In this chapter we describe the analysis of the development of team mental models in the two engineering design meetings. We present a two-stage model of the development of sharedness in teams, which formed the basis for a communication analysis of both meetings. The transcripts of the meetings were categorised according to underlying cognitive acts and design strategies. We find that the changes of frequencies linked to task-related, team-related and process-related cognitive acts within and between the two meetings were largely consistent with the assumptions of the model.

This chapter explores the role and development of mental models in coordination. We introduce a theoretical framework on the development of shared mental models and a measurement approach based on observational data. The basic assumption is that individual mental models are shared through verbal communication. At the beginning of a task, this is likely to be explicit and thus observable. Once the team members assume that they hold a shared mental model, less verbal communication will be required and team members will continue their coordination in an implicit fashion. The methodology is illustrated using data from observations of two meetings of a design team. The analysis largely confirms our hypotheses. Implications for using the model and method in other contexts are discussed.

The present study investigates the influence of common sketching in teams on the idea generation process in early concept generation. Thirty-six teams of three design students were given a small task in which they were asked to come up with visualized ideas. In the control groups, team members sketched on an individual sheet of paper while working in a team. As expected, the teams sketching individually produced more in total and more diverse ideas. No difference was found between the quality and innovativeness of the ideas. Also according to the hypotheses, individually sketching teams elaborated less on their ideas and explained their own ideas more. The teams did not differ in their satisfaction with the final result. The results suggest that common sketching did serve as a common ground in the group that leads to shared views and ideas. This, however, goes along with less productivity of ideas.

This paper describes a new interdisciplinary, project-based seminar at TU Munich, where mechanical engineering, electrical engineering and computer science students create cognitive consumer products. The main goal is educational and aims to provide students with experience in artificial cognitive systems and related technology, conceiving new products, prototyping and working in multidisciplinary teams. Due to the high technology and multi-domain nature of cognitive products, project-focused, technical lectures and a software and hardware prototyping toolkit are integrated into a new product development process that is supported by process and technical coaches. Results from running the seminar two semesters are presented and discussed.

The past decade has seen a remarkable increase in studies of how designers think and act under various conditions. This special issue aims to contribute to the scattered fields of scientific result...

This article provides an overview of research into mental models in teams and discusses the relevance of this theoretical concept for design teams. Researchers in several disciplines have applied the construct of mental models to understand how people perform tasks based on their knowledge, experience and expectation. The notion has also been used to study teams and to analyse the relationship between team mental model and team performance. Five different types of mental models for studying design teams are proposed: task, process, team, competence, and context. A review the literature found only very few studies on team mental models in design-related areas. A brief overview is provided on what is known about team mental models in general, on the effect of team mental models on team performance, and on what kind of results can be transferred to design teams. A short review of measurement techniques and how they can be applied to design research is presented. Finally, implications for the field of design are discussed and a methodological framework for studying mental models in design teams is proposed.

In this article, an analysis of the development of team mental models in two engineering meetings is described. The authors present a two-stage model of the development of sharedness in teams, which formed the basis for a communication analysis of both meetings. The transcripts of the meetings were categorised referring to underlying cognitive acts and design strategies. The results are largely consistent with the assumptions of the model indicating a lack of sharedness. This was confirmed by changes of frequencies linked to task-, team-, and process- related cognitive acts within and between the two meetings. Implications of the findings and the model are discussed.

The paper discusses the value of researching team mental models in design to overcome potential difficulties in collaboration. The authors present an overview of the existing literature on team mental models and suggest a model by which the underlying cognitive processes that are inherent to designers can be studied. This model covers four main types of mental models: task, process, team, and competence. Based on previous research in other domains, a framework for measuring mental models of team members in design collaboration is presented. Finally, the basic outline of a categorization scheme assessing the underlying cognitive structures relevant to the model is discussed and the benefits of this behavioural analysis are elaborated.

In this paper we report on ongoing experiments with an advanced multimodal system for applications in architectural design. The system supports uninformed users in entering the relevant data about a bathroom that must be refurnished, and is tested with 28 subjects. First, we describe the IST project COMIC, which is the context of the research. We explain how the work in COMIC goes beyond previous research in multimodal interaction for eWork and eCommerce applications that combine speech and pen input with speech and graphics output: in design applications one cannot assume that uninformed users know what they must do to satisfy the system’s expectations. Consequently, substantial system guidance is necessary, which in its turn creates the need to design a system architecture and an interaction strategy that allow the system to control and guide the interaction. The results of the user tests show that the appreciation of the system is mainly determined by the accuracy of the pen and speech input recognisers. In addition, the turn taking protocol needs to be improved.