The methodology of biomimicry design thinking is based on and builds upon the overarching patterns that all life abides by. “Cultivating cooperative relationships” within an ecosystem is one such pattern we as humans can learn from to nurture our own mutualistic and symbiotic relationships. While form and process translations from biology to design have proven accessible by students learning biomimicry, the realm of translating biological functions in a systematic approach has proven to be more difficult. This study examines how higher education students can approach the gap that many companies in transition are struggling with today; that of thinking within the closed loops of their own ecosystem, to do good without damaging the system itself. Design students should be able to assess and advise on product design choices within such systems after graduation. We know when tackling a design challenge, teams have difficulties sifting through the mass of information they encounter, and many obstacles are encountered by students and their professional clients when trying to implement systems thinking into their design process. While biomimicry offers guidelines and methodology, there is insufficient research on complex, systems-level problem solving that systems thinking biomimicry requires. This study looks at factors found in course exercises, through student surveys and interviews that helped (novice) professionals initiate systems thinking methods as part of their strategy. The steps found in this research show characteristics from student responses and matching educational steps which enabled them to develop their own approach to challenges in a systems thinking manner. Experiences from the 2022 cohort of the semester “Design with Nature” within the Industrial Design Engineering program at The Hague University of Applied Sciences in the Netherlands have shown that the mixing and matching of connected biological design strategies to understand integrating functions and relationships within a human system is a promising first step. Stevens LL, Whitehead C, Singhal A. Cultivating Cooperative Relationships: Identifying Learning Gaps When Teaching Students Systems Thinking Biomimicry. Biomimetics. 2022; 7(4):184. https://doi.org/10.3390/biomimetics7040184
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Preliminary empirical research conducted by the leading author has shown that design students using biological analogies, or models across different contexts, often misinterpreted these, intentionally or unintentionally, during design. By copying shape or form without integrating the main function of the mimicked biological model, students failed to consider the process or system directing that function when attempting to solve the design need. This article considers the first step in the development of an applicable educational model using distant analogies from nature, by means of biomimicry thinking methodology. The analysis examines results from a base-line exercise taken by students in the Minor Design with Nature during the Spring semester of Industrial Design Engineering at The Hague University of Applied Sciences in 2019, verifying that students without biomimicry training use this hollow approach automatically. This research confirms the gap between where students are at the beginning of the semester and where they need to be as expert sustainable designers when they graduate. These findings provide a starting point for future interventions in biomimicry workshops to improve systematic design thinking through structural and scientifically based iterations of analogical reasoning. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10798-020-09574-1 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/helenkopnina/
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Societal transitions require activities of multiple stakeholders on different systemic levels. Designers and design researchers are often involved in supporting specific interventions and sometimes in enabling and facilitating entire processes. Practices and literature in ‘co-creation ecosystems’ are a developing field for them to discuss differences and relatedness of micro-, meso- and macro perspectives. Using the case of a three-year multi-stakeholder co-creation project in the retail industry, the paper analyses processes and principles for making impact in design-led transition projects. A transition process with three phases is constructed and four principles for making impact at the various levels were found. Comparing findings with the UK Design Council’s ‘Systemic Design Framework’, the paper suggests process adaptations to scale between the local and the sector/national level. It also contributes to a better understanding of systemic design principles like Leadership, Storytelling and Systems Thinking. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christine-de-lille-8039372/?originalSubdomain=nl https://www.linkedin.com/in/overdiek12345/
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In many schools teaching learners is conducted in isolation, and often, so is teachers’ learning. Isolation hinders shared practices; it creates a key challenge for those in middle leadership roles who must foster collaborative professional development. This study examines how a system perspective empowers aspiring middle leaders to develop their capacity for teacher leadership – leading instructional improvement through expertise and collaboration rather than formal authority. Participants (n = 10), all experienced teachers in a Dutch master’s programme preparing them for middle leadership positions, engaged with two tools: causal loop diagrams (CLDs) to map systemic interactions, and the ‘Colours of Change’ model to strategize interventions. Findings indicate that adopting a system perspective enhanced participants’ diagnostic capability, strategic thinking, and confidence as change agents. This study positions systems thinking tools as practical means to develop the teacher leadership capacities essential for middle leaders to navigate complex educational environments and drive sustainable improvement.
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We developed an application which allows learners to construct qualitative representations of dynamic systems to aid them in learning subject content knowledge and system thinking skills simultaneously. Within this application, we implemented a lightweight support function which automatically generates help from a norm-representation to aid learners as they construct these qualitative representations. This support can be expected to improve learning. Using this function it is not necessary to define in advance possible errors that learners may make and the subsequent feedback. Also, no data from (previous) learners is required. Such a lightweight support function is ideal for situations where lessons are designed for a wide variety of topics for small groups of learners. Here, we report on the use and impact of this support function in two lessons: Star Formation and Neolithic Age. A total of 63 ninth-grade learners from secondary school participated. The study used a pretest/intervention/post-test design with two conditions (no support vs. support) for both lessons. Learners with access to the support create better representations, learn more subject content knowledge, and improve their system thinking skills. Learners use the support throughout the lessons, more often than they would use support from the teacher. We also found no evidence for misuse, i.e., 'gaming the system', of the support function.
