The cognitive aspects of the engineering design activity – A literature survey

Abstract

This literature survey aims at representing the cur-rent research on the cognitive aspects of the design activity, with an emphasis on problem-solving proc-esses. The study is based on the selection of about sixty papers and books on the subject. The principal parameters of the study were defined as follows: general topics of the works, objects of the works, cognitive approaches, research results, study meth-ods. The findings from this survey are: Most of the studies concern design theory, and then design sup-port and education; They focus mainly on the con-ceptual design phase; The foremost cognitive aspect studied is problem solving, but knowledge, imagery and memory are also considered; The results of the reviewed papers confirm the validity of prescriptive methods for the design process, but there is a felt need for acknowledgement of the design activity con-straints induced by cognitive limitations; The meth-ods employed in most experiments are based on ver-bal protocol analysis and sketch analysis. The most important findings of this survey are that research should be extended to new areas, such as: Research on the cognitive aspects of the designer in the em-bodiment and detail design phases; Implementation of the research findings in current design practice, to improve the design process; Research of the origins of expert knowledge.