Education and Training: Issues for the Field of Interior Design

Abstract

Interior design as a discipline shares much with architecture, art history, and environmental psychology, but the core and issues of a discipline can be found in its graduate education research. It is in graduate research that important topics are rigorously explored by faculty and students. The purpose of this study was to examine the educational and training topics being explored at the doctoral level in interior design. The study utilizes a bounded qualitative meta-study framework to examine 38 dissertation abstracts from 1999 through 2009 found by searching the terms interior design and education or teaching in the ProQuest Dissertation and Theses ^TMdigital database. The overarching research question for this study was: What can we learn from examining doctoral dissertations abstracts found during this 10 year time period that focus on the teaching of interior design? The study provides an overview of qualitative meta-syntheses within a bounded qualitative framework. The content of the study’s findings addresses the attributes of the researcher and the research of interior design education. We conclude by calling for a discussion of doctoral research and interior design instruction focusing on the relationship of professional practice and academic research and the utilization of qualitative meta-analysis as a tool for establishing evidence based design.