5. Design research Reflection

The two guest lecturers gave an interesting insight into what we can understand as design research and how to market ideas. They also made us aware of the benefits and limitations of this kind of research.

For Ylva a design research can be a concept that is grounded in existing scientific research and contributes to empirical data by analyzing and looking on the topic from different perspectives. It doesn’t necessarily need to take a collection of statistical data or qualitative information to consider a paper as research. I personally were struggling a bit with this explanation because I feel that research needs to undergo some kind of proof or validation process to state how relevant or meaningful the results are. However, I could better understand what Ylva meant when she described the different approaches between design work and design research. Whereas in design work the focus lies on the particular design and how to sell it, design research adds another dimension by grounding the concept with a theoretical framework, critically reflect pros and cons and sharing your ideas with others.

Li approached the field of design research from a different angle. For him every innovation process starts with a problem. By coming up with a good idea or the “right” solution to the problem, there is a great potential for the commercialization of your concept. In order to get there and to be successful, your design research needs to undergo a validation, an evaluation and a communication process. Li provided us here with important information that I found lacking in Ylvas talk. He further outlines that quantitative and qualitative research methods are supporting tools to evaluate and validate your idea.

Even though I feel now that I can better agree on the fact that design research is considered as scientific research, you always have to be aware of the limitations. Both lecturers made their points clear. Design research involves a lot of experiments, e.g. observing user behavior and the following revising and adjusting process in order to build a product that satisfies the needs and meets all requirements. Furthermore, the implementation can become a challenge when your idea is ahead of the actual state of technologies. You sometimes have to wait for the right technologies to come up in order to implement your idea. This reminded me of James Cameron who wrote the screenplay for “Avatar” nearly 20 years before shooting the actual movie, because he had to wait until the 3-D technology was advanced enough. 

In relation to that design research is very much dependent on technologies which can quickly become outdated. Whereas scientific research in other fields lasts as long as someone could disprove a theory, design research can only last for a few years until there is a shift in technologies or consumer behaviors. This is the main reason why I feel that a validation and evaluation process with prototypes is crucial in design research to be successful – not in the way of making money but in the way of generating meaningful results.