Action case research: a method for the accumulation of design theory/practice knowledge

in practice
Ching-Chiuan Yen
Martin Woolley
& Kuo-Jung Hsieh
Chang Gung University, TW
<[email protected]>

Introduction

Design research is a relatively young discipline and to date does not have a well-
established cultural base in comparison to the sciences, humanities and other scholarly
disciplines (Owen 1994). Generally, artists and designers undertaking formal research
draw heavily on existing research methods from the Physical and Social Sciences.
Recently, there has been an increasing debate about research as a discipline in art and
design (Frayling 1993/4 & Press 1995) as art and design practitioners become increasingly
involved in research. The nature of art and design has become one of the main topics for
such debates.

However, industrial/product design is not art, craft or engineering, it has its own purposes,
values, measures and procedures (Owen 1994). It can be assumed that there is a way of
processing research for design as design knowledge is gained through both research and
practice. More accurately, design studies could be described as a 'field of knowledge',
because it is multi-faceted and draws upon many related disciplines (Creigh-Tyte 1995).
Design, like many other occupations is seeking to establish itself as a profession, it is
therefore concerned about the development of a service orientation, the continual growth
of knowledge, based on practice and the evolution of a distinct body of knowledge that
distinguishes designers from other professionals.

The increasing awareness of design research as an integral part of professional design

practice has been accelerating rapidly in recent years. Designers should therefore
recognise the need to extend the base of design knowledge as part of their professional
responsibility. Thus, research has an important role to play in helping designers establish a
knowledge base for design practice.

2 The evolution of the design study

The nature of design practice is dynamic and involves a series of interrelated processes of
thinking and practising (or input and output). According to Cross (1984), the editor of
Development in Design Methodology, four generations of concepts have been developed
within the process of evolution of design methodology since 1962. Despite individual
preferences of methodologists for 3, 4, or 6 stages in the design process within the
different stages of evolution, the main change is the premise on which the philosophy of
the methodology is based. Philosophy for design methodology emerged from the concern
over the conflict between art (intuition) and science (rationality). The focus subsequently
extended from a scientific systematic process to a humanitarian relationship. Such a
relationship empowers individuals not only to explore the diverse qualities of personal
experience but also to shape that of community and societal experience.

Experience gained through this process of evolution suggests that much of the practical
failure of earlier stages of design methodology was based on inappropriate premises.
More recently, 'pluralism', a more ideal premise, has been suggested by Margolin and
Buchanan (1995) for design studies, which seeks to find the meanings of design on the
basis of the study of many instances of design in a variety of circumstances. A pluralistic
field of design may be "bringing theoretical understanding into direct relation with practice
and production" (Margolin and Buchanan 1995). This not only maintains the merits of
previous generations of methodology which mainly focus on design as a discipline, but
also considers the contribution of different types of philosophic or cultural content. For
example, 'product semantics' empowers users by transposing a linguistic method to
develop a more meaningful product form.

Besides the meta-knowledge established from the pluralism of conceptions of the

discipline, the design methodology also needs to be established through 'designerly
thinking' (Archer 1984b). In order to devise a useful standard or additions to a
methodology, it is necessary to identify the 'designerly' way of thinking and knowing. In
Design Methods, Jones (1992) identifies 3 different types of designer as follows:
The designer as a black box (from the creative viewpoint): the result comes from the
mysterious creative leap.
The designer as a glass box (from the rational viewpoint): the result is as a consequence
of a completely explicable rational process.
The designer as a self-organising system (from the control viewpoint): the result is as a
consequence of a strategy-plus-objectives design process.
The first two types may be inappropriate, as design is neither purely art nor science. The
final type of 'designerly thinking' echoes the above concept. In his interpretation of design,
Archer (1984) defines designing as a "goal-oriented problem-solving activity." As in all
goal-oriented activities, a pre-requisite for getting there is knowledge of where 'the goal' is.
In a conference for healthcare design, Dr. Kaiser echoes this statement and believes that
design should make a 'value statement' before the physical construction begins (Bell et al.
1994). The ultimate success of a design project therefore depends a great deal on the
accurate establishment at the beginning of the 'real' project goals. Therefore, success of
design depends on the skill of establishing the right goals. Cross (1995:108) took this
discussion further and claimed that to emphasise the role of the conjectured solution of
goals is a way of gaining understanding of the design problem and states the need "to
generate a variety of solutions precisely as a means of problem analysis." The imposition
of a set of objectives or specific solutions as 'primary generators' for an initial design
solution was originated and championed by Darke (1979). Instead of simply treating the
methodology as a scientific and pragmatic approach to thinking, the ideal methodology
should accommodate the intentions and responsibilities of design itself. Designers
therefore need to perceive and understand the relevant information to establish a 'value
goal' before beginning the design. The outcome of a design study should therefore help
designers to identify, collect and synthesise such information, in order to achieve a more
appropriate solution to such a goal.

