Industrial and Product Design Commons^™

Evidence-Based Design: Documenting A Research Experiment In A School Environment With Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Julie E. Irish

Julie Elaine Irish

Purpose Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a developmental disorder affecting around 1:59 children. Among other characteristics, children with ASD can be unduly sensitive to elements in the built environment, such as noise or light. Despite this knowledge, to date there has been little evidence-based experimental research investigating how the environment affects them. The purpose of this paper is to conduct an experiment in a school environment with children with ASD and document the process as a model that other researchers could apply to similar studies.

Design/methodology/approach The study focused on whether the application of wayfinding aids (colored doors, colored shapes …

Design For Living Complexities, Peter J. Taylor

Working Papers in Critical, Creative and Reflective Practice

Lectures from a 12-session course that addresses the intersection of design with critical thinking. Design in this course means intentionality in construction, which involves a range of materials, a sequence of steps, and principles that inform the choice of materials and the steps. Design also always involves putting people, as well as materials, into place. This happens by working with the known properties of people, as well as the known properties of material, and trying out new arrangements to work around their constraints (at least temporarily). Critical thinking, as I define it, involves understanding ideas and practices better when we …