A Study of Analysing Characteristics of Students’ Informal Learning between Peers within Different Environments--- Taking British Architecture Schools as Examples

Alongside the development of architectural education, especially the engagement of virtual and distance platforms, traditional design studio pedagogy has been challenged in this discipline. This paper makes a thematic analysis to compare architecture students’ informal learning experiences between peers in physical and virtual environments. The relative data are collected by both quantitative and qualitative measures, divided into two phases. The first phase was processed within three British architectural institutions, whose students were taken surveys to collect their preferences on learning within the conventional design studio and remotely; the second source was collected from observations and interviews conducted explicitly in one British architectural institution. Those data were analysed to summarise the main factors which affect architecture students’ learning experiences within the design studio and virtual environment, respectively. The study identified four main factors, which are face-to-face and distance contacts, studio atmosphere and its alternatives, peer-to-peer bonds, and the form of a community and/or a group. Additionally, research has shown that the majority of architecture students have a preference for studying in a studio environment that is created within a traditional design studio atmosphere. This suggests that the virtual platforms are unable to fully replace the physical design studio.