Based on such an aim in related to design practice, an analytic/synthetic, theory/practice

research model was developed by Owen (1994) for generating and accumulating
knowledge in the realm of theory and practice. New knowledge for design can be
demonstrated by overall process regarding the synthesis of the theoretical and practical
knowledge. A similar notion has been developed by Routio (1997) who claims that
normally researchers for design should work simultaneously within these two realms.
Routio argues that the way of looking at the two realms is natural to a designer. However,
the designer starts his work in the realm of practice and first produces conceptual plans
and projects for new products. The designer is not interested in producing theory; instead,
he is keen to know how to apply such a theory into practice. Thus design research
operates at the interface between academic inquiry and industrial practice, and the
creative tension which can emerge from the sometimes differing world views can stimulate
the demand for new knowledge generated by research. To approach these, Owen (1994:
2) claims that "it is probably best to abandon the term 'research' for a time and instead,
look at how knowledge is used and accumulated - since building knowledge, after all, is
the goal of research." The primary goal of design research has therefore become the
examination of how knowledge is accumulated and deployed in the realm of theory and
practice (Fig 1).

Fig 1: The ideal of design studies

3 Research methods for design practice

In this section, two main types of research method applied in the study of design practice
are examined: action research and case study. Research techniques, such as surveys,
interviews and questionnaire are considered to be a common associated factor in both
forms of research as they might be used to a greater or lesser extent in certain research.

3.1 Action Research

Normally, knowledge is generated and accumulated through action. Action research is an

approach which has proved to be particularly attractive to practitioners because of "its
practical, problem-solving emphasis, because practitioners carry out the research and
because the research is directed towards grater understanding and improvement of
practice over a period of time (Bell 1993)”. The essentially practical, problem-solving
nature of action research make this approach attractive to practitioner-researchers who
have identified a problem during the course of their work, see the merit of investigating it
and, if possible, of improving practice.

3.2 Case study

Case study method is a favoured and traditional approach to the study of design practice
(Svengren 1993, Hinnells 1993). A case study is an empirical inquiry that "investigates a
contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context; when the boundaries between
phenomenon and context are not clearly evident; and in which multiple sources of
evidence are used." (Yin 1989: 23) The use of these methods is concerned principally with
the interaction of factors and events, particularly in practical applications (Bell 1993). For
example, case studies for design involve an analysis and systematic evaluation of a single
designer/product or a group of designers/products to demonstrate design interventions
(Cross and Cross 1996). Yin (1989: 14) states that "case studies allow an investigation to
retain the holistic and meaningful characteristic of real-life events, such as individual life
cycles, organizational and managerial processes, neighborhood change, international
relations and the maturation of industries." This description covers the ways in which the
case study approach can be used in this study. When a new design methodology
(knowledge) evolves, there are opportunities to examine changes in theory and practice
for design, and it is these changes that can be documented as case studies. Studies
focusing on user, designer, product and product manufacturers can be helpful in
understanding the reasons for changes in design practice. The use of these methods
becomes vital as Patton (1990: 54) states that "case studies are particularly valuable when
the evaluation aims to capture individual differences or unique variations from one
program setting to another, or from one program experience to another." Therefore, the
essence of the case study is to illustrate a design methodology, to demonstrate its
implications for the design practice. The knowledge and understanding is gained from the
study of events and process rather than conjecture. However, such knowledge gained
from a case study may not always be useful, as it cannot readily be applied to other cases,
which might require practical remedies. A research method for design is therefore required
as the aim of the study is therefore not only the desire to observe and understand the use
of theory in practice but also to intervene in and change the process under the theory. The
use of action study in parallel to case study can therefore fill the gap as it is not only
focused on the existing process or theory, but also on intended changes or the discovery
of new phenomena (Fig 2).

