2008 at Purdue University, the 2nd Workshop on Human Problem Solving was held. This workshop, which was a natural continuation of the first workshop devoted almost exclusively to optimization problems, addressed a wider range of topics that reflect the scope of the "Journal of Problem Solving." The workshop was attended by 35…