A Review of Design-Related Literature Concerning Cognitive Processes, Prototyping Strategies, and Modeling Processes

In industry and academia, designers and engineers use prototyping at various stages in the design process to evaluate progress, archive process, assess viability, and communicate mental models to a team. Cognitive processes not only play a huge role during the design process, but also have causal relationships with various prototyping strategies. However, these causal relationships are not well understood in the design field. This paper presents a review of design-field literature related to cognitive processes, prototyping strategies, and modeling processes to identify literature consensus, consolidate experimental results, and expose gaps in the literature. After analysis of the literature, Fixation, Team Cognition, Iterative Prototyping, and Rapid Prototyping are the most well researched areas, especially when compared to their effects on cognitive processes. Sunk Cost, Requirement Relaxation, and Expertise are areas that could be better understood. The relationships between relevant cognitive processes, prototyping strategies, and modeling processes are consolidated into a data visualization that invites researchers and novices alike to explore the field of design in a fresh way that could spark new research endeavors or provoke interest in the field. This literature review and analysis reveals trends in design research through a novel approach with an emphasis on cognition, as well as provides a consolidated cannon of work that gives a sense of what has already been done on these topics and what is still left to explore.