An Analysis of Design Science and Its Research Domain

L. Tang ^1，2

1 Xie Youbai Design Science Research Fund Commission, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China

2 Donghua University (retired scholar), Shanghai, China

Ltang@dhu.edu.cn

Abstract: Design is the fundamental for enhancing competitiveness, and Design Science serves as the basis for conducting design activities with high efficiency and quality, harboring immense potential productivity. However, research on "Design Science" has yet to receive the attention it deserves. Duo to the inherent complexity and uncertainty of design, to date, no consensus has been reached within the design community about Design Science and its research domain. Therefore, exploring the connotation and research content of Design Science has itself become a critically important research proposition. Drawing on the author's perception of Design Science, this paper analyzes its connotation and provides relevant insights on the core research focus that Design Science must address.

Keywords: Design Science, research focus, universal laws of design activities, knowledge, needs

1 An Interpretation of Design Science

"Knowledge" refers to human cognition of objective laws. Design is an intellectual activity that employs knowledge to create “artifacts” in order to meet human needs. "Science" is the representation of objective laws. It not only articulates the already recognized objective laws (existing knowledge), but also continuously identifies new problems and solves them to generate new knowledge. Therefore, the knowledge system of science is characterized by systematicity, logical coherence, verifiability, describability, and dynamic development.

Artifacts exist in every aspect of human life and work and can be summarized as products that satisfy the material needs, the spiritual needs, or the social needs. These artifacts that meet the three types of needs may also be referred to as "broad-sense products". In reality, whether at the material level, the spiritual level, or the social level, there are activities closely related to "design"^[1]. For example, engineers developing material products, doctors prescribing for patients, chefs cooking dishes, painters creating artworks, composers writing musical works, choreographers devising dance movements, employee formulating sales plans for companies, civil servants drafting social welfare policies for governments, institutions of higher education establishing new schools, governments formulating strategies for national governance, and service-oriented enterprises (such as e-commerce platforms, telecommunications agencies, commercial centers, etc.) defining their service targets, service modes, and service environments, and constructing service processes and service platforms. In essence, there is no fundamental difference among these activities^[2]. All are design activities in which designers create artificial objects (broad-sence products) based on knowledge. That is, designers employ their professional knowledge to devise solutions that address the needs in question. Here, designers are the subjects who engage in design activities. For example, in the cases above, engineers, doctors, chefs, painters, composers, choreographers, company employee, civil servants, institutions of higher education, governments, and enterprises are all designers carrying out design activities. All design activities are driven by clear objectives, namely to satisfy needs that stem from either external user requirements or intrinsic personal motivations. Their shared characteristics are that designers based on knowledge or their professional knowledge carry out design. The results obtained from various design activities are, in essence, "artificial objects". It can be seen that "design" is not only ubiquitous in human life^[1] but also its common features can be abstracted and distilled from various design activities.

Based on the connotations of "Design" and "Science," as well as the above analysis of the common features across various design activities, this paper interprets “Design Science” as the science that explores the underlying universal laws of design activities.

2 Research Domain of Design Science

The natural world is the environment upon which human survival depends. To adapt to and integrate into this living environment, humans need to understand the natural world. To continuously improve the living environment, humans need to enhance the quality of life through "artifacts"^{[2, 3]}. These two needs give rise to two categories of science: "Natural Science" and "Design Science." Among them, Natural Science investigates objective reality in nature, with the goals of discovering and understanding natural phenomena and the essence of natural things, exploring and interpreting the objective laws of the natural world, helping people understand the natural world and its laws of evolution and change, and imparting foundational knowledge about the natural world. Design Science, on the other hand, examines the relationship between human subjective ideals and artifacts. Its objectives are: to explore the general laws governing the transformation of subjective ideals into artifacts through the application of knowledge; to establish a knowledge system of Design Science which in turn guide the design of artifacts that satisfy material, spiritual, and social needs; and to equip people with the knowledge of how to create artifacts that fulfill human needs, that is, how to design. Ultimately, it aims to achieve the unity of human subjective ntention and the objective environment.

Design Science, which reveals the "general laws" of design activities, is analogous to Natural Science in that both possess deterministic qualities due to their objective attributes. The difference between these two types of science lies in the following: Natural Science takes objective things as its research objects, and its findings exhibit the character of truth with certainty; Design Science, however, takes the design activity that transforms subjective ideals into artifacts as its research object. Because design activities are influenced by various factors, and both the same influencing factors and the categories of influencing factors often exhibit dynamically changing characteristics. For example, for the same subjective ideal, when designing an artifact, differences in the designer's professional background and knowledge reserves, differences in the technological and economic conditions for realizing the artifact, and differences in the social and natural environments in which the artifact will be used, typically lead to different design solutions. These factors introduce uncertainty into design, and this characteristic of design activities increases the difficulty of exploring Design Science. Perhaps for this very reason, although research on Design Science began with Simon's monograph in 1969^[4], a unanimity knowledge system of Design Science has yet to be established.

2.1 Reflections on Research of Universal Laws of Design

In the mathematical branches of Natural Science, there is a very simple knowledge point: 1+1=2. This knowledge point can be applied to the calculation of any entities with the same attributes and has an extremely broad range of applications. This paper argues that the universal laws of design that Design Science intends to explore are highly similar in universality to "1+1=2" in Natural Science. The difference is that the "universal laws of design" constitute a "knowledge system" that can guide various types of design activities, rather than a simple formula.

