The Cognitive Use of Prior Knowledge in Design Cognition: The Role of Types and Precedents in Architectural Design

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.25034/ijcua.2019.v3n3-4

Keywords:

Prior knowledge, cognition, cultural schemas, architectural design, architectural type

Abstract

This paper examines the cognitive use of prior knowledge in the design and evaluates the role of types and precedents in architectural design and education from a cognitive perspective. The previous research on design cognition shows that the amount of prior knowledge possessed by the designer plays a fundamental role in the production and quality of the creative outcome. This paper examines this correlation between the cognitive concept of cultural schemas with the architectural concept of types and investigates the cognitive role of types and precedents within architectural design and education in the light of the cognitive literature. With such an attempt, the research conducts an interdisciplinary theoretical inquiry that respectively studies the role of prior knowledge in design cognition, the concept of cognitive-cultural schemas, the concept of type and its relationship with cultural schemas, and the cognitive role of types and precedents in architectural design and education. In conclusion, this study proposes that types function identically as cultural schemas at the cognitive level and types and precedents have a generative value for architectural design, by virtue of the fact that they exist as the initial cognitive schemas that are employed at the beginning of the design process.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Akin, O. (2002). Case-based instruction strategies in architecture. Design Studies. 23. 407-431. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0142-694X(01)00046-1

Argan, G. C. (1996). On the typology of architecture. In K. Nesbitt (Ed.), Theorizing a New Agenda for Architecture: An Anthology of Architectural Theory 1965-1995. New York: Princeton Architectural Press.

Bonnardel, N., & Marmeche, E. (2005). Towards supporting evocation processes in creative design: A cognitive approach. International Journal of Human Computer Studies, 63, 422-435. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhcs.2005.04.006

Bruning, R. H., Schraw, G., Norby, M. & Ronning, R. (Eds.). (2004). Cognitive psychology and instruction. Columbus, Ohio: Pearson Merrill Prentice Hall.

Chan, C. S. (1990). Cognitive processes in architectural design problem solving. Design Studies, 11(2), 60-80. https://doi.org/10.1016/0142-694X(90)90021-4

Cross, N. (2001). Design cognition: Results from protocol and other empirical studies of design activity. In C. Eastman, W. Newstetter & M. McCracken (Eds.), Design knowing and learning: Cognition in design education. Oxford: Elsevier Books.

Cross, N. (2006). Designerly ways of knowing. London: Springer-Verlag. https://www.springer.com/la/book/9781846283000

D’Andrade, R. (1992). Schemas and motivation. In R. D’andrade & C. Strauss (Eds.), Human motives and cultural models. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139166515.003

Goel, V. (2001). Dissociation of design knowledge. In C. Eastman, W. Newstetter & M. McCracken (Eds.), Design knowing and learning: Cognition in design education. Oxford: Elsevier Books.

Goldschmidt, G. (1998). Creative architectural design: reference versus precedence. Journal of Architectural and Planning Research, 15(3), 258-270. https://www.jstor.org/stable/43030466

Habraken, N. J. (1985). The appearance of the form: four essays on the position designing takes place between people and things. Cambridge, MA: Awater Press.

Holland, D. & Quinn, N. (1987). Culture and cognition. In D. Holland & N. Quinn (Ed.s), Cultural models of language and thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Jansson, D. G., Condoor, S. S. & Brock, H. R. (1992). Cognition in design: viewing the hidden side of the design process. Environment and planning b: planning and design, 19, 257 – 271. https://doi.org/10.1068/b200257

Johnson, M. (1987). The body in the mind: The bodily basis of meaning, imagination and reason. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Koestler, A. (1964). The act of creation. London: Penguin Books.

Kolodner, J. L. (1992). An introduction to case-based reasoning. Artificial intelligence review 6, 3-34. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/BF00155578

Lawson, B. (2004). Schemata, gambits and precedent: some factors in design expertise. Design studies, 25(5), 443-457. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.destud.2004.05.001

Laxton, M. (1969). Design education in practice. Attitudes in design education. London: Lund Humphries.

