Mind-sets are expected to influence the process of designing, which require designers to successfully integrate complex decision-making processes into good design solutions. The study reported here analyses whether differences in mind-sets shown by design students can influence their design processes and impact the quality of the design solutions that they produce. The considerations, design activities and quality of solutions that design students produced in response to a given design task are examined to make an inference of mind-sets in actual design situations. 45 undergraduate students majoring in industrial design filled in a questionnaire that assessed their mind-set, and engaged in a design task. Two general types of mindsets can be discerned empirically: discerning and opportunistic. Significant differences between design students with a discerning or opportunistic mind-set could be observed. Evidence for the cultivation of a discerning mind-set in designing is found. Building on these results, recommendations on how to potentially support design teaching and learning are discussed.

@en

Mind-sets play an important role in orienting the decisions and activities that an individual engages in when he or she is designing, and designing involves interaction with complex, open-ended and ambiguous situations. This means that the individual disposition of a person influences the way that he or she reacts, and in designing, the complexity of the conditions that the individual interacts with, can increase due to the nature of the design problems. The processes that an individual engages in while designing is in turn, expected to influence the quality of design solutions that he or she produces. This thesis focusses on investigating the phenomena of mind-sets in the context of design and design learning, and its effects on the process of designing and quality of design solutions. Prevalent mind-sets that design students have toward design learning are identified and examined. Two categories of mind-sets are proposed, validated and tested across three different empirical studies. The two categories of mind-sets include the discerning and opportunistic mind-sets. Distinct differences between the two mind-sets provide significant insights toward the effects of mind-sets on the process and quality of outcomes in designing. Findings from these studies carry implications and recommendations for design education. @en

Design learning can be improved by understanding the differences between individual characteristics of students and its connection with their learning processes and outcomes. This paper focusses on the differences between discerning and opportunistic mind-sets. 91 students from industrial, product or automotive design courses participated in a quasi-experiment where they were required to generate solutions for a design problem, answer a Q&A survey and fill in a questionnaire. The obtained data were analysed using qualitative and quantitative metrics. We found evidence of individual characteristics, processes and outcomes that differentiate the discerning and opportunistic mind-sets. Based on these findings the paper proposes and discusses potential implications for design education.

@en

In this study, we investigated the inter-relationship between students' mind-sets, tolerance for ambiguity and self-efficacy to the learning approaches that design students adopt. Data was collected using a questionnaire and distributed to industrial design students from two universities in Malaysia. We find significant differences between high and low surface learners. In contrast to low surface learners, high surface learners were associated to a fixed mind-set and views their design capability as unchangable, are highly tolerant of ambiguity and rates themselves highly on self-efficacy.@en