Positioning industrial design students to operate at the ‘fuzzy front end’: investigating a new arena of university design education

This paper describes pedagogic research to instigate, support and understand a significant change in the education of undergraduate industrial design students. Design educators at Loughborough University, UK, have proposed that it will be critical for future industrial designers to learn new knowledge and abilities which will enable them to successfully operate at the ‘fuzzy front end’ of new product development. This is an arena before a traditional design brief exists (i.e. ‘pre-brief’), and typically involves in-depth investigation of such issues as users, experiences and brand, followed by exploitation of the findings. Curriculum development and new teaching, evolved over five annual cycles of implementation, reflection, planning and new implementation, is described. A model of the activities and processes of this ‘pre-brief’ arena is presented. Through structured investigation of the cycles of improvement and follow-up evaluation research, evidence gathered from stakeholders (students, educators, and industry) indicates that industrial design students can be taught to successfully operate at this fuzzy front end, and that this can be a highly effective strategy for students in their design project work. It also suggests that the students’ enhanced abilities will be in demand following their graduation.     

Scanning the Year’s Half:Hotspot Issues

The textile industry is growing at a slow speed against backdrop of outrageous rise in raw materials, energy, wages, yuan’s appreciation etc.. Three hot issues are more obviously brought into spotlight to be seen as most important factors that weigh a lot on the economic growth during the first half of the year and defi nitely the second half to come.A half of 2008 has elapsed, and the fore part of the year is mingled with hopes and worries, but the industry has managed to voyage on in the troubled waters. Reviewing the situation in perspectives, [[China Textile]] has summed up three hotspot issues that played protagonists in China’s textile industry: Firstly, outside-in sales from outbound shipment to homebound march on, secondly, the industry’s development is restricted by fund shortage; thirdly, the industrial adjustment and production relocation are still in progress.     

Inclusive design in the Key Stage 3 classroom: an investigation of teachers’ understanding and implementation of user-centred design principles in design and technology

This paper starts out with a discussion of the importance of user-centred design, outlining its history and current embodiment in national and international standards and considers its particular relevance in addressing the needs of ageing populations. The paper moves on to examine how the premise of user-centred design has been taken up in education and focuses on the specific example of user-centred approaches as part of the Design and Technology requirement of the English National Curriculum, taught in England’s schools since 1989. The initial stage of the Designing our Tomorrow project presented in this paper was an investigation of the extent to which user-centred design was integrated in current teaching practice. Analysing baseline data collected from teachers and pupils at two state secondary schools the project team found that many of the tasks teachers planned for pupils did not provide opportunities to identify users’ needs when solving design problems. Finally, the paper presents a discussion of the project’s implications for pupils’ learning and understanding of Design and Technology.     

The analysis of economic performance of China’s garment industry during the first half of 2008

During the first half of 2008, snow havoc, earthquake, the yuan appreciation, together with the rising material and labor costs has made the main economic benefit index in China’s garment industry decreased synchronously.     

China’s Anti-Monopoly Law: What is the Welfare Standard?

China??s Anti-Monopoly Law (AML) sets forth the country??s antitrust enforcement policies. We investigate the welfare standard that the AML seeks to maximize by examining both its stated language and, via revealed preference, the antitrust actions taken by the Anti-Monopoly Enforcement Authority.     

The licensing of telecommunication suppliers: Beyond the EU’s Directive

The WTO agreement on basic telecommunication services does not provide detailed guidance for giving effect to member country commitments, especially in regard to the licensing reform which will be required to permit easier market access. This is where the EU’s recent Licensing Directive takes on special significance beyond its application to Europe since it is likely to be closely examined as a potential model for multinational licensing reform. For this reason, it is important to draw attention to the shortcomings of the EU directive to help ensure that they are not transported into any model/principles of licensing reform developed to give effect to the WTO Agreement.     

Addressing the ‘Qualitative’ in fuzzy set Qualitative Comparative Analysis: The Generic Membership Evaluation Template

Fuzzy set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) can help researchers to address causal complexity, especially in relation to the interactions between different conditions leading to the outcome in question. FsQCA helps investigate how alternative solutions (different configurations of conditions) make up the outcome, and considers the asymmetrical nature of social phenomena. An important challenge that researchers often face when they apply fsQCA to qualitative data is the lack of distinct and operationalizable anchor points for fuzzy set calibration. This study offers the Generic Membership Evaluation Template (GMET) to support the decision making about assigning fuzzy set values to conditions, and therefore improves the transparency of the qualitative calibration process. This paper aims to highlight why and how fsQCA can be carried out to obtain a more in-depth understanding of complex problems using qualitative data, to identify some core method issues involved in this analytical process, and to develop a conceptual and empirical framework that helps in managing some methodological issues, with special regard to the calibration process. For illustration of the method we scrutinize ways in which the customer firm can achieve attractiveness in the eyes of the supplier. Our study explores configurations leading to the Relational Attractiveness of the Customer (RAC) based on 28 in-depth interviews with senior managers on the supplier side. In the interest of methodological reflections and parsimony, it is assumed that the reader is familiar with the principles of fsQCA.     

