Examining vignettes in AEC research – how are they used, and what are they good for?

Prominent concerns of the SEEDS research community revolve around the intentions, ethics, behaviours and standards of designers, constructors and users of our built assets. One way of examining such 'approaches' is through the application of well-considered vignette type questions embedded within appropriate research instruments. The vignette technique presents research participants with a credibly constructed 'hypothetical' scenario that facilitates reflection, and can potentially reveal normative behaviours, specifically 'how' participants would react in such circumstances. An appraisal of the typical research methods used in the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) literature reveals an apparent underuse of such a data collection technique, and a systematic type literature review reveals several other uses of the term. The aims of this work are to explore the use of vignettes across the wider AEC literature, introduce the usefulness of vignettes as a data collection tool, and consider their suitability for the purposes of the agenda of the SEEDS community. The work concludes with the inclusion of an exemplar 'ethical dilemma' vignette to demonstrate the technique and a call for greater use of more 'sustainability-focused' vignettes, in future empirical research work.