The Visual Questionnaire an Innovation in Design Research: Fid-Bau Portal

The Visual Questionnaire an Innovation in Design Research

Anjum, Nomana / Ashcroft, Roland / Paul, Jeanette

The visual questionnaire originated from the idea of evolving an effective research instrument for the discipline of Interior Design. The idea is to supplement/support written text with visuals to facilitate a better understanding of the technical aspects of Interior Design. It is proposed that this concept could be adopted by other design disciplines. This paper covers the process of developing a visual questionnaire: concept, background, need and the experimentation with computer software for the development and incorporation of visual images into a questionnaire. Questionnaire design is discussed to give details on layout. The visual questionnaire development evolved through an on-going research project focusing on office interior environment and aims to establish the impact of office environment on employees. Pre-testing, piloting and comparative analysis of visual and non-visual questionnaires was carried out before finalizing the questionnaire and launching the national survey of a random sample of 3,000 UK office employees. Discussion of the findings of this study is not within the scope of this paper, which concentrates on analysis and interpretation of responses on the use/usefulness of visuals for the questionnaire. The potential of the visual questionnaire is portrayed for other design-related studies.