Anticipating the Impact of Virtual Reality for Learning the Design Fundamentals: Students’ Perceptions and Perspectives

An increasing adoption of Immersive Virtual Reality (iVR) based solutions can be observed in higher education and in design education particularly, namely in the teaching and learning the design fundamentals, usually referred to as Basic Design (BD). Research on this subject focuses mainly the overall potential of this technology for developing new pedagogical tools for teaching, being scarce regarding the understanding of the students' expectations about the adoption of such technology, which is essential in a Human-Centred Design (HCD) approach. The main objective of this study was to understand students' familiarity and expectations regarding the use of iVR for teaching-learning BD. An online questionnaire assessed the students’ perception concerning: i) the difficulties related to the learning of the design fundamentals; ii) the suitability of the used digital technology; iii) and the receptivity/expectations to use iVR-based tools in the teaching-learning process. The results suggest that the students perceive the iVR-based tools as important and motivating for the learning process, being expected to assist the learning of all the BD-related content topics. Moreover, it is noteworthy that the most difficult content to learn appears to be 3D form, which iVR-based technologies are widely believed to aid in mastering. It is expected that the findings can support the development of learning activities assisted by iVR-based tools, more likely to meet the expectations of future students, thus contributing to engaging teaching-learning experiences and improved learning results.