Malhotra, A., Thomas, J. C., Carroll, J. M. & Millera, L. A. (1980). Cognitive processes in design. International journal of man-machine studies, 12(2), 119-140. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0020-7373(80)80013-7

Mcdermott, J. (1982). Domain knowledge and the design process. Design studies, 3(1), 31-36. https://doi.org/10.1016/0142-694X(82)90077-1

Nisbett, R. E. & Norenzayan, A. (2002). Culture and cognition. In D. L. Medin (Ed.), Stevens’ Handbook of Experimental Psychology, Third Edition, New York: John Wiley & Sons.

Oxman, R. E. & Oxman, R. M. (1992). Refinement and adaptation in design cognition. Design studies, 13(2), 117–134. https://doi.org/10.1016/0142-694X(92)90259-D

Oxman, R. E. (1990a). Design shells: A formalism for prototype refinement in knowledge-based design systems. Artificial intelligence in engineering, 5(1), 2-8. https://doi.org/10.1016/0954-1810(90)90030-8

Oxman, R. E. (1990b). Prior knowledge in design: a dynamic knowledge-based model of design and creativity. Design studies, 2(1), 17–28. https://doi.org/10.1016/0142-694X(90)90011-Z

Oxman, R. E. (1992). Refinement and adaptation in design cognition. Design Studies. Vol. 13. No. 2.

Oxman, R. E. (1994). Precedents in design: a computational model for the organization of precedent knowledge. Design studies, 15(2), 141-157. https://doi.org/10.1016/0142-694X(94)90021-3

Oxman, R. E. (1996). Design by re-representation: a model of visual reasoning in design. Design studies, 18(4), 329–347.

Oxman, R. E. (1999). Educating the designerly thinker. Design studies, 20(2), 105-122. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0142-694X(98)00029-5

Oxman, R. E. (2001). The mind in design: a conceptual framework for cognition in design education. In C. Eastman, W. Newstetter & M. McCracken (Eds.), Design knowing and learning: Cognition in design education, (pp. 269-295). Oxford: Elsevier Books.

Oxman, R. E. (2004). Think-maps: teaching design thinking in design education. Design studies, 25(1), 63-91. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0142-694X(03)00033-4

Oyserman, D., Sorensen, N., Reber, R. & Chen, S. X. (2009). Connecting and separating mind-sets: culture as situated cognition. Journal of personality and social psychology, 97(2), 217–235. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/a0015850

Petruccioli, A. (1998). Typological process and design theory. MA: Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture. https://archnet.org/publications/4240

Purcell, A. T. & Gero, J. (1991). The effects of examples on the results of design activity. In J. S. Gero (Ed.), Artificial intelligence in design aid. Oxford, UK: Butterworth-Heinemann. https://doi.org/10.1016/0950-7051(92)90026-C

Shore, B. (1996). Culture in mind: cognition, culture and the problem of meaning. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Simon, H. A. (1973). The structure of ill-structured problems. Artificial intelligence, 4, 181–201. https://doi.org/10.1016/0004-3702(73)90011-8

Suwa, M., Purcell, T. & Gero, J. (1998). Macroscopic analysis of design processes based on a scheme for coding designers' cognitive actions. Design studies, 19(4), 455-83. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0142-694X(98)00016-7

Uysal Ürey, Zeynep Çiğdem. (2019). The Sociocultural Role of Architectural Types: Cultural Sustainability in Architecture and the Possibility of Convention. GRID - Architecture, Planning and Design Journal, 2 (1), 83-99. http://dergipark.org.tr/grid/issue/42546/491782

Uysal, Zeynep Çiğdem. (2012). Architectural Type as a Cultural Schema and Its Cognitive Use in Architectural Design: An Analysis of the Aga Khan Award Winning Dwellings in Turkey (1970-2008), Unpublished PhD Dissertation, North Carolina State University, Raleigh.

Wertsch, J. (Ed.). (1985). Culture, communication and cognition: Vyogotskian perspectives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://trove.nla.gov.au/work/6991064?q&versionId=45241165

Downloads

Published

2019-12-25

How to Cite

Urey, Z. C. U. (2019). The Cognitive Use of Prior Knowledge in Design Cognition: The Role of Types and Precedents in Architectural Design. Journal of Contemporary Urban Affairs, 3(3), 39–50. https://doi.org/10.25034/ijcua.2019.v3n3-4