EAGER: TheDesignExchange: Characterizing, Mapping and Interacting with Industry on User-Focused Design Methods

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The research objective of this EArly-Concept Grant for Exploratory Research (EAGER)award is to explore, characterize, and map the use of user-centric design methods and tools. TheDesignExchange will provide a mechanism for investigators to answer questions pertaining to the motivation for the choice of and use of a particular design method for a design problem. TheDesignExchange will offer a centralized venue where human-centered design methods will be shared, discussed and disseminated, so that the research community can then engage in research to provide explanations as to how the various methods within the design process relate to each other. TheDesignExchange will increase researchers' understanding of structured design processes, and will also be an invaluable resource to train novice and professional engineers and designers.If successful, the outcomes of this award will result in an interactive web portal to facilitate the capture, analysis and widespread use of human-centered design methods, together with the insights as to how these methods will be best used for maximum success of the design venture. TheDesignExchange will be powered by a multidisciplinary community contributed database, which will allow practitioners and researchers to more deeply understand the use of design methods in practice and will facilitate the exchange of information between industry and academia. A workshop will be held in conjunction with this work at the 2012 NSF CMMI Grantees Conference. The outcomes of this workshop will form the basis of the research agenda for TheDesignExchange platform, including hypotheses for an ontology that maps human-centered design methods to real-world design problems, which will be made available to both industry and the research community.