I would like to add a brief twist to the note Ken posted below. Naturally, I cannot and will not comment on the substance of the project or matters of method. However, I think Ken might have responded in an equally compelling manner and I suspect (though I have not checked with him yet) that he might even agree. As he and I will actually be speaking rather soon, I suspect I'll find out!
To wit: It is an error to either assume or conclude that relevant knowledge in the study of a mystery or the solving a problem, is "located" within disciplinary distinctions. Therefore, the inclusion of people from within a discipline does not, in itself, ensure that relevant knowledge to a task will be resident and available on a research or design team. Ken did not say or imply this, but did offer a defense along disciplinary lines. I would like to reframe that defense — if I may — because I'm increasingly concerned about the reification of disciplines as though they "exist" and "work" as units.
Disciplines (and I am not suggesting Terry was saying this, but the point still needs to be made) are not like blocks that contain organized knowledge and methods that can be stacked up or employed as machine parts. While metaphors are always problematic, they are more like tectonic plates that overlap, collide, break apart, and otherwise interact. They are not organized around skills or conclusions. They are usually organized around literatures, research agendas, and sometimes (but not always) core methods relevant to the investigation of their organizing problematics. My own field of international relations, for example, (though I have a Ph.D. in it), still does not strike me as a discipline as much as a theoretical commitment. As we like to joke, there are no "international relationists." (no, our jokes are not very funny).
Disciplines are conveniences that can easily be inconvenient. For example, for some ten years Lisa Rudnick and I have worked (hard) on bridging cultural research with the design of policy and programming. We have made far greater inroads in the field of communication than in the field of anthropology, though one might assume a more natural affinity with the latter. But this is not the case because disciplinary distinctions — because they have histories and institutions, and organized systems within them — can be mobilized, or immobilized, around key problematics. Ron Scollon and I wrote a book chapter on why anthropology in particular has been unable to mobilize itself around problematics in peace and security (in Researching Violence in Africa: Ethical and Methodological Challenges, and entitled Cooperative Ethics as a New Model for Cultural Research on Peace and Security, 2011).
So while Ken's response below is surely a powerful statement and to me a very convincing one, it can also be appreciated that relevant skills and knowledge can come from a variety of places — and often unexpected places — because some of the greatest conceptual and methodological challenges often lay at the "root" of seemingly and thematically different disciplines.
Just one example of a key problematic addressed in disciplines as different as gender studies, political science, historiography and the philosophy of science: Iif not a positivist model of causality for understanding change in social behavior, then what? If this problem concerns you in a research project, then you need to look for the people with the skills to address it in an applicable manner to the mystery or problem being faced. Trying to hire out of disciplines can be a whopping mistake. And Lisa and I have made that mistake. Lesson learned, lesson being shared. Buyers beware …
Derek.
_________________
Dr. Derek B. Miller
Director
The Policy Lab®
321 Columbus Ave.
Seventh Floor of the Electric Carriage House
Boston, MA 02116
United States of America
Phone
+1 617 440 4409
Twitter
@Policylabtweets
Web
www.thepolicylab.org
This e-mail includes proprietary and confidential information belonging to The Policy Lab, Ltd. All rights reserved.
On Nov 22, 2012, at 9:47 AM, Ken Friedman wrote:
> Friends,
>
> Yesterday, Terry Love posted a comment to the list, stating, “The personnel on the project though doesn’t seem to have any scientists / mathematical modelers in there with expertise in neuroscience.” I asked why Terry believes this. There has been no reply to my query. This brief note describing the project will outline our expertise.
>
> A project such as this involves massive investments in staffing, research fellowships, andlaboratories. This project represents millions of dollars and Euros in university and external funding. Terry is mistaken in the belief that the senior management of four leading research universities would make the kind of investment without proper staff expertise. I was dean at Swinburne Design when we launched this project, so I will outline staff expertise on one of the best-staffed research projects in the field of design research.
>
> The four partner universities in Project UMA are Technological University of Delft, Cambridge University, University of Vienna, and Swinburne University of Technology, all highly ranked research universities. The core research metrics used to compile the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU) at Shanghai Jiao Tong University show Cambridge at 5 worldwide, with Vienna in the top 200 research universities,Delft in the top 300, and Swinburne in the top 400. Major research projects require approval by the faculty and the university, with careful review by the dean and the deputy vice chancellor for research with ultimate oversight by the vicechancellor.
