Many undergraduate engineering students perform relatively poorly in design courses, even though they are otherwise academically very strong. Some average students perform exceptionally well in design courses. While there are generally strong correlations between the results that each student gains at university, the design outcomes seem anomalous. It is hypothesized that some of the variation in relative success at design courses is due to the influence of otherwise un-used skills. One clue to the existence of additional skills needed in design courses arises from an appreciation of ‘hemispheric preference’, since many of the special tasks in design projects rely on creativity, holistic problem solving, visualization and intuition; skills normally associated with the brain’s right hemisphere. A special test of relative hemispheric strength, the Thinking Preferences Indicator, (TPI) was devised and administered to 274 undergraduate engineering students. Their grades in each design course as a ratio of the grades in a non-design course were calculated, and correlated against the TPI measures. There were significant positive correlations between some categories of right hemispheric skills and relative design strength, and negative correlations with some categories of left hemispheric skill. The research indicates that right hemispheric strength is an important factor in achieving good outcomes in undergraduate design courses.

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