Hi Martin,
Thank you for your message.
When I wrote "Research in Art provides better understanding of aesthetics
that visual designers can use." I was thinking of theories of aesthetics
coming from research in Art such as imitationalism, formalism, emotionalism,
instrumentalism, realism, aesthetic concept structures, aesthetic value....
On the second part of your questions you asked " It would also be useful to
know how this can be separate or distinguishable from the idea of
'knowledge'."
I suggest you are misunderstanding what I wrote?
Of course the above are forms of knowledge. Perhaps you might call it 'Art
knowledge and processes useful for visual designers'.
I was, however, suggesting that in making a clean definition of the
boundaries of design research distinct from other disciplines it is
helpful to exclude such knowledge and processes that come from other
disciplines.
That is, it is helpful to exclude from design research 'Art knowledge and
processes useful for designers', 'engineering knowledge and processes useful
for designers' etc.
I understand that there are many discipline-based groups with significant
investment in making design research focus on their own speciality, whether
it is visual design, engineering design interaction design or whatever. I
suggest this has been the problem and led to design research becoming the
disciplinary mess it has become.
The lack of clarity about the boundaries of the definition of design
research (and the general mess and failure of design research as a field)
has most commonly resulted from an uncritical and unconscious (and to some
extents careless) conflation of the subject knowledge and subject-based
processes in which a particular designer works with the separate and
distinct actions of design activity.
This lack of ability to separate the subject knowledge and processes from
the activity of designing is similar to the problematic confusion and
conflation by which language use is presumed to be the only basis for
thinking.
I'm suggesting:
1. That it is helpful to ensure that no subject-specific knowledge or
processes are included in a formal definition of design research
2. That such clean definition of design research focuses only on research
that specifically improves the activities of designing (as distinct from any
subject-specific knowledge or processes such as those from art or
engineering)
Hence, going back to your question, it is irrelevant whether the
understanding (or domain knowledge or processes) of aesthetics from art
research is useful for visual designers. Such subject-specific knowledge and
processes are better excluded from design research, and, instead, only
undertaken in Art.
Similarly, it is irrelevant whether the understanding (or domain knowledge
or processes) of technical and mathematical issues from engineering
research is useful for engineering designers. Again such subject-specific
knowledge and processes are better excluded from design research and
instead only undertaken in engineering.
The above provides a basis for a definition of a distinctly
subject-separate topic area 'design research' that is not part of any other
discipline.
Regards,
Terry
==
Dr Terence Love
CEO
Design Out Crime & CPTED Centre
Perth, Western Australia
[log in to unmask]
www.designoutcrime.org
+61 (0)4 3497 5848
==
ORCID 0000-0002-2436-7566
-----Original Message-----
From: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]> On
Behalf Of Salisbury, Martin
Sent: Saturday, 23 June 2018 9:53 PM
To: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
research in Design <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: RE: Domains of Design Knowledge
Dear Terry,
There are some interesting ideas in your manifesto.
Just a quick question: you state,
"Research in Art provides better understanding of aesthetics that visual
designers can use."
Could you elaborate on what this actually means and perhaps give some
tangible examples? It would also be useful to know how this can be separate
or distinguishable from from the idea of 'knowledge'.
Best regards from Bogota,
Martin
Martin Salisbury
Professor of Illustration
Director, The Centre for Children's Book Studies Cambridge School of Art
0845 196 2351
[log in to unmask]
http://www.cambridgemashow.com
http://www.anglia.ac.uk/ruskin/en/home/microsites/ccbs.html
________________________________________
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
research in Design [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of Terence Love
[[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Friday, June 22, 2018 3:35 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Domains of Design Knowledge
Dear Francois, Ken and all,
Thanks to Ken for pointing out that we sometimes go over the same ground.
Like Ken, I was also interested in the domains of design from the early 90s.
We worked together with others on mapping design fields for a while.
I suggest among other things that identifying the domains of design research
is better if we avoid using the idea of 'design knowledge'
Here is a trilogy of four issues that spring to mind in exploring the
meaning of 'design research':
* The added value to others gained from design research
* The distraction of the idea 'knowledge' in design research
* The relationship between design research and future studies
* Boundaries of design research
Issue 1: Added value to others and design research
Looking back, it is clear that design research has resulted in major
improvements to the ways that products, systems, services and programs have
come into being. Examples include: a halving of the development time for
motor vehicles, significant reductions in design-related costs of large
construction projects (e.g. Singapore airport costs reduced by 8% due to
improved web-based design and construction process), reductions in the
serious failure rate of large information systems design projects due to
improved design processes, improved quality and reliability of designed
products due to standardised design systems such as VDI 2221. The reason it
is an important focus of design research to investigate how people design is
that improvements to the ways that people design produce real and
significant economic and social gains.
This is not to deny other significant contributions developed as a result of
work in other fields such as ergonomics, engineering, the natural and social
sciences, and the Arts and Humanities. These have contributed to the
information resources designers have used in developing new designs. The key
point is that it is research aimed at improving the ways that designers
design that provide the main value to others. Mostly, however, this has not
resulted from methods for individual designers' and design teams'
activities. Instead, the fruits of design research are primarily gained by
becoming embedded in computerised systems that designers use whose primary
purpose is to automate as much as possible of design activity.
Until recently, there have been large strides made by drawing directly on
research approaches of other disciplines. Much of the improvements in design
processes has resulted from research based on approaches from management,
project management, in service training, information management and
information and communication technologies. The application of these
approaches over the last thirty years has shown up weaknesses in core
conceptualisation.
Until recently, it has been sufficient to use terms like design, creative,
system, image, vision and user loosely provided they were accompanied by
sufficient arm waving. Contemporary design projects are typically complex
and multidisciplinary with requirements of high standards for reliability,
manufacturability, functionality and user friendliness, whilst at the same
time being economical to produce and satisfying increasing restrictive
legislative criteria in relation to safety, intellectual property,
environmental and social impacts etc.
Research aimed at solid improvements in effectiveness and efficiency of
design teams and design processes in this context requires better conceptual
foundations than has been the case over the last thirty years. This is where
Philosophy of Design is important to the future of design research (and
designing). Design philosophers are working on identifying how key
concepts are best defined, so that design theories can be built to
facilitate the building of improved models of how people design, so that
improvements to the ways that people design can be hypothesised, so that
these hypotheses can be tested and validated by research - so that designers
can design more effectively and efficiently.
Issue 2: The Distraction of 'Knowledge' in Design Research
Design research involves research. In defining design research, the idea of
'design knowledge' is a distraction. The appropriate focus of design
research is on providing added value to stakeholders in design processes.
This parallels the ways that other disciplines provide added value to
designers. For example, research in Engineering provides technical
information that designers can use. Research in Art provides better
understanding of aesthetics that visual designers can use. Research in
Psychology provides increased understanding of the emotional responses
people have towards particular forms and services.
Design research that adds value for stakeholders is that research that
informs how designing can be undertaken more effectively and efficiently.
For PhD programs, the focus is in research training. Educationally, the main
issue is to provide an educational and assessment context in which the PhD
student can learn, and demonstrate that they have learned, the ability to
independently undertake dependable justifiable and valuable research,
develop well justified useful theory, and describe their findings and
research process in a complete and unambiguous manner. Having the PhD
student undertake a research project fulfils most of these requirements.
Requiring them to develop an individual contribution to knowledge in their
research makes the learning authentic, reduces the possibility of cheating,
and provides motivational support via the candidate's ego. It is only in
this secondary role that is found the sense in most PhD contributions to
'knowledge'. Some might ask whether the focus on 'design knowledge' is a
problem. I agree. It is a problem in particular, because of confusion about
meanings of both 'design' and 'knowledge' in this context. Conceptual
clarity is considerably improved if discussion about designing, design
research and philosophy of design drop the concept of 'design knowledge'.
Issue 3: Relationship between Design Research and Futures Studies
The outcomes of designing and design processes change the future, and it is
a necessary aspect of undertaking designing to understand these changes and
use this information as an important part of the background context. The
purpose of research that is part and parcel of Futures Studies is to make
reliable theory models of future situations. These theory models, and
perhaps the primary research data unearthed by Futures Studies researchers,
are information that designers use in creating designs.
This points to key differences between Design Research and Futures Studies.
Futures Studies provides information about future scenarios that is of use
by designers.
Futures Studies does not focus on understanding designing or improving the
efficiency and effectiveness of design activities. The study of the impact
of particular sorts of design activities on future scenarios is a secondary
issue. Design research, in contrast, has a core focus on improving the
efficiency and effectiveness of design activities. Research into future
scenarios in general is an entirely secondary issue in design research.
Issue 4 in the trilogy: Boundaries of Design Research
Much of the confusion that marks design theory making is a consequence of
unclear boundaries of design research in relation to other disciplines. One
explanation for this is that designing is undertaken in many disciplines,
and a general lack of conceptual clarity about the differences in purpose
and process of designers and design researchers has resulted in a tendency
to assume that 'all is design research' (including designing). I suggest
that this is unhelpful for the formation of a coherent body of theory.
A first step in developing a coherent body of theory is to identify which
core areas are addressed by design research that are not core areas of other
disciplines. If there are none, the implication is that design research is a
subset, or duplication of, one or more other disciplines.
Assuming this is not so, then the identified core areas of design research
immediately suggest the disciplinary boundaries of design research. This
clarifies things conceptually because it identifies theory 'edges' at which
design theories must align with theories of other disciplines.
I suggest that there are only two core foci of design research that satisfy
the above.
A) The study of designing as it happens inside individuals and among
individuals.
B) The study of how individuals interact with designed objects. In
short, how the artificial is devised and used.
The study of any special ways that designers internally view design
contexts, partially completed designs and designed artefacts, systems and
services would fall naturally into these core areas - and without needing to
invoke the idea of 'design knowledge'.
Best wishes,
Terry
==
Dr Terence Love
MICA, PMACM, MAISA, FDRS, AMIMechE
Director
Design Out Crime & CPTED Centre
Perth, Western Australia
[log in to unmask]
www.designoutcrime.org
+61 (0)4 3497 5848
==
ORCID 0000-0002-2436-7566
-----Original Message-----
From: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]> On
Behalf Of Ken Friedman
Sent: Thursday, 21 June 2018 3:54 PM
<snip>
"Dear Colleagues,
Every now and then, we seem to enter a time warp, repeating old
conversations "
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