EFFECTS OF DESIGN STUDIO CULTURE ON PERFORMANCE OF ARCHITECTURE STUDENTS

Abstract

Architectural education will not be complete without due reference to its studio culture. The said culture consists of a set of reoccurrences such patterns, habits and experiences expressed by students in their design studio. The design studio culture has been observed to affect students’ performance over the years. This paper examined the components of design studio culture already existing from the review of literature. The survey method was adopted to obtain quantitative data from students in selected schools in south-west Nigeria through the use of structured questionnaires. The data gotten was subjected to factor and regression analysis using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). Results gotten showed that the students perceived some other factors to be the core components of design studio culture, in addition to those already identified in the review of literature. The findings also indicated that only four of these components of design studio culture affects students’ performance and they are encouragement, Environment of the design studio, constraint and sacrifice. The paper thus recommends that awareness of design studio culture should be promoted through departmental policies as a way of improving students’ performance. Findings of this study are expected to provide universities empirical grounds that will aid policies and reforms directed at improving academic performance of architecture students.