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1. Problem Reframing and Empathy Manifestation in the Innovation Process

   https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--35084  

   Kim, Eunhye; Purzer, Senay; Vivas-Valencia, Carolina; Payne, Lindsey; Kong, Nan (June 2020, 2020 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Montréal, Quebec, Canada)

   null (Ed.)

   In the innovation process, design practice involves multiple iterations of framing and reframing under high levels of uncertainty and ambiguity. Additionally, as user desirability is a significant criterion for innovative design, designers' empathy in the framing and reframing process is considered a critical user-centered design ability that engineering students should develop. In this context, this study aims to discuss how problem framing and empathy manifestation interplay in the innovation process. As an exploratory study, this study investigates biomedical engineering (BME) students’ reframing processes and decisions in a one-semester design project involving problem definition and concept identification. This investigation is guided by the following research questions: 1) how do engineering students perceive the relationship between empathy and reframing in the innovation process, 2) how and how often do they make reframing decisions over the stages of problem definition and concept identification, and 3) how different are reframing processes and decisions between teams with higher and lower empathetic design tendency scores? This study was conducted in a junior-level design course, including 76 BME students. We collected and analyzed three data sources: students’ self-reflection reports about their reframing processes, empathic design tendency score, and interviews with selected teams and instructors. The results demonstrated that more than half of the students perceived the connection between empathy and their reframing decisions and that they usually had one reframing moment in the stages of problem definition and concept identification. Also, the findings illustrate triggers for their reframing moments, information sources guiding their reframing processes, changes made through reframing, and influences of reframing decisions on team project processes. Furthermore, the comparison of the selected two teams revealed two differences in reframing processes between the high and low empathic design tendency-scoring teams. The authors believe that the study expands engineering education research on engineering students’ empathy and problem-framing by illustrating students’ reframing processes throughout a design project and exploring the interplay of empathy and reframing processes. Also, based on our study findings, engineering design educators can promote student empathy development by including more project activities and evaluation criteria related to empathic design and providing formative feedback on their reframing processes. 

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2. A Functional Perspective on the Emergence of Dominant Designs

   https://doi.org/10.1115/detc2023-116868  

   Robinson, Myles; Taube-Adams, Bailey; Kang, Samantha; Dong, Andy (August 2023, American Society of Mechanical Engineers)

   Abstract Models of long-term product innovation depict the trajectory of products through an evolutionary selection metaphor in which product designs converge toward a dominant design. The product innovation literature favors trajectory descriptions based on the physical manifestations of products while neglecting to account for solution principles. This paper offers a new way to explain the life-cycle of product innovation through the identification of motifs that describe the functions of a product. Functional motifs are recurrent function blocks across multiple generations of designs for a product. A collection of functional motifs defines the functional architecture of the product. Using some key examples from innovations in sewing machines, the paper illustrates the occurrence of motifs as the basis for detecting the emergence of a dominant design. Patents related to the sewing machine over 177 years are analyzed to identify functional motifs characterizing the evolution and convergence toward a dominant design. Results show that motifs do not change over long periods once a dominant design emerges even though components continue to change. This observation confirms a view of dominant designs as a technological frame but refutes the notion that design no longer matters in the era of incremental change. These motifs refine our understanding of how designs evolve along a particular path over the course of product innovation. 

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3. Using a Multi-Dimensional Model of Gender to Assess Learning with Different Game-Based Learning Narratives

   Stec, Hayden; Richey, J Elizabeth; Nguyen, Huy; Else-Quest, Nicole; Hammer, Jessica; Baker, Ryan S; Arroyo, Ivon; McLaren, Bruce (October 2024, Play Story Press)

