Detta är ett examensarbete med inriktningen rumslig gestaltning inom informationsdesign. Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur en multimodal och visuell utformning av dagens miljörum kan påverka barns rumsupplevelser och leda till att miljörummen upplevs mer tillgängliga och inkluderande för specifikt barn, men även för miljörummens övriga användare. Studien inkluderar ett metodiskt arbete genom litterära studier inom rumsliga element, kognition och perception, det lärande rummet med utgångspunkt i barns lärande, multimodalitet, rumsupplevelser och miljöpsykologi. Samt en platsanalys, ett frågeformulär, en kvalitativ intervju med experter och en deltagande workshop med studiens målgrupp. Detta i syfte att få en djupare förståelse för problematiken kring rummet, användaren och kontexten de verkar i för att besvara studiens frågeställning. Utifrån insamlade teorier och empiri formgavs ett exemplifierande gestaltningsförslag, där miljörummet av ett flerbostashus i Eskilstuna omgestaltades. Gestaltningsförslaget förhåller sig till barnens perspektiv och förutsättningar, med målet om att skapa en inkluderande, lärande och levande plats – där barnen inkluderas tidigt och blir en del av miljöarbetet för en bättre framtid. / This is a thesis specializing in Spatial design in the field of Information Design. The purpose of the study is to examine how a multimodal and visual design of today's rooms for recycling can affect children's spatial experiences and lead to a higher degree of accessibility and inclusive for children and other users of the room. The study includes a methodological work through literary studies on spatial elements, cognition and perception, the learning spaces based on children's learning, multimodality, spatial experiences, and environmental psychology. As well as a place analysis, a survey, a qualitative interview with experts, a participatory workshop with the study's target group. This to gain an in-depth understanding of the problems surrounding the room, the user, and the context in which they operate to answer the study's question at issue. Based on collected theories and empirical data, a exemplifying design proposal was designed, in which the environmental space of an apartment building in Eskilstuna was redesigned. The design proposal relates to the children's perspective and conditions, with the goal of creating an inclusive, learning and living place – where the children are included early and become part of the environmental work for a better future.

University libraries struggle to keep up with rapidly changing technology and the associated change in teaching strategy. Most administrators and librarians are often not trained to assess space needs and struggle to reassign library spaces for non-traditional library use. As such, they often embark on expensive and time-consuming feasibility studies, using (typically) hard-earned monies to complete the research or to pilot a new space. What academic research library administrators and staff lack is an analysis tool for discovering and planning needed renovations and improvements in aging library facilities. The purpose of this research project was to determine how students use library spaces for learning in this new high-tech, hands-on education experience (i.e. synthesis of previous research); develop a tool that can be used by library staff to self-analyze existing academic library spaces, identifying areas that could be improved for student benefit (e.g. provide a checklist of potential learning spaces that institutions should carefully consider adding to their facilities); and provide some examples/case studies of potential facility improvements. The end result is a hierarchical self-analysis tool that merges space options, Abraham Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, and an example of library-user personas. It also provides some general cost guidelines, helpful construction tips, and a synthesis of exploratory questions related to strategy and space. The tool uses evidence-based design to facilitate important conversations, provide an organized checklist of various considerations, and be a quick reference for library administrators and facility managers as they navigate the world of twenty-first century pedagogy and student learning.

The purpose of this study was to examine how academic deans perceived the characteristics of facility built environment and its impact on learning in higher education. Q methodology was used as the means to explore the subjective opinions of academic deans within the State of Florida regarding the facility built environment’s impact on learning in higher education. For this Q study, the concourse statements were the result of communications taken from the subject literature and participant responses to this study’s online concourse questionnaire. The resulting 32 item Q sample was sorted online by 43 academic deans, associate and assistant deans. In completing the survey, the participants ranked statements representative of the characteristics of facility built environment according to their own beliefs and subjective opinions. From the resulting data and subsequent analysis, three distinct factors emerged that represented the collective opinions of this study’s participants. The emergent factors for this study were named Traditionalist – Focused on Functionality and Universal Rationality; Modernist – Technology Conscious Seeking Innovation and Flexibility; and Abstractionist – Contextual and Expressive.