THE CONSTRAINT SATISFACTION APPROACH TO DESIGN - A PSYCHOLOGICAL INVESTIGATION

More and more CAD systems are constraint-based. This raises the question whether this view is compatible with the cognitive processes involved in design. This paper presents a first psychological assessment of the constraint satisfaction approach. An empirical study, conducted in the domain of computer network design, outlines the results of the comparison between constraint-directed reasoning and designers' cognitive processes. It is stressed that some of the artificial intelligence (AI) formalisms which support constraint-based systems are relevant to the characteristics of psychological behaviour. Furthermore, the concept of constraint is not sufficient to describe the mental processes of design: some additional cognitive concepts have to be developed and taken into consideration in the implementation of CAD systems.