Scientific models from empirical design research

For many designing is an unknowable mystery. Science is founded on the axiom that things are knowable. Can designing be “known” through science? Science takes the approach that there are observables called phenomena that can be represented separately from the phenomena themselves and that these phenomena exhibit regularities. Further, science assumes that these phenomena can in some sense be measured. Hypotheses are conjectures about the regularities of these phenomena that can be tested against the data acquired through measurement. Tested hypotheses form the basis of the construction of models that can be used both to describe the regularities and to make predictions about the phenomena underlying those regularities. It has been argued that since the result of designing is a unique design, i.e., when you carry out the same design task again you produce a different design, where is the regularity that is required for science to apply to designing? The regularity in designing is not necessarily in the resultant design but in the process that produces that design – designerly behavior. Using science to study designerly behavior results in scientific models describing designerly behavior based on empirical evidence rather than on personal experience. The remainder of this chapter will introduce a method for the capture of empirical data on designing. This is followed by the description of an ontology of designing that maps onto the phenomena of designing that are capturable. The rest of the chapter describes some of the scientific models that can be produced from this empirically-grounded data.