Design studies began in the 1920s and have been carried out with different approaches. At first, according to the scientific paradigm that dominated the early decades, researchers' perception of design was "design as science", but it gradually changed with the use of newer interdisciplinary approaches. One of the new interdisciplinary approaches that have helped design studies is the approach related to cognitive sciences. Since design is a cognitive activity, studies that emphasize the cognitive aspects of design and study the mental functions related to design are called cognitive design. However, most of the studies that have been conducted in the field of cognitive design have studied the performance of people (designers) either individually or in groups as an individual activity. As a result, the use of protocol analysis methods, black box and methods related to neurological studies and physiological functions have only been aimed at studying the individual characteristics of designers' design thinking. But if we want to study design activities on the scale of a collective culture, what approach and method would be appropriate for the study? Since such an approach was not found in studies related to cognitive design, this research, with the aim of introducing a new approach to cognitive design studies, answers the question that what approach and method can be appropriate in studies of design thinking as a cultural-cognitive activity?
This research has studied the sources in detail with a qualitative approach to the descriptive method of content analysis. In the review of sources, first, a systematic report of the historical course of design methodology was presented, and then the shortcomings of cognitive design research methodology for studying design thinking at the scale of a culture were examined. After that, cognitive anthropology was analysed with the aim of investigating the possibility of using it for cognitive design studies and finding a new approach to study design thinking at the scale of a culture. Because this approach deals with the cognitive study of the culture of the people of a group or community. Since in cognitive design, the mental functions of designers are also studied, the cognitive anthropology approach is a suitable platform for searching in the field of choosing an operational theory and a suitable methodological framework in the desired field.
Cognitive anthropologists believe that culture consists of logical rules that are based on theories in the mind. And basically, cognitive anthropology pays attention to the rules governing behaviour instead of emphasizing on behaviour. It was also said that the purpose of cognitive anthropology is to study and investigate cultural knowledge, that is, the acquired and shared knowledge that are used in the creation of various aspects of the material culture of a society, such as handicrafts, work tools, literature, and poetry, etc. So, the study of designers' design methods can be one of the appropriate topics for applying the cognitive anthropology approach. One of the important theories of cognitive anthropology is the theory of cultural models, which is obtained by examining the categorization method, conceptual designs and metaphors used by informants. In fact, through the study of cultural knowledge, which includes cultural knowledge and is formed in the process of interaction between the members of a cultural group, formatively, over time and space, it is possible to achieve the cultural models of that group.
Therefore, because cultural models are common mental representations among the members of a culture, and the production and shaping of purposeful behaviours, the reading of intentions, attitudes, and social situations can be considered one of the functions of cultural models. Design thinking as a cultural mental function that leads to the production of works in the context of a specific culture can also be studied by cognitive anthropologists. Also, by extracting the cultural models of a cultural group, one can understand the design method of that group; because according to cognitive anthropologists, people with similar experiences have common schemas in their minds. In fact, according to the theoretical framework of this research, a subset of common cultural models, under the title of cognition, help designers to understand their professional environment. In addition, cultural models are internalised during the designers' collaborative and experiential processes and then become individual cultural schemas. Also, based on these schemas, designers use specific metaphors that can appear in their speech or creation.
When a researcher seeks to study design thinking as a cultural-cognitive activity, regardless of whether the field of study is graphic design, industrial design, architectural design, etc., design thinking at the scale of a culture is dependent on the common lived experience of the designers of that culture. This common lived experience causes the formation of common cultural schemas in that cultural sphere. These shared schemas are also the rules that govern design behaviour and activities and appear in the form of cultural metaphors. In fact, to obtain cultural models of design thinking, the researcher should study designers and extract cultural metaphors used by them, which appear in the form of verbal and non-verbal metaphors in designed works, as well as in design-related activities and in their words. It is possible to find in different cultures, not only the authors of design books and theoreticians in this field, but also the designers who grow in the context of these trainings and their specific cultural environment, in addition to the universal features of design, many features of design and basically design thinking are influenced by culture. They understand themselves differently from other cultures; because design itself is an abstract concept and people use metaphors to understand abstract issues, also people in different cultures use different metaphors based on the dominant schemas in that culture.
Also, in terms of methodology, it is necessary to collect ethnographic data at the beginning of cultural model research; because the ethnographic data is the primary information that shapes the research in the next stages; what strategy can be chosen to set up the interviews and laboratory assignments depends on the primary ethnographic research. In the second stage, it is suggested to acquire linguistic information. Conducting semi-structured interviews in relation to the domain of specific knowledge models under investigation is the second important step to obtain the cultural model(s) and describe and analyse them. Analyses are carried out on all three levels of linguistic structure, i.e., word, sentence, and discourse. The results of ethnographic analysis and linguistic analysis prepare the researcher for the design, preparation, and implementation of laboratory exercises. Controlled experiments that are used in the cognitive design study model, such as protocol analysis, cannot be used for research methods related to anthropological approaches. Rather, in these researches, according to the obtained linguistic information, the experiments are designed in a different way and also according to the existing conditions in a much more flexible way.
According to the study conducted in this research, it can be concluded that the approach of cognitive anthropology and the theory of cultural models is suitable for studies of design thinking on the scale of a culture or group. In fact, it is not possible to use a predetermined and specific model and theory to study designers in different cultures. Rather, it is necessary for the theoretical model and approach to observe the native characteristics of that culture and emerge from within the culture. Cultural models allow the researcher to reveal the indigenous cultural features in design thinking as a collective knowledge through the discovery of conceptual metaphors used by the designer and, accordingly, the identification of schemas related to it. Also, to study designers in a specific culture in this way, the researcher must not only be familiar with the design discourse of that culture, but also the important sources that may have caused the formation of schemas in designers and come from the common lived experiences of the people of that culture. Also, considering that designers are influenced by the educational space and dominant design discourse in their culture, tracking metaphors in the visual culture and discourse of spaces and educational books will also help the researcher to achieve cultural models.