Where have all the ideas gone? An anatomy of sketch inhibition among student designers

The reluctance of student designers to engage in sketching during the early stages of their processes is an increasing phenomenon, observed on a continual basis within higher education, and one with marked effects on design quality. An investigation into the causes and symptoms of sketch inhibition identifies social, personal and skill-set shortfalls among students together with a favouring of digital tools. A lack of understanding of the functions and benefits of sketching together with an assumption that design sketching is intuitive and requires no tuition have led to its neglect. An anatomy of sketching and its particular qualities is presented, concluding with the issues that higher education needs to address. These include a greater awareness of digital and manual tools and design-specific research types, together with the need for a revised pedagogy for design sketching