Abstracting the "scientific" issues inherent in design activities themselves and exploring the universal laws of design activities are the research contents that Design Science needs to investigate. From a philosophical perspective, the universal laws of design manifest as follows: abstracting universal design principles from design activities for various special artifacts, and then using these universal laws of design to in turn guide the design activities of various special artifacts.

2.2 Reflections on Knowledge-Related Research in Design Science

In the inaugural editorial of the journal "Design Science", a viewpoint was put forward: the challenge of "design" as a science lies not only in developing fundamental knowledge about all aspects of design, but also in how we should integrate and consolidate this knowledge^[4].

"Knowledge" is one of the indispensable and important essentials in engaging in design activities. Whether it is for generating ideas, carrying out design activities to realize those ideas, or conducting routine design activities where design laws have already been clarified, knowledge is indispensable. Moreover, no matter how capable a design team may be, the knowledge it can master is limited. However, if an open platform for providing and acquiring knowledge could be established based on the Internet, allowing knowledge to be bought and sold like commodities, then the aspirations of generating ideas, realizing ideas, improving design quality, reducing design costs, and enhancing design competitiveness would no longer be unattainable.

Design activities are inseparable from "knowledge." Therefore, researching knowledge-related content should be one of the key focuses of Design Science research. This includes: knowledge representation, and the theoretical foundations for accurately acquiring, reusing, and integrating knowledge during the design process. These theoretical foundations can support the construction of an open knowledge service platform, which in turn provides the underpinning for broadly encountering, precisely acquiring, and efficiently applying knowledge in design activities, thereby promoting knowledge flow.

To clarify the universal laws of design and build an open knowledge service platform, this approach can also leverage AI technology to enable the efficient execution of high-quality design activities. Through the continuous acquisition of general and design-specific knowledge, along with ongoing learning about the design process, which typically requires human participation in decision-making (a “dance with humans”), new knowledge is continually generated and accumulated, creating a virtuous cycle that underpins efficient and high-quality design activities.

2.3 Reflections on Research to Transform Requirement Information into Design Factors

Requirements are not only the source that triggers design, not just the foundation for acquiring knowledge during the design process, but above all the criterion for evaluating design outcomes. Therefore, Design Science research is inseparable from requirements that are the source of design. What knowledge should be acquired during the design process? How should design decisions be made? How should the quality of design outcomes be assessed? All of these are closely related to the source (requirements) of design activities. Researching "how to transform requirement information into design information that can directly serve design activities" is another important content area that Design Science needs to explore. It is also a neglected challenge in current Design Science research, and one of the weakest links in research. This challenge is particularly pronounced in the conceptual design stage, where innovation potential is greatest, especially when designing for personalized requirements. Here, conceptual design refers to the entire process of translating abstract requirement information into the functional characteristics of the design object, and then further seeking principle solutions and carrier solutions to realize those functions. In fact, the accurate transformation of requirement information into design factors is precisely one of the critical foundations for leveraging artificial intelligence technologies to efficiently conduct high-quality design activities.

3 Conclusion

The vigorous development of artificial intelligence technologies has provided a relatively good foundation for accumulating, providing, acquiring, and applying knowledge in design activities. However, to this day, artificial intelligence technologies have not yet played a significant role in design activities, especially in the practice of conceptual design that is the stage with the greatest innovative potential. Why is this? The author believes that Design Science is not only an important foundation for enhancing design competitiveness, but also a crucial cornerstone for effectively applying artificial intelligence technologies to design activities. Therefore, researching Design Science has significant practical implications.

 The author has read the article commemorating the tenth anniversary of the journal Design Science, which was written by 41 editorial board members across 13 countries—both current and former^[5]. In it, each offered their own interpretation of Design Science. Yet, no consensus has been reached regarding the research domain of Design Science. This paper offers the author's reflections on Design Science and its research domain since participating in the Xie Youbai Design Science Research Fund commission’s work^[6] in 2023. It is intended for exchange and discussion among peers in the design community.

Acknowledgments

Some of the reflections on knowledge research presented in this paper stem from academic exchanges with Academician Xie Youbai of the Chinese Academy of Engineering since 2014. I am deeply grateful for his invaluable insights and guidance.

Declaration of AI Tool Usage

All ideas and content in this paper were independently developed by the author, without the use of AI tools. This paper is an original academic work that has not been published previously. Nevertheless, due to the author's limited English proficiency, the original Chinese article was translated into English with the assistance of the AI tool “DeepSeek”^[7], aiming to engage in exchange and discussion on Design Science research with peers worldwide

References

[1] Tang L. Embodying Innovative Concepts – Conceptual Design. In: Zou HJ, Jiang ZH, editors. An Interesting Talk on Ubiquitous Design. Beijing: Science Press; 2010, p. 143-158.

[2] Simon HA, Trans. Yang L. The Science of the Artificial. 2nd ed (1981). Beijing: PLA Publishing House; 1988. p. 127.

[3] Gero JS. Computational Models of Innovative and Creative Design Processes. Technological Forecasting and Social Change 2000; 64: 183-196.

[4] Papalambros PY. Design Science: Why, What and How. Design Science 2015; 1: 1-38. DOI:10.1017/dsj.2015.1

[5] Papalambros PY, Gero JS, Maier A, et al. Design Science: Why, What and How – Revisited. Design Science 2025; 11: 1-53. DOI:10.1017/dsj.2025.10026

[6] Institute of Modern Design School of Mechanical Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University.  Xie Youbai Design Science Research Fund Network. https://designscience.sjtu.edu.cn. 2018

       [7] DeepSeek. https://chat.deepseek.com, 2023; China. 

注：作者英文水平有限，语言表述不准确和错误之处感恩指正，敬请谅解！谢谢！

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