7. Conclusion

By making it possible to describe the subjective experience associated with the implementation of expertise, knowledge-explanation techniques make it possible to highlight the pre-reflective, "hidden" know-how contained within it. Although the data collected using these techniques concern the subjective experience of the subjects interviewed, they go beyond the particularity and relativity of the experiences described: their analysis makes it possible to identify a generic structure of the invention experience, as well as its variants.

As a creative activity, technical invention is renowned for its mysterious and largely unconscious nature. However, by clarifying the specific processes involved in technical invention with some fifteen inventors, we were able to highlight several aspects of technical invention which, although implemented without being noticed, become...