Fig 2: A proposed research (Source: Adopted from Braa and Vidgen 1997: 396)

3.3 Action case study

To response to the dilemma of interpretation and intervention as well as providing a

pragmatic response to the issues of manageability of in-context research, a research
method labeled “action case” was developed by Barr and Vidgen (1995) for Information
System Design. This method has been successfully applied by numerous studies (Hughes
and Wood-Harper 1999; Stenmark 2000). As shown in Fig 3, the area labeled action case
represents a mix of interpretation/understanding and intervention/change. This name
reflects that it contains elements of action research which “reflects the potential for
research to change organizations resulting in changes to the social world” and case study
which “reflects the necessity of weighing understanding gained from the findings (Barr
1995).”

Fig 3: Method location for action case (Source: Vidgen and Braa 1997)

To transposition such a research method into the context of design study, ‘action case’ is a
hybrid of understanding of theory and its change to practice, designed to balance the
trade-offs between being either an researcher capable of making interpretations of theory
to design and a researcher/practitioner involved in creating change in design practice. In
this case, researchers operate as or collaborate with practitioners in studying and
transforming such knowledge generated from the design theory into practice. The
application of such a theory/knowledge to design practice through an action case study is
an intrinsically goal-oriented problem solving case study activities. It attempts to lean
general lessons from specific cases, to operate concepts, to develop comparisons and the
like, through repeated case applications.

As the majority of the research is done (collaborated) by design practitioners themselves,

the research results reflect their understandings of their system better than the work of
external professional researchers alone could. These understandings are also conditioned
by design practitioners’ rights and obligations to act within their own system. Thus,
pluralistic and action case in the research process is capable of producing both
scientifically and socially meaningful research results.

4 Examples of action case studies

Within the confines of the research, five cases applied to the research method evoked.
The detailed process involved have been written up in detail elsewhere and readers who
want to get a sense of the empirical favor of these processes can consult these other
sources (Yen 1998, Liaw and Yen 2002, Tseng and Yen 2002, Chin et al. 2001 & Hsu et al.
2001). Instead, the goals of this paper are to demonstrate the strength and weakness of
the “action case” study within different situations to meet various research goals.

Action case projects have been conducted in two separate occasions. First, author’s PhD
project (Yen 1998), studied the application of patient-centred care to medical equipment
through industrial design practice, attempted to generate and test rhetorical context of the
action case study by developing a dialysis equipment within a self-conducted setting. The
rests, four MA projects taking place at Chang Gung University, attempted to understand
the application of such a method to design research and the results are summarized in
Table 1. These action cases were carried out in real but dissimilar settings, such as a
Taiwanese lighting, suitcase and wheelchair manufacturers, etc.

These cases included design process action from action research and the understanding
of the design goals in a real-life context from case studies. These cases also dealt with the
characteristics defined by Barr and Vidgen (1997) in the following ways: 1. real-time
intervention: the projects were conducted in on-going product development processes,
where the participants included the designers themselves, users and other relevant
people. 2. short duration: the timescale is shorter than a typical action research. 3.
reduction of complexity: focusing on one design theory/method at a time in order to gain
clear case description from the action case. 4. real-life evaluation: the evaluation of the
theory/method in a real-life context. The common activities carried within these action
cases are as follows: 1. Area of concern, i.e. goal of the study, 2. method development, 3
problem context, 4. action, 5. evaluation and method refinement. The detailed case
descriptions and outcomes are shown in Table 1 and Fig 4-8.

Product name
Medical equipment design
Street lighting system
Notebook bag
Personal communicator
Wheelchair
Goal
Patient-Centred Design
Product Serialization
Product protection
Analogy Methods
Functional Analysis
Outcome
See Fig 4
See Fig 5
See Fig 6
See Fig 7
See Fig 8
Reference
Yen (1998)
Chin et al .(2001)
Tseng and Yen (2002)
Liaw and Yen (2002)
Hsu et al. (2001)
Case description
This study is concerned with the application of patient-centred care (PCC) principles within
the context of medical practice, in order to derive a PCC design methodology for designers
engaged in medical equipment design.

A design methodology was generated by the study.

The use of PCC principles poses new challenges to designers to develop medical
equipment, which fulfil not only the needs of clinicians but also those of patients.
This study is concerned with the application of modularity to product serialization of
outdoor lighting, in order to derive a design methodology for designers engaged in lighting
equipment design. This study collaborated with a lighting company in order to solve their
problems as a consequence of cost struggling.

A combination of modularity and product serialization was introduced.

Several products based on the main unit were designed and will be the market within a
few months time.
This study is concerned with the use of protection design concept to notebook bag, in
order to derive a design alternative for suitcase industry.

