| Definition | Warning! | |
|---|---|---|
| Research for Design | • Anything you to in preparation for design. User interviews, benchmarking, mood boards, etc. The gathering of reference materials. | |
| • Design without research is just making images and models. | ||
| • Research is needed to de-risk the business. The product is developed by various teams in a complex way with a high degree of collaboration and dependencies. Researchers usually don’t design but communicate the findings with various teams. | • The research that doesn’t lead to design is wasted. | |
| • May be stuck in certain research methods. | ||
| • Focus too much on executing the perfect studies. Often scrappier and faster methods are better, such as observing pedestrians, reading, asking friends and families. | ||
| • Report readers have a difficult time digesting the insights. | ||
| Research into Design | • Most design research in academia is this. Psychology, anthropology, education, and history scholars investigates the creatives and creative work. | - |
| Research Through Design | • Design as a research method. | |
| • Tackle a problem with design. Design as a way to think and seek knowledge. | • Too busy making and not thinking. Sacrifice research integrity and theory. Too much design and too little research. |
(Frayling, 1993; Baytaş, M. A., 2021)
“Design should be generating research and then you’ve got research through design and not design as a bolt-on.”
(Frayling, 2015. video link)
Three ways to Research Through Design
| Type | Description | Theoretical Source | Goal |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lab | Build prototypes systematically, controlling various variables. Test in a highly-controlled environment. | Use quantifiable data and statistics to make causal judgements. | Establish generalizable knowledge and theory. |
| Field | Examine the design in a natural/uncontrolled environment. | Comes from ethnographic research. Try to understand how people give meaning to thing. | Get information with context. |
| Showroom | Where research, design, and art meet. | Art is beyond knowledge. Asking questions and not providing answers. | To wander and imagine. |
Prototype could be…
(Wensveen, 2018)
Sources
Baytaş, M. A. (2021). The Three Faces of Design Research. Main site: Design Discipline.
URL: https://www.designdisciplin.com/the-three-faces-of-design-research/
Wensveen, S. A. G. (2018). Constructive design research. TU/e.
Frayling, C. (1993). Research in Art and Design. RCA.