Context as Content: Architecture of Social Learning in the Metaverse

Introduction

The physical architecture of learning environments (research buildings, workplaces, schools, libraries, university campuses, etc.) is considered both a resource and an obstacle for learning. It is a resource when designers consciously use a combination of (a) principles of environmental design research (e.g., research in environmental psychology and human geography) [12, 15, 29]; and (b) the accumulated normative wisdom in the field of architecture to create good forms and spaces. Yet, it can also become an obstacle. due to a combination of (a) limited collaboration between learning experts and designers to translate complex theories and concepts from the field of learning into the physical space; and (b) shifting priorities and resources dictated by practicalities of creating physical buildings.

In a nutshell, demands of learning theories are far greater than what the material world can supply, so architecture often turns into a limiting factor as opposed to an enabling one.

That is about to change.

For the first time in history, capabilities of the Metaverse, a decentralized network of virtual spaces, are providing learning experts, learners, and designers with new resources to co-create a fit between the environment and learning theories.

For example, consider the following concepts from some of my favorite learning theories: communal memory, peripheral participation, trajectory, shared repertoire, immersion, distributed cognition, social history of learning, cognitive system, socio-technical system, boundary object, boundary mechanisms, realms of knowledge, landscapes of practice, constellations of communities, and community of practice [22, 31, 39, 41, 42, 43]. Physical architecture can embody, or support, only a fraction of these concepts. Metaverse architecture, however, can digitally materialize almost all of them.

Architecture in the Metaverse: Challenges and Potentials

Before I expand on what the architecture of learning in the Metaverse could look like, let me start with a brief observation about the current state of architecture in the Metaverse, challenges, and emerging potentials.?

The Metaverse

The Metaverse is a decentralized network of virtual spaces where users can socialize, learn, trade, create, and play. The economic, cultural, and technological infrastructure of the Metaverse is still in development, yet it revolves around four key areas [14, 24, 25, 28, 35, 36]:

• 3D game engines creating digital spaces and XR tools enabling immersion;
• DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) facilitating creation and operation of a decentralized, networked society as well as participation in the crypto economy;
• AI supporting scalability and promoting inclusion by refining user experience; and,
• Social life and co-creation culture shaped around the Metaverse widely adopted and evolved by Gen Z and advanced by brands and the gaming industry.

The Challenge: Experiencing Déjà vu

There is a whole world out (or in) there – it has its own social life, culture, economy, art, landscapes, and tools and material to build stuff; of course, it should have buildings and cities. And it does; it is just that architects, urban designers, and interior designers aren’t creating them.

History of architecture and urban design teaches us that it is natural for natives of a culture to architect their own buildings and places – they have the insider view into who the users are, what they need, and how to use local resources to respond to those needs.

But I also recall the chapter where, one day, it all went south. As cities grew in size and complexity, buildings and urban environments lost their placeness to unbridled formalism, corporations colonized public spaces, inhuman orderliness was imposed on complex social fabric of cities, public life was dismantled, everyday people were spatially marginalized, and the race for using displaced and misplaced aesthetics replaced attention to emotional and behavioral needs of people and communities. As a result, in smaller cities people lost their sense of belonging and place attachment, while bigger cities turned into machines for making profit, oppression, and segregation [11, 15, 18, 26, 29, 34].

It wasn’t until after the early years of 1960s, the decade of protests and socio-cultural disillusionments, that a group of architects, urban designers, and environmental researchers called for a different approach towards design. Since then, there has been substantial research done into the psychology and sociology of interacting with the built environment. This work has been mainly championed by environmental design researchers including environmental psychologists and human geographers [1, 10, 16, 21, 29, 33, 37, 40].

Interestingly, over the years, coupling environmental design research with the normative wisdom of good form, light, scale, and material has been elevated from a form of intellectual curiosity to an industry-wide competitive advantage.

If you ask me how much of the knowledge described in the above couple of paragraphs is currently being incorporated into creating spaces in the metaverse, I will say a smidgen. In a way, the Metaverse’s spatial life is stuck in the pre-60s era. That is the challenge we’ve got to address.

The Opportunity: Experiencing Vuja Dé

Comedian George Carlin first coined “vuja dé”. We all know déjà vu – looking at an unfamiliar situation and feeling like you have been there before.?Vuja dé, in contrast, describes looking at a familiar situation with fresh eyes, as if you have never seen it before.

The opportunity here is in revisiting complex non-architectural theories and concepts with fresh eyes. We can now expand our source of inspiration beyond social-behavioral sciences and architects’ normative knowledge to include theories that use geographical metaphors, spatial references, and material clues in explaining humans’ state of being in and interacting with the world.

Due to the limitations of the physical world putting restraints on our imagination, designers rarely attempt to materialize highly conceptual thoughts developed in disciplines other than architecture. Metaverse lifting the restraints is an invitation to revisit those conceptual thoughts with a fresh set of eyes.

Architecture of Social Learning

To build on the above argument, I’ll start by revisiting a group of thought-provoking theories from the field of learning.

Social Theories of Learning

Learning has traditionally been the realm of psychological theories. Thanks to the efforts in the field of Environmental Psychology during the past six decades, many useful perspectives and concepts have travelled from psychology to the field of design [1, 10, 16, 21, 29, 33, 37, 40]. So, there is a high level of comfort among architects to engage with psychological theories of learning.

Yet, there are five theoretical lenses that define learning more than just a cognitive process but as a form of participation in the social and material world: Situated Cognition, Distributed Cognition, Cognitive Apprenticeship, Situated Learning, and Community of Practice.

The five theories are similar in principle. They all expand the unit of learning from individual to a larger social, material, and technological organism – a collection of people and things that interact and learn how to better achieve their purpose. From this view, it’s not just the individual who is learning, it’s the entire ecosystem of people and things that learns and grows and preserves knowledge and produces history and collaterals [2, 8, 9, 22, 23, 30, 31, 32, 39, 41, 42, 43].

Designing for Social Theories of Learning

Context is content. This is where experts in social theories of learning and designers of learning environments find a common ground.

From this shared viewpoint, architecture is not just where learning happens, but is also how community members engage with each other and with things – to shape and re-shape their culture, to belong, and to produce, preserve, and express their social history of learning. In other words, the context is elevated into an integral part of the ecosystem of learning as knowