Designing for socio-technical engineering systems requires that professionals, stakeholders and end-users with diverse perspectives, experiences and expertise co-create in meaningful and goal-directed processes. Such efforts typically require substantial planning, staging, execution and managing, and an important part of that is the careful selection of effective methodology to support these activities. Methodology captures key procedural knowledge that is central to both education and practice. The selection of methods and tools is a critical first step in the process of using methodology and is prone to biases that might influence such decisions for the worse. In this chapter, we provide an overview of the state of the art on the selection of methodological means in engineering systems design and the broader design literature. We do so by focusing on five aspects: i) the method user; ii) method content; iii) method selection; iv) acquisition of new methods; and v) selection aid. To link theory to practice, we review how method selection is aided in 20 online design toolkits. Then, building on a taxonomy of thinking errors and biases in cognitive science, we identify relevant biases in choosing methodological means in engineering system design.@en

The proper use of methods is increasingly important as design challenges are more complex and involve more stakeholders. Such work also demands high reflective ability from designers. Reflective thought processes do not necessary produce positive outcomes for the process and the individual involved. Positive reflection is goal oriented while negative reflection is typically self-oriented. In design education, reflection by students is often treated as rather trivial or only rudimentary support is offered. Research in cognitive science shows that poor reflection can hurt students’ well-being, abilities and confidence over time. Thus, there is a need to better understand method use and reflection in design education more specifically when done poorly. We take a theory-building approach and interviewed 12 design students and recent graduates and investigated instances of method use where these led to negative experiences and effects. In doing so, we show different types of negative experiences that students have when using methods, the effects that these experiences have and how they relate to problematic use of methods and poor reflection practices. We end with implications for design education and design research.@en