>
> At the Technological University of Delft, the project is located in the Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering. At Swinburne University of Technology, UMA is in Design. At Cambridge University, UMA is in Engineering. At the University of Vienna, UMA is in Psychology.
>
> The principal investigator in Delft is Prof. Paul Hekkert, psychologist and professor of form theory at Technological University of Delft. Paul is also founding president of the Design and Emotion Society. The Dutch major funding for this project is theVici grant, a high-level expert grant of 1,500,000 Euros from NWO, Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research. This project is basic research in the traditional sense of the term. This is the largest funding ever allocated to a basic research program in the design field.
>
> At Swinburne, the principal investigator is Prof. Allan Whitfield, a psychologist who helped to develop the concept of neuroaffective design. We also have Prof. Gitte Lindgaard, former Distinguished Professor and Cognos Chair in User-Centred Product Design at Carleton University and Director of the Human Oriented Technology Lab; and Associate Professor John Patterson, the former director of Swinburne’s sensory neuroscience lab. Our investments include staffing, full-funded doctoral research fellowships, and building a neuroscience lab at the Faculty of Design.
>
> Dr. Clementine Thurgood is our post-doctoral research fellow on this project. As a PhD student at Swinburne Design, she invented and patented some of the computer systemsthat allow us to test perceptions and perception time at far faster speeds than was thought possible before her work – her LED-Tachistoscope can accurately display visual material down to one millisecond, a level of exposure no other instrument can achieve. Swinburne’s Gitte Lindgaard had actually achieved the fastest times until then. Clementine published her instrumentation in the Review of Scientific Instruments from the American Institute of Physics and she published her research outcomes in the journal Vision Research from Elsevier.
>
> The principal investigator at the University of Vienna is Prof. Helmut Leder, head of psychology and deputy director of cognitive science. At Cambridge University, the principal investigator is Dr. Nathan Crilly, Burrell Fellow in Engineering at Clare College. We also work with Prof. Kieu Nhi Ngo on neural networks. She is one of Vietnam’s top scientists, and a leading expert in the field.
>
> Our staff and researchers come from artificial neuro-networks, biophysics, brain measurement, cognitive science, design, engineering, engineering design, HCI, philosophy, psychology, psychophysiology, statistics. All of our research students won full-funded research fellowships following first class honors degrees in their undergraduate fields. Our team has significant and sophisticated skills in mathematics, mathematical modeling, and statistics.
>
> There have been research projects in neuroscience, cognitive science, and design dating back well over a decade. This involves more than “drawing attention to the potential role of neuro-cognition in design research.” It is a long-term commitment to serious research in the field. This work enabled us to develop the massive funding this project represents.
>
> With respect to funding, Terry got it backward. This was not a case of money “being allocated by funding bodies” with universities “following up.” In the Netherlands, Project UMA bid for the highly competitive Vici program funding against top quality projects in the full range of research fields. The NWO states that the Vicigrant “is directed at senior researchers who have shown that they have the ability successfully to develop their own innovative lines of research and to act as coaches for young researchers.” The Vici grant required a serious research proposal supported by strong track records of scientific and scholarly research. In Australia, Austria, and the UK, we are funding our own projects while seeking additional resources.
>
> It’s clear that Project UMA has expertise in neuroscience and mathematical modeling.
>
> Yours,
>
> Ken
>
> Professor Ken Friedman, PhD, DSc (hc), FDRS | University Distinguished Professor | Swinburne University of Technology | Melbourne, Australia | [log in to unmask] | Phone +61 3 9214 6102 | http://www.swinburne.edu.au/design
>
>
>
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> PhD-Design mailing list <[log in to unmask]>
> Discussion of PhD studies and related research in Design
> Subscribe or Unsubscribe at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/phd-design
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------------------------
PhD-Design mailing list <[log in to unmask]>
Discussion of PhD studies and related research in Design
Subscribe or Unsubscribe at https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/phd-design
-----------------------------------------------------------------
|
