Analysis of complex integrated design activities: Traceability of information and characterization of its evolution in relation to design media

This paper summarizes a research project on collaborative architectural design aimed at understanding how the information characterizing the project evolves, and through which mediating objects this evolution takes place. Design activity in architecture has been extensively studied through various prisms. The originality of our approach lies in a paradigm shift that places information at the heart of our questioning. In this paper, we address the issue of information traceability throughout the design process, as well as the visualization of this evolution of information in the activity. We set up an experiment built to analyze an integrated design process of 13 weeks through 110 hours of exchanges and evaluation of information. The originality of this observation protocol lies in its ability to characterize design activities of different natures and temporalities in real time. We then propose new formalisms for visualizing this data. Our main observations reveal very rapid fluctuations and inconsistencies in the level of abstraction of successive information, recurrent or deviated uses of certain media. We also we highlighted some typical design activities to characterize the project, recurrent associations of information and finally the importance of graphical traces as a support of this characterization.