InformeDesign Releases Implications on Design Rese

Washington, DC, December 1, 2006--InformeDesign recently released a new issue of Implications, a monthly newsletter on design and human behavior, that looks at the emerging field of practice-based design research. Authors Lyn Geboy, Ph.D., and Amy Beth Keller, M. Arch., both with Kahler Slater Architects in Milwaukee, address the role of research in practice and describe various research methodologies that can be integrated into the design process at various phases of a project. “Practice-based research projects are typically initiated by immediate design problems that can be resolved with input from research,” state the authors. “It is crucial that the research question(s) be ‘doable,’ meaning it should be realistic to research the topic within the real-world constraints of time, money, expertise, access, and ethics.” Although they acknowledge that many types of research are useful to the practitioner, such as research on products or technology, in their own research they focus primarily on the complex relationship between people and environmental design. Employing both quantitative and qualitative methods, they seek to present new information that designers can apply creatively in their design solutions and/or to substantiate the effectiveness of design decisions as they relate to the human experience of the environment. “Lessons learned from research studies are carried forward by designers as they make design decisions,” say the authors. “When research knowledge has an obvious and positive impact on design decisions, we consider research as having informed design.” InformeDesign is the first searchable database of design and human behavior research on the Web. The site currently contains more than 1,500 “practitioner-friendly” Research Summaries of findings from research literature transformed from more than 165 scholarly journals related to design and human behavior. All services on the InformeDesign Web site are available at no cost to visitors. In addition to the searchable database of Research Summaries, the site features a calendar of research-related events and a glossary of terms. The Web site is interactive, allowing visitors to provide comments about specific Research Summaries or other site issues. Visitors may register with InformeDesign and receive automated e-mail notifications about Research Summaries pertaining to their areas of interest or practice. Once registered, users have access to MyInformeDesign, a tool to catalogue and store Research Summaries of interest in a personal cache, available anywhere there is access to the Internet. Registered users also will be notified by e-mail when a new issue of Implications is published. The staff of InformeDesign recommends that registered users who are not receiving requested notifications check with their information technology administrators to ensure that e-mails from informedesign@umn.edu are on a “safe” list and not considered spam.

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