An Industry Case Study: Investigating Early Design Decision Making in Virtual Reality

The research presented here describes an industry case study of the use of immersive virtual reality (VR) as a general design tool with a focus on the decision making process. A group of design and manufacturing engineers, who were involved in an active new product development project, were invited to participate in three design reviews in an immersive environment. Observations, interviews, and focus groups were conducted to evaluate the effect of using this interface on decision making in early product design. Because the team members were actively engaged in a current product design task, they were motivated to use the immersive technology to address specific challenges they needed to solve to move forward with detailed product design. This case study takes the approach of asking not only what can users do from a technology standpoint but also how their actions in the virtual environment influence decision making. The results clearly show that the team identified design issues and potential solutions that were not identified or verified using traditional computer tools. The design changes that were the outcome of the experience were implemented in the final product design. Another result was that software familiarity played a significant role in the comfort level and subsequent effectiveness of the team discussions. Finally, participants commented on how the immersive VR environment encouraged an increased sense of team engagement that led to better discussions and fuller participation of the team members in the decision process.