Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
AI and Society, 2025 (ESCI, Scopus)
The introduction of generative AI (GenAI) tools has created a significant disruption in the design professions as they become increasingly integrated into creative processes. Whilst there is an abundance of case-specific, applied studies testing how to integrate AI-supported tools into design workflows, little work has holistically examined their role and impact on the industrial design profession. This paper investigates human–AI co-creation, focussing specifically on the experiences and perspectives of industrial designers through a series of workshops and focus group discussions. In these workshops, industrial designers reflected on incorporating GenAI into their workflows via hands-on experiences with selected AI-based image generators. We conducted five workshops and focus group discussions with 32 industrial designers and design students, providing valuable insights into how the role and impact of GenAI for product design is perceived. Thematic analysis of the data collected from the discussions was triangulated with observation notes and AI-generated works collected during the workshop, offering a comprehensive view of the performance of said tools, their pragmatic uses, impacts on design performance and creativity, and anticipated effects on professional practise. Through designers’ elicited motivations and concerns, we outline the perceived professional opportunities, barriers, and risks of image generation. Drawing on these insights, we map the factors influencing GenAI adoption in the industrial design profession, framing the interplay of communication, automation, and designerly autonomy, and offer recommendations for the development of designer-friendly GenAI systems.