Design and Development Research

Design and development research is the systematic study of design, development, and evaluation processes with the aim of establishing an empirical basis for the creation of instructional and noninstructional products and tools and new or enhanced models that govern their development. It addresses an issue of perennial concern raised by scholars of educational technology over the last half century. For example in 1953, James Finn proclaimed that the field suffered from gadgeteering reflecting a poverty of thought, and he advocated for research to help to professionalize the field. Thirty years later, Robert Heinich encouraged scholars to conduct field-based research to improve educational technology practices. More recently, Rita Richey and James Klein observed that few design models, strategies, and tools employed by practitioners have been empirically ...