   Digital learning games can help address gender disparities in math by promoting better learning experiences and outcomes for girls. However, there is a need for more research to understand why some digital learning games might be especially effective for girls studying mathematics. In this study, we assess two possible pathways: that girls might benefit from math games because they reduce the anxiety and evaluation apprehension that girls are more likely to experience when doing math; and that girls might benefit from math games when they enjoy the narrative and thus experience greater engagement. To evaluate these pathways, our work uses multiple dimensions of gender (e.g., gender identity and gender-typed interests, activities, and traits) and surveys of affective experiences to examine the impact of three learning systems with identical learning content: a digital learning game, Decimal Point, that has consistently led to better learning for girls over boys; a new masculine-typed game, Ocean Adventure, developed based on a survey of over 300 students; and a conventional tutoring system. We predicted that girls and students with stronger feminine-typed characteristics would experience less math anxiety in both Decimal Point and Ocean Adventure compared to the tutor. We also predicted that girls and students with stronger feminine-typed characteristics would experience greater engagement and learning with Decimal Point while boys and students with stronger masculine-typed characteristics would experience greater engagement and learning with Ocean Adventure. Consistent with predictions, students with stronger feminine-typed characteristics experienced less anxiety and evaluation apprehension in both games compared to the tutor. This suggests that math learning games may provide a way to address these negative affective experiences. In terms of our measures of engagement, we found that students with stronger masculine-typed characteristics reported greater experience of mastery in the masculine Ocean Adventure; however, this was the only indicator that the more masculine narrative of Ocean Adventure led to different experiences based on gender. This suggests that narrative alone may not have a strong enough effect on students based on gender, especially when other game features are kept constant. Contrary to our predictions, there were no effects of gender identity or condition on learning outcomes, although both masculine-typed and feminine-typed characteristics were negatively associated with learning. Overall, these results point to the value of a multi-dimensional model of gender in assessing learning with a game, the important role learning games can have in reducing math anxiety and evaluation apprehension for girls and students with feminine-typed characteristics, and the nuanced effects of game narratives on experiences with game-based learning. 

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4. A Functional Perspective on the Emergence of Dominant Designs

   https://doi.org/10.1115/1.4064043  

   Robinson, Myles; Taube-Adams, Bailey; Kang, Samantha; Dong, Andy (March 2024, Journal of Mechanical Design)

   Abstract Models of long-term product innovation depict the trajectory of products through an evolutionary selection metaphor in which product designs converge toward a dominant design. The product innovation literature favors trajectory descriptions based on the physical architecture of products while neglecting to account for the functional architecture. This paper offers a new way to explain the life cycle of product innovation by identifying motifs that describe a product’s functions. Functional motifs are recurrent function blocks across multiple generations of designs for a product. A collection of functional motifs defines the functional architecture of the product. Using some key examples from innovations in sewing machines, the paper illustrates the occurrence of motifs as the basis for detecting the emergence of a dominant design. Patents related to the sewing machine over 177 years are analyzed to identify functional motifs characterizing the evolution and convergence toward a dominant design. Results show that motifs do not change over long periods once a dominant design emerges, even though components continue to change. This observation confirms a view of dominant designs as a technological frame but refutes the notion that design no longer matters in the era of incremental change. These motifs refine our understanding of how designs evolve along a particular path over the course of product innovation. 

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5. Exploration of Relationships between Conformity to Masculine Social Norms and Demographic Characteristics

   https://doi.org/10.1109/FIE.2018.8658515  

   Akpanudo, Usenime M.; Huff, James L.; Godwin, Allison (October 2018, IEEE Frontiers in Education)

   In this full research paper, we bring into focus the interplay of conformity to masculine social norms and demographic characteristics (i.e., gender, race/ethnicity, institutional settings) among undergraduate engineering students in the United States. We approached this study with an exploratory, non-experimental design that involved examining patterns of relationship between the conformity to masculine social norms and demographic characteristics of respondents. Our data were obtained from of survey responses by engineering students (n = 128) in first-year general engineering courses at three universities in the Southeastern United States. We operationalized conformity to masculine social norms using the Conformity to Masculinity Social Norms Inventory (CMNI-22). Our results revealed moderate to low conformity to masculine social norms among engineering students in first-year general engineering courses. Overall, student demographic characteristics appeared to have weak to limited influence on levels of conformity. However, the institutional setting interacted significantly with both gender and race/ethnicity such that male students at the public research university setting and white students in the same setting reported significantly higher levels of conformity to masculine social norms than students in other demographic categories. We discuss these findings as they enrich understanding about how institutional contexts might affect gendered social norms related to engineering professional formation. 

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