Abstract:

The purpose of this study is to enable students of Space Design to understand the concepts and trends of Universal Design and Affordance Design.

In 2018, 47.9% of registered disabled persons in South Korea had physical disabilities, and the disabled population increased by 10.9 %. Among them, 46.7 % were 65 years old, which is more than twice the number of the super-aged society. With the promotion of the aging society in South Korea, although Universal Design is generally applicable, it is basically composed of physical design with physical considerations, which needs to be studied in various aspects.

After decades of development, the study of Universal Design has become the design standard of many Architectural Spaces, which is stipulated in the law as a detailed standard and has been universally applied in life. In addition, with the sharp increase in the number of people with disabilities in daily activities, Affordance Design gradually becomes the focus of Architectural Design out of consideration of the convenience of social life of the disabled caused by such physical inconvenience. Therefore, we need to move away from the existing curriculum and look at things from a new perspective.

This study selected the general reading room of public library as the object space, combined the Universal Design with the Affordance Design, and put forward the research and evaluation framework of the general reading room, in order to provide convenience for disabled users with physical inconvenience.

As mentioned earlier, in order to sort out and evaluate the Affordance Design for the interior space based on the movement of the user. This study mainly starts from two aspects of Universal Design and Affordance Design, and the corresponding research methods and scope are set as follows:
- First, the study focused on physically unfit adults with disabilities, including wheelchair users, excluding blind and deaf people from the study.  
- Second, the development process of the concept of Affordance Design is sorted out, which is divided into two parts: Affordance Design in space and Affordance Design of user behavior.
- Third, the development trend and principle of Universal Design are sorted out.
- Fourth, in combination with the characteristics of Affordance Design and Universal Design, detailed assessment items are launched in the general reading room to provide convenience for users who are disabled due to physical discomfort.
Through this study, the spatial Affordance Design characteristics and user behavior generated Affordance Design are divided into two parts and a detailed evaluation project framework is proposed. It is expected that students learning space design in the future will be able to distinguish and apply Affordance Design and Universal Design. In addition to meeting the basic performance of space, we are also looking forward to the emergence of a new design that is users-centered who are physically disabled and provides convenience.

Keywords:

Affordance, Handicapped Person, Wheelchair User, Public Library，Reading Room.