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Biomimicry education is grounded in a set of natural design principles common to every known lifeform on Earth. These Life’s Principles (LPs) (cc Biomimicry 3.8), provide guidelines for emulating sustainable strategies that are field-tested over nearly four billion years of evolution. This study evaluates an exercise for teaching LPs to interdisciplinary students at three universities, Arizona State University (ASU) in Phoenix, Arizona (USA), College of Charleston (CofC) in Charleston, South Carolina (USA) and The Hague University of Applied Sciences (THUAS) in The Hague (The Netherlands) during the spring 2021 semester. Students researched examples of both biological organisms and human designs exhibiting the LPs. We gauged the effectiveness of the exercise through a common rubric and a survey to discover ways to improve instruction and student understanding. Increased student success was found to be directly linked to introducing the LPs with illustrative examples, assigning an active search for examples as part of the exercise, and utilizing direct assessment feedback loops. Requiring students to highlight the specific terms of the LP sub-principles in each example is a suggested improvement to the instructions and rubric. An iterative, face-to-face, discussion-based teaching and learning approach helps overcome minor misunderstandings. Reiterating the LPs throughout the semester with opportunities for application will highlight the potential for incorporating LPs into students’ future sustainable design process. Stevens LL, Fehler M, Bidwell D, Singhal A, Baumeister D. Building from the Bottom Up: A Closer Look into the Teaching and Learning of Life’s Principles in Biomimicry Design Thinking Courses. Biomimetics. 2022; 7(1):25. https://doi.org/10.3390/biomimetics7010025
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In the aftermath of the systemic financial crises of 2007-9, several scholars argued that the problem of systemic financial crises is not well understood. At the same time, the introduction of digital technologies led to new threats and opportunities for the design of the monetary and financial system. For example, thousands of private cryptocurrencies have been implemented and hundreds of research papers on the (possible) introduction of public digital currencies have been published. It is often not explained why these new forms of digital money are needed and which (systemic) problems they (can) solve. In addition, the literature does not provide requirements nor guidelines to shape the development of the monetary and financial system in the digital age. This thesis applies design science to the monetary and financial system as a whole. The application of this novel methodology offers new possibilities to examine this complex system. The contribution of this thesis is threefold. First, different theories on money, banking and systemic financial crises have been researched through an extensive literature review and balance sheets. Second, those theories have been used to develop design requirements and guidelines. Finally, the consensus and pivotal dissensions about the systemic problem(s) of the current monetary and financial system, requirements and guidelines among experts have been identified through semistructured interviews. This research process results in widely supported requirements that demarcate the design space and widely supported guidelines that aim to give direction within the design space, that is, to the future development of the monetary and financial system.
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Societal actors across scales and geographies increasingly demand visual applications of systems thinking – the process of understanding and changing the reality of a system by considering its whole set of interdependencies – to address complex problems affecting food and agriculture. Yet, despite the wide offer of systems mapping tools, there is still little guidance for managers, policy-makers, civil society and changemakers in food and agriculture on how to choose, combine and use these tools on the basis of a sufficiently deep understanding of socio-ecological systems. Unfortunately, actors seeking to address complex problems with inadequate understandings of systems often have limited influence on the socio-ecological systems they inhabit, and sometimes even generate unintended negative consequences. Hence, we first review, discuss and exemplify seven key features of systems that should be – but rarely have been – incorporated in strategic decisions in the agri-food sector: interdependency, level-multiplicity, dynamism, path dependency, self-organization, non-linearity and complex causality. Second, on the basis of these features, we propose a collective process to systems mapping that grounds on the notion that the configuration of problems (i.e., how multiple issues entangle with each other) and the configuration of actors (i.e., how multiple actors relate to each other and share resources) represent two sides of the same coin. Third, we provide implications for societal actors - including decision-makers, trainers and facilitators - using systems mapping to trigger or accelerate systems change in five purposive ways: targeting multiple goals; generating ripple effects; mitigating unintended consequences; tackling systemic constraints, and collaborating with unconventional partners.
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In this paper, we discuss the pedagogical approach of two lessons that are aimed at learning domain knowledge and systems thinking simultaneously using qualitative representations. Next to understanding basic cause-effect relationships, these lessons focus on the notion that systems can move through different states of behavior. An additional focus concerns system boundaries and distinguishing between what is part-of and not part-of a system.
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This paper presents three lesson activities for upper secondary education that focus on learning subject specific knowledge and general system thinking skills by creating a qualitative representation. The learning goals and the pedagogical approach are described.
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