How Cultural Knowledge Shapes Core Design Thinking

TY - JOUR

T1 - How Cultural Knowledge Shapes Core Design Thinking

T2 - A Situation Specific Analysis

AU - Clemmensen, Torkil

AU - Ranjan, Apara

AU - Bødker, Mads

N1 - Published online: 10. November 2017

PY - 2018/6

Y1 - 2018/6

N2 - The growing trend of co-creation and co-design in cross-cultural design teams presents challenges for the design thinking process. We integrate two frameworks, one on reasoning patterns in design thinking, the other on the dynamic constructivist theory of culture, to propose a situation specific framework for the empirical analysis of design thinking in cross-cultural teams. We illustrate the framework with a qualitative analysis of 16 episodes of design related conversations, which are part of a design case study. The results show that cultural knowledge, either as shared by the cross-cultural team or group specific knowledge of some team members, shape the reasoning patterns in the design thinking process across all the 16 episodes. Most of the design discussions were approached by the designers as problem situations that were formulated in a backward direction, where the value to create was known first. Then the designers were using available cultural knowledge to articulate the unknown what to design (products/services) and how the design would work (the working principles of product/services). In conclusion, we demonstrate a novel approach for understanding how cultural knowledge shapes core design thinking in specific situations.

AB - The growing trend of co-creation and co-design in cross-cultural design teams presents challenges for the design thinking process. We integrate two frameworks, one on reasoning patterns in design thinking, the other on the dynamic constructivist theory of culture, to propose a situation specific framework for the empirical analysis of design thinking in cross-cultural teams. We illustrate the framework with a qualitative analysis of 16 episodes of design related conversations, which are part of a design case study. The results show that cultural knowledge, either as shared by the cross-cultural team or group specific knowledge of some team members, shape the reasoning patterns in the design thinking process across all the 16 episodes. Most of the design discussions were approached by the designers as problem situations that were formulated in a backward direction, where the value to create was known first. Then the designers were using available cultural knowledge to articulate the unknown what to design (products/services) and how the design would work (the working principles of product/services). In conclusion, we demonstrate a novel approach for understanding how cultural knowledge shapes core design thinking in specific situations.

KW - Cultural knowledge

KW - Design thinking

KW - Abduction

KW - Situational analysis

KW - Cultural knowledge

KW - Design thinking

KW - Abduction

KW - Situational analysis

UR - https://sfx-45cbs.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/45cbs?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&url_ctx_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:ctx&ctx_enc=info:ofi/enc:UTF-8&ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&rfr_id=info:sid/sfxit.com:azlist&sfx.ignore_date_threshold=1&rft.object_id=1000000000017413

U2 - 10.1080/15710882.2017.1399146

DO - 10.1080/15710882.2017.1399146

M3 - Journal article

VL - 14

SP - 115

EP - 132

JO - CoDesign: International Journal of CoCreation in Design and the Arts

JF - CoDesign: International Journal of CoCreation in Design and the Arts

SN - 1571-0882

IS - 2

ER -