Exploring how students attend to the nature and dynamics of complexity in their design problems

Authentic design problems necessarily reflect the complexity of real-world dynamic, open systems that have numerous components and nonobvious connections across different systems or components. As engineering design teams define, scope, and research their problem the team will develop a shared understanding of the problem and any complex system(s) underlying it. This conceptualization may then continue to evolve throughout their design process and deeply impact the direction of their project. Therefore, the degree and depth to which the team attends or conceptualizes the complexity of the underlying problem will likely affect the effectiveness, adaptability, and longevity of any resulting design solution. In this work we propose to examine how capstone engineering design teams attend to complexity within their design problems through a modified method for complex system mapping. We draw on complexity theory, and specifically the framework of Paul Cilliers to define complex systems as systems with many elements, dynamic and dense interconnections, nonlinear and shortrange interactions, feedback loops, open to environmental inputs, operating far from equilibrium, possessing a unique history and trajectory, and where elements have limited “awareness” of other elements or lack a global view. This work adapted an approach used in policy planning and evaluation research called Participatory Systems Mapping (PSM). Within policy evaluation, PSM is used to bring together a group of stakeholders to identify a policy target (e.g., reducing city pollution) and then collectively map out a full view of the complex system(s) impacting this target and the relationships or connections between systems and/or their components. PSM is adapted into Design Problem Systems Mapping (DPSM) by contextualizing the original protocol into engineering design concepts and language. Data is collected from two capstone engineering design teams who have completed at least one semester of their project. Sessions were audio recorded and students' final systems map, and other design documents were collected. Design teams maps were analyzed through content analysis using Cilliers framework deductively, to answer the following question: How do students attend to complexity within their design problem? Results report on how the two design teams attend to different dimensions of complexity in their problem as viewed through the Cilliers framework. Findings suggest differences between the teams which may be affected by assumptions and framing of the problem itself. Connections are made for what this may mean for supporting students to attend to complexity within their problems and how instructional decisions can affect this.