Date, G. R., & Chandrasekharan, S. (2016, June), The Socio-Technical Connection is Plastic, but Only When Design Starts from Need Formulation  Paper presented at 2016 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana. 10.18260/p.27019

\bibitem{asee_peer_27019}
  Date, G. R., \& Chandrasekharan, S. (2016, June), \emph{The Socio-Technical Connection is Plastic, but Only When Design Starts from Need Formulation}
  Paper presented at 2016 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana.
  10.18260/p.27019

Geetanjali R. Date and Sanjay Chandrasekharan.  "The Socio-Technical Connection is Plastic, but Only When Design Starts from Need Formulation".  2016 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana, 2016, June.  ASEE Conferences, 2016.  https://peer.asee.org/27019 Internet.  15 Oct, 2024

\bibitem{asee_peer_27019}
  Geetanjali R. Date and Sanjay Chandrasekharan.
  "The Socio-Technical Connection is Plastic, but Only When Design Starts from Need Formulation".
  \emph{2016 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana, 2016, June}.
  ASEE Conferences, 2016.
  https://peer.asee.org/27019 Internet.  15 Oct, 2024

@INPROCEEDINGS{asee_peer_27019
author = "Geetanjali R. Date and Sanjay Chandrasekharan"
title = "The Socio-Technical Connection is Plastic, but Only When Design Starts from Need Formulation"
booktitle = "2016 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition"
year = "2016"
month = "June"
address = "New Orleans, Louisiana"
publisher = "ASEE Conferences"
note = {https://peer.asee.org/27019}
number = {10.18260/p.27019}
}

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - Background
Many current engineering problems, particularly engineering for social equity and ecological sustainability, require a close understanding of the social and environmental contexts. Recent research suggests that engineering education overemphasizes the technical aspects, and encourages externalization of the social and environmental aspects. This has led to a two-fold gap. One, students lack knowledge of the social and problem contexts as well as requirements and ways to address them. Particularly lacking are problem identification and problem framing skills. Second, students develop values that are technology-centered, and they move away from the social and environmental components of the engineering problem space. These gaps limit students' abilities to develop socially-engaged engineering solutions. Engineering is a socio-technical enterprise, and flexibility / plasticity in the connection between society and technology, that is, a room for negotiation in the interaction of the two is essential for any innovation in technological solutions. Students estranged from the social assume the corporate structure as the default socio-technical connection, where the focus of innovation is directed towards profitability and economies of scale, leaving no room for innovation directed towards broader problems of the society. 

Objective
We seek to characterize how classroom knowledge of the engineering design process deals with social and environmental context, by contrasting the formal engineering design process with that of a formally trained engineer solving grassroots engineering problems in rural areas, and (elsewhere) a grassroots innovator (not trained in engineering, but solving engineering problems in rural interiors).

Design/Method
The case study we report here focuses on the socio-technical connection, examining whether/how the social and environmental factors influence and interact with the design of a formally trained engineering professional (EP). The data are collected through interviews, field observation, and secondary data sources. Using one of the widely referenced models of the engineering design process as a lens, we look at the nature of EP's process of designing and building micro-hydro power stations in remote mountain villages, for domestic use and income-generation.

Results
In this historical analysis of EP's design process, we find that the problem definition and understanding of the requirements at the grassroots is very complex, and the needs are not always explicitly stated or directly technical. In EP's case, the social and environmental factors that influence the design process go from being embedded and implicit, to being explicitly stated in the task specifications. The material and social structures interact with the technical, influencing it, and in the process, the needs and constraints emerge and become clear. The detail design stage that engineering students are groomed for, and even the conceptual and embodiment design stages, are constantly shaped by the problem definition. The connection between technology and society is thus fluid or plastic, and only by beginning at the problem formulation / definition stage can alternate and better solutions be designed.

Conclusions / Next steps
We argue that the socio-technical connection, and how it is articulated and negotiated, as well as its recurring interaction with all stages of the engineering design process, needs to be explicitly depicted and elaborated as part of formal engineering design. Rather than work with technical and user requirements, students need to be encouraged to go out and identify problems and develop their own task specifications, which are social specifications. This will help the students understand that the technology and society connection is plastic, and encourage them to explore and expand it beyond the currently dominant models.

Keywords: engineering design education; design process; sustainability; equity; case study; socio-technical; community; problem formulation; need identification
AU  - Geetanjali R. Date
AU  - Sanjay Chandrasekharan
CY  - New Orleans, Louisiana
DA  - 2016/06/26
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - The Socio-Technical Connection is Plastic, but Only When Design Starts from Need Formulation
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/27019
DO  - 10.18260/p.27019
ER  -