Young children’s views of the technology process: an exploratory study

This paper describes an exploratory study of an aspect of the technological knowledge of two groups of five-year-old students in their first year at school. Their emerging understandings of the steps required to develop a new product were investigated through a series of interviews. A theoretical framework linking technological knowledge to ‘funds of knowledge’ from experiences outside the classroom supported the analysis. The data suggest that young children draw on a broad range of experiences and knowledge, often uncritically, in order to explain how things are made. They are able to transfer their understandings of the technological process from one experience to another particularly when they have the language and background experiences to support them. Of particular note however, is that they were often unfamiliar with the properties of materials and therefore unable to anticipate the processes necessary to convert raw materials into a final product. The research also highlighted some key considerations for working with young children in this area.     

Industry Characteristics and Anti-Competitive Behavior: Evidence from the European Commission’s Decisions

We analyze all the European Commission’s decisions on antitrust cases between 1999 and 2004 using a unique dataset that also contains information on all the cases that were filed for the Commission’s consideration but were never pursued. This data allow us to determine whether there is any type of bias in the selection process followed by the Commission when deciding which cases to pursue until a final decision is reached. We find that the selection of cases is not random and that it is quite efficient but not very significant. We also find that the economic literature criteria are important for the Commission’s decisions.     

The role of ICT in Korea’s economic growth: Productivity changes across industries since the 1990s

This paper investigates the hypothesis that technological convergence has been a major driving force for the recent productivity increase in Korea. Based on the dynamic panel data of Korean industries, the direct impact of information and communication technology (ICT) on labor productivity is assessed through growth accounting, and the indirect network effect of ICT on industrial total factor productivity (TFP) is estimated. The results confirm the essential role of broadband networks for successful convergence. The policy implications for the regulatory change are drawn from the empirical analysis.     

Influence of problem-based learning strategy on enhancing student’s industrial oriented competences learned: an action research on learning weblog analysis

In order to respond to the ever-changing global economic environment, the technological and vocational education system in Taiwan needs to be dramatically reformed to the changing needs of the domestic industrial structure. Integrating practical talents with practical industrial experiences and competences can help avoid discrepancy and close the gap between vocational education and the practical demands of industries. Thus, to achieve the goals of technological and vocational education, it is necessary to incorporate instruction that meets the demands of the industrial-oriented manpower in Taiwan. In this study, the well-known problem-based learning (PBL) approach, utilized commonly in the educational area of medicine and business management, was integrated with the qualitative method of action research to explore how such a learning strategy could influence college students’ learning outcomes regarding industrial-oriented competences. The research results were induced from the empirical data collected via participatory classroom observations, and analyses of teachers’ instructional journals and semi-structural interviews. A survey with quasi-experimental design of the control group pretest and posttest was conducted by using an industrial-oriented competences scale to explore the influences of PBL on students’ learning outcomes of industrial-oriented competences. The findings are expected to shed light on the teaching and learning strategy of college students’ industrial-oriented competences and contribute to theoretical implications and future educational and industrial development of Taiwan.     

The analysis of economic performance of China’s industrial textiles and nonwovens industry during the first half of 2008

The yuan appreciation, together with the rising material and labor costs, China's industrial textiles factories feel the squeeze during the first half of 2008. But, the year of 2008 also witnessed a fast growing of industrial textiles after the snow havoc and earthquake.     

Objectives and incentives: Evidence from the privatization of Great Britain’s power plants

Does privatization increase plant productivity because the private owner’s objective is different, or because they are better able to control management? And, is privatization sufficient to improve productivity, or is it only effective in combination with competition? We answer these questions using the quasi-experiment of Great Britain’s electricity industry privatization. To separate the effect of a change in objectives from a change in incentives we assume, that the former only affects labor but not fuel productivity. And, assuming that effective competition was only introduced after privatization, we are able to separately identify the effects of privatization and competition. We find that privatization increased labor but not fuel productivity: evidence for the importance of objectives. There is no evidence that the introduction of effective competition after privatization increased labor or fuel productivity: evidence that privatization increases productivity by itself.     

Implementing an exemplar-based approach in an interaction design subject: enhancing students’ awareness of the need to be creative

In higher education effective teaching includes making learning goals and standards clear to students. In architecture and design education in particular, goals and standards around assessment are often not well articulated. There is good evidence that when teachers engage students before an assessment in marking exemplars, and explain why the exemplars received the grades they did, students’ performance in their written assessment is consequently enhanced. However some teachers are concerned that exemplars may discourage students from being creative; this concern is particularly important in design education. In this small-scale mixed methods study we explore interaction design students’ perceptions of the effect of an exemplar-based teaching approach on their work in a design task. Our quantitative and qualitative results show that students developed their understanding of task criteria and standards; far from discouraging their creativity, most students perceived that their experience of the approach enhanced their awareness of the need to produce an original design. The exemplar-based approach used in this study complements the studio-based teaching approach in design education, and helps to make clear the design goals and standards that teachers expect their students to strive for.     

Middle-school teachers’ understanding and teaching of the engineering design process: a look at subject matter and pedagogical content knowledge

This paper reports on research investigating six middle school teachers without engineering degrees as they taught an engineering unit on the engineering design process. Videotaped classroom sessions and teacher interviews were analyzed to understand the subject matter and pedagogical content knowledge the teachers used and developed as they introduced the eight steps of the engineering design process (from content standards for the state of Massachusetts, USA). The teachers demonstrated wide-ranging knowledge of the engineering design process, and this paper describes two of the steps the teachers showed a more sophisticated understanding—constructing a prototype and redesigning. Examples from the teachers illustrate strengths that can be built upon as well as some areas for further development.