| Summary: | 博士 === 國立臺灣科技大學 === 建築系 === 96 === Architectural design is a knowledge-intensive activity. Knowledge is critical to reducing the chance of design errors and improving design quality. Both in professional practice and design education, knowledge sharing is a major form of design collaboration due to the fact of ‘symmetry of ignorance’. Design studio is a paradigm of design education in which a circumstance of collaborative learning is constructed through simulating professional practice, reflecting the practice with the tutors’ assistance, and learning from each other students’ work. It expects that design knowledge will be transferred and created through sharing experience, information, and knowledge. This implies that the peers are a considerable design knowledge source for the students. However, students are also involved in grade competition. Because knowledge is a critical resource for students’ performance, students face a dilemma between hoarding knowledge for grade competition and sharing knowledge for cooperative learning. Many studies suggest that we can apply Information Technology to promoting knowledge sharing behavior; on the other hand, some other scholars argue that the convenience of technology may tempt free riding behavior and impede the development of a knowledge sharing culture. The purpose of this research is to understand the knowledge sharing phenomena and the effect of technology on knowledge sharing behavior in the design studio. Two approaches were adopted. The first was developing research models based on Game Theory to analyze knowledge sharing between students. The other was knowledge sources investigation to estimate the actual state of knowledge sharing in the design studio.
Research models include a Design Scope Model and a Knowledge Sharing Game. The Design Scope Model was utilized to interpret and analyze knowledge sharing among students. The model is based upon design problem solving and has integrated features of learning alliances and Game Theory (Chapter 2). The results of a pedagogical case analysis demonstrate that (1) students’ motivation of knowledge sharing may be to resolve the ill-defined design problem; (2) frequently sharing knowledge to invite allies can be a necessary strategic move for sustaining the profit of cooperation; (3) information technology which improves information transparency and reduces communication costs may act as a catalyst for initiating and sustaining cooperation. The analysis also indicates two phenomena about the payoff of knowledge sharing strategies. The first is that only relevant knowledge can bring gains to students; the second is that the more a student contributed, the more the student gained.
The second model is a Knowledge Sharing Game in shared electronic databases that was based on the Voluntary Contribution Mechanism (VCM) (Chapter 3). Based on design scope analysis, players' payoff function was defined. Through analyzing the payoff function, the equilibrium of the knowledge sharing game was affected by the group size, the initial distribution of players' strategies, and the characteristics of knowledge relevance function. Agent-based computer simulation is employed to explore the complicate interrelations of these three factors. Simulation results demonstrate that the knowledge sharing game in shared electronic databases can be characterized as an Assurance Game. The more strategic diversity and the more player of the initial state are, the more chance that non-zero strategies (knowledge contributors) can dominate the game. In addition, the more strategic diversity, non-zero strategies can dominate with less group size.
Besides theoretical analysis, students’ knowledge sources were investigated to examine whether the peers are students’ primary knowledge source, and whether a shared web forum will promote knowledge sharing behavior. Two pedagogical studios were investigated and the findings are as follows. First of all, the peers were a primary design knowledge source for the students. Second, the ill-defined nature of design problems may be the main factor of encouraging knowledge sharing behavior. The more complicated, ill-defined design projects required more knowledge and resulted in more obvious knowledge sharing behavior. Third, competition in the design studio is to propose unique and creative design proposals. This kind of competition did not seem to hinder knowledge sharing between students. Forth, shared web forum did not have a significant influence on the development of a knowledge sharing culture. The evident function of shared databases is documenting students’ works and learning processes. Finally, through investigating students’ knowledge sources, we can estimate the knowledge sharing culture in a design studio, evaluate the efficacy of the facilitator of knowledge sharing, and analysis the mutual effect among different knowledge sources on the knowledge sharing behavior.
Cooperation and competition coexist in the design studio. Nevertheless, existing literature seems to overemphasize competition and fails to explain the coexistence. Contributions of this research are developing analytic models and investigation instrument and revealing some unique phenomena of knowledge sharing in the design studio. Nevertheless, knowledge sharing in the design studio is a complex phenomenon. Employing various approaches or developing new methods for advanced studies is necessary. The major findings of this research are:
* Knowledge sharing between students was pervasive and frequent in the three design studios. The ill-defined nature of design problems may be the main contributing factor encouraging knowledge sharing behavior.
* The effect of Information Technology in promoting design knowledge sharing is still vague. The author suggests that the ideology of IT application should be shifted from the provision of public goods to personal design or learning tools.
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