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Exploring the learning problems and resource usage of undergraduate industrial design students in design studio courses

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Abstract

Design is a powerful weapon for modern companies so it is important to have excellent designers in the industry. The purpose of this study is to explore the learning problems and the resources that students use to overcome problems in undergraduate industrial design studio courses. A survey with open-type questions was conducted to collect data. Participants in this study were 189 undergraduate industrial design students from three universities, and two coding schema were formulated for analysing the data. The results demonstrated that the most difficult design tasks included concept generation, design presentation, and design research. The learning resources used to solve the learning problems included four categories: people, object, method, and environment. This information will increase the understanding of the learning process of students and provide a reference for teaching and the setting of learning resources in industrial design education.

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Acknowledgments

This research was funded by the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Republic of China under Grant Number NSC 99-2410-H-182-028-MY2. Thanks are extended to all participants and research assistants for their contributions to this project.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Industrial Design, College of Management, Chang Gung University, 259 Wen-Hwa 1st Road, Kwei-Shan, 333, Tao-Yuan, Taiwan, ROC

    Wenzhi Chen

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  1. Wenzhi Chen
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Correspondence to Wenzhi Chen.

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Chen, W. Exploring the learning problems and resource usage of undergraduate industrial design students in design studio courses. Int J Technol Des Educ 26, 461–487 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10798-015-9315-2

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