On 17/09/2008, at 4:46 PM, Christopher Kueh wrote:
> I am currently working on developing and improving Architectural
> Research Methods unit at Curtin University, Western Australia. One
> of the important aspects that I am looking into is Design as
> Research. This area emphasises design process itself as
> investigation process. Just wondering if anyone can point me to some
> literature in this area.
Hi Christopher,
My research is not in the area of architectural design, it's in
information design, But you might find some of the ideas in a recent
paper of mine useful because of what it says about design as research
and the links between design research and philosophy:
> Sless D 2007
> Designing Philosophy
> Visible Language 41-2 101-26
Also, it might be useful to distinguish between research, which most
designers do not do, even when they claim to be doing it, and routine
investigation, which many designers use and mistakenly call research.
As an example from another discipline, consider the temperature,
pulse, blood pressure, and blood tests which a doctor might undertake
to diagnose an illness. When a doctor does this type of investigation
it is not generally considered to be 'research'. These are routine
investigative procedures, part of clinical practice. Of course,
temperature, blood tests etc. can be used as part of a research
program, but that is a different matter. So, in our information design
practice we routinely undertake something like 20 different
investigations at the start of a project, using a variety of methods,
and during a project we routinely use 'diagnostic testing'—a
specialised form of usability testing—but we would not consider this
'research', in much the same way that a doctor does not consider
taking a patient's temperature as 'research'. On the other hand,
developing the 20 types of investigation and the procedures for
diagnostic testing was research, just as the first doctors to
investigate the link between health and temperature etc were doing
research.
But I suspect that a lot of what is called 'design research' is a type
of routine clinical investigation, using known investigative methods
as a normal part of design practice. Conflating the idea of routine
investigation with research is tempting, particularly in an education
system which places an added value on 'research' but I don't think it
helps towards making better designers.
(In some quarters, I could be taken out and shot for this last comment.)
From a beautiful spring day in Melbourne, best wishes.
David
--
blog: www.communication.org.au/dsblog
web: http://www.communication.org.au
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