An air protection concept was introduced and the final outcome won a design prize in
Taiwan.
This study is concerned with the use of analogy methods in design concept development,
in order to derive a design method for enhancing concept development.

The application of this study was based on a design competition “flowing” which aimed to
design a future IA products.
This study is concerned with how to design a wheelchair which can positioning the disable
in an appropriate position.

This project was collaborated with a local wheelchair manufacturer and the outcome was
on the market and received a good response.
Table 1 The detailed information of individual action case

Fig 4: The positioning of PCC design methodology into design practice (Source: Yen 1998)

Fig 5: Product serialization of street lighting system (Source: Liaw and Yen 2002)

Fig 6: Air protection notebook bag (Source: Tseng and Yen 2001)

Fig 7: Application of analog design method to a personal communicator design (Source:

Liaw and Yen 2002)

Fig 8: Functional analysis of positioning wheelchair (Source: Hsu et al. 2001)

5 Discussion and conclusion

The increasing awareness of practice-based design research as an integral part of

professional design practice has been accelerating rapidly in recent years. Designers
should therefore recognize the need to extend the base of design knowledge as part of
their professional responsibility. A research method which began with action research
ended with case study in the context of design practice was therefore recommended, in
order to generate a new ' field of knowledge'. The purpose of using this method in design
practice is to identify the significant influential factors of a specific design theory/
methodology and to show how they affect the implementation of that theory/methodology
and individual methodological functions. In this way the design theory/ methodology can
provide specific guidance on the conduct of action case research and the knowledge
generated can therefore be used within a wide variety of design contexts.

The use of single ‘case’ study was chosen for the individual action case study to
accumulate design knowledge. The reason for selecting this is that "the single case
represents the critical case in testing a “well-formulated theory” and to determine "whether
the theory's propositions are correct or whether some alternative set of explanations might
be more relevant" (Yin 1989, p.47).

The advantages of using"action case" studies in design research are to:

add detail to the methodology/knowledge identified in theory generations.
discover new concepts which were not found in theory generations and in the context of
design.
trace changes over time.
test existing notions to enhance the usability of the design methodology/knowledge.
Table 2 demonstrates a comparison the differences between action case and traditional
action and case study research in terms of their research focus and concerns.
Action research
Case study
Action case study
Researchers
Participation
Third-party
Participation
Research inquiry
Problem-oriented, might change during the process
Goal-oriented
Goal-oriented, problem-solving
Research process
Flexible, solution-oriented
Preplanned, some flexibility
Preplanned, flexible, goal-oriented
Dependency on the case
High
Low
High
Research objectives
Knowledge and understandings: focus on intended changes
Knowledge and understandings: focus on establish a new knowledge (know how)
Knowledge can be applied to all i8nstances of the same type. It contains mainly general
rules.
Area of validity
Pieces of knowledge are detached and valid only in one case
Knowledge can be applied in several instances
Knowledge can be applied in several instances of the same type. It contains mainly
general rules.
Reliability
Difficult
Possible
Difficult
Intervention by researchers
Allowed and desirable
Not allowed
Allowed and desirable
Analysis concern (pragmatic criterion)
Credibility/consistency and workable for client
Credibility/consistency
Credibility/consistency and workable for other instances
Mode of presentation
The essential sense of 'tacit' knowledge cannot be explained verbally
Tradition. Exemplar. Skill of trade. Many important points of these cannot be presented
verbally.
The knowledge can be explained as a design models

Table 2: A comparison of research focus and concerns between action case and traditional
action and case research. (Source: The comparison between action research and case
study adopted from Svengren 1993)
The research method ‘action case’ has been an attempt to create input to a new research
method accumulating design theory/practice knowledge in practice. On balance, the
evidence favors action case study. Future research is necessary for testing the method in
various research projects in different context and settings. This is essential in order to
refine and correct the method of action case study.

6 Acknowledgments

This paper was supported by H048 of the Ministry of Education, Taiwan. We would like to
thank a number of people involved in the research: Liaw Wen Yu, Tseng Yo Lin, Hsu Ching
Lu, Chen Yu Wen, and Chiou Yung Ming, for their assistant for conducting the cases in
real practice.

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to cite this journal article:

Yen, C-C., M. Woolley & K-J. Hsieh (2002) Action case research: a method for the
accumulation of design theory/practice knowledge in practice. Working Papers in Art and
Design 2

ISSN 1466-4917