Abstract:

The use of Facebook in support of higher education has been increasing since its inception. This is particularly significant in developing countries as universities do not always have adequate access to learning management systems. Facebook is also the social media platform that is most commonly used in support of architectural design studios to mitigate the ever-increasing numbers of student enrollment and budget cuts that tend to increase student-to-instructor ratios. The social media platform allows increased contact hours between faculty members and students of architectural departments, and enhances computer supported collaborations between its users, while increasing the levels of communication throughout the pedagogical design process. Although, numerous English-language academic articles have been published on the use of Facebook in higher education in general, to date only a handful of studies examine Facebook use in support of the traditional architectural design studio, and nearly none present a detailed account of how it specifically facilitates communication between faculty and students. This paper presents the findings of an empirical study investigating a closed Facebook group created in support of an architectural design studio in Cairo, Egypt which is the case study investigated in this research . The study depends on researchers’ observations to comprehend the digital communication between the Facebook group members in the form of posts for the duration of 5 academic years, along with a survey conducted to collect data from the group users to classify how the different faculty members and students tend to use the social media platform for communication. The findings revealed distinct patterns of communication between the 340 members that have joined the group through 11 academic semesters, and identifies 15 distinct categories of posts. Descriptive statistical analyses are used to understand the frequencies of use of those categories of posts by both the faculty members and students. Semi-structured interviews were then conducted with 46 students and 3 faculty members of the most recent semester to investigate their preferences and intentions of use in regards to the classified posts. Results indicate that both faculty and students prefer to use particular sets of the emergent 15 categories. The chosen sets of posts seem to fit with their corresponding roles in the physical design studio, and posts of social nature appear to be the most favored. The classifications identified appear to be the most detailed in all the literature reviewed, and are potentially beneficial not only for enhancing computer supported collaboration in architectural education, but also valuable for enhancing the use of social media in design pedagogy in general.

Keywords:

Facebook, Architectural design studio, Design Pedagogy, Egypt, Social Media.