2015 Fiscal Year Research-status Report
革新的なエコデザイン戦略を持続可能な生産と消費のための工業デザイン教育に統合
| Project/Area Number |
26340112
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| Research Institution | Chiba University |
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Principal Investigator |
UEDA Edilson S 千葉大学, 工学(系)研究科(研究院), 准教授 (50436341)
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| Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) |
寺内 文雄 千葉大学, 工学(系)研究科(研究院), 教授 (30261887)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2014-04-01 – 2017-03-31
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| Keywords | サステナブルデザイン / デザイン教育 / エコデザイン戦略 / 製品デザイン / 工業デザイン / エコプロダクト / エコツール / イノベーション |
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| Outline of Annual Research Achievements |
According to research planning proposal in 2014, this second year of research focused on design education for sustainability, the topics of which are a) the barriers to promoting ecodesign in education and b) strategies and resources (tools) for industrial design students and industrial designers. At the same time, ecodesign in Japanese academic industrial design has been investigated. On this last topic, we collected data from Japanese national and private universities as well as foreign universities that have offered product design courses with environmental concerns and industrial design courses that have implemented an eco-product concept in their curricula. We have also collected data from scientific articles and papers on ecodesign and sustainability approaches by professional industrial designers and students of industrial design. For topics a) and b), the research method was literature reviews, questionnaires and practical case studies. The results of topics a) and b) have been detailed in the series of papers on design education for sustainability: “Design Education for Sustainability (I): A Survey of Product Design Students’ Attitude Toward Environmental Consciousness”; “Design Education for Sustainability (II): A Case Study of an Undergraduate Student Team Learning about Sustainable Design. Topics c) and d) are a continuation of the series of design education for sustainability, which has been explored to justify and complement topics a) and b).
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| Current Status of Research Progress |
Current Status of Research Progress
2: Research has progressed on the whole more than it was originally planned.
Reason
The progress of the research plan for 2015 has been rather smooth. The quality and quantity aspects of design education for sustainability have been explored in the papers introduced in the previous section. Paper (I) introduced the theoretical study of design education in the sustainability context in the academic and professional field and a case study of 620 product design students’ attitude, knowledge and viewpoints toward environmental consciousness. According to the results of the survey, students’ strong consideration of socio-cultural principles was the most important factor for addressing environmental issues. The majority of the 413 students who did not follow an environmental education expressed a strong desire to receive environmental information, with the primary topics related to examples of environmentally friendly products (eco-products). Paper (II) analyzed the activities and attitudes of undergraduate students toward eco-product development. The activities and attitudes of the student team showed that they focus on sustainable consumption and consequently lean toward a socio-cultural rather than a technological ecodesign approach in their work. Students face real-world sustainability issues, providing a great opportunity for them to discuss among themselves as well as with the public. Here, the barriers to design education for sustainable design were found, and the student team expressed that the available support tool during their design process was complex. They also expressed that the tool was incompatible with their academic skills and background.
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| Strategy for Future Research Activity |
In planning for 2016, we will continue the series of research on design education for sustainability. We will analyze in detail the data collected from Japanese national and private universities as well as foreign universities that offer product design courses with environmental concerns. The programs and curriculum contents in ecodesign and sustainable design will then be compared to identify a new way in which to promote the implementation of sustainability in future industrial design courses. The data collected from articles and papers on ecodesign and sustainability in the industrial design field will be quantified and analyzed in detail. The focus of the analyses of this paper is to identify and analyze the eco-tools used by the engineering design and industrial design fields. An in-depth analysis of the eco-tools could clarify the advantages and disadvantages of the current methods and tools for industrial designers and design educators at an academic and a professional level. Identifying a compatible eco-tool for industrial design skill could be used to stimulate, encourage and motivate students and industrial designers into rethinking sustainability approaches during the initial phase of project development. This will be focused on users, sustainable consumption principles and eco-services to explore visual and intuitive interactions, with easy accessibility and understanding. Further, it might even stimulate new ideas and solutions by using concrete examples and future sustainable scenarios.
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