ARCHITECTS REASONING WITH STRUCTURES AND FUNCTIONS

Although there is a visible increase in the number of publications in the area of design thinking and signs that it is becoming a serious ar ea of research, there is a lack of theoretical approaches that directl y address its domain-specific characteristics. This study is an attemp t to develop such a theory directed towards design reasoning based on a protocol study and formal notation, among other things. Three domain s of reasoning are described: construction, object, and representation . Inference making within and between these domains is described in te rms of operations called functions and states called structures in a s tate-space representation of design. Five types of mapping which are i llustrated by the protocol study are described by means of structures and functions. Shortcomings and strengths of the proposed theoretical formalisms are both discussed. Future work is indicated.