Dear all,
Terence Love raised the critical question of what is the purpose of design research and suggested the following categories:
"I suggest all the purposes of design research are included in the following four items:
1. To improve the prediction of behaviour of designed outputs 2. To improve the prediction of the behaviour of outcomes that result from designed outputs 3. To identify how humans and machines create designed outputs on the basis of their inputs 4. To reduce the number of design solutions and problems that are regarded as 'wicked' and 'hyper-wicked'"
In order not to muddle up Danielle's thread perhaps this topic deserves its own thread?
So, what is the purpose of design research? If we start from the assumption that knowledge generation and dissemination is the purpose of academic research, a central question for design research is where do we gather design knowledge?
In my view, Nigel Cross' (2007) categories are sufficiently broad to serve as a foundation for a taxonomy of design research. So, if we agree that design has its things to know and ways to find out about them, then design knowledge resides mostly in people, processes, and products. These three areas establish a foundational design research taxonomy: design epistemology, design praxiology, and design phenomenology.
It seems that these categories are broad enough to include the many different sub-fields and specialities of design research. Design epistemology, for instance, covers design as a natural human ability, possessed by professionals with different levels of skill, but also includes the study of how people (non-professionals) use, change, adapt, or transform their artefacts; furthermore, the study of how people learn how to design falls into the category of design epistemology.
Design praxiology encompasses the study of design processes, that is, the tactics and strategies of designing; here we can fit the study of the design process in general but also how specific tools, skills, and techniques (such as modelling or sketching) help designers design.
Finally, with design phenomenology, we have the study of artefacts themselves. The actual forms and materials of everyday objects and their embodiment in physical shape.
Surely, within this taxonomy, we could fit Terence’s categories without the field becoming too reductive?
'best,
Cross, N. (2007). Designerly Ways of Knowing. Basel: Birkhäuser Verlag AG.
--
João Ferreira
REDES - Research & Education in Design
Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Arquitetura, CIAUD
00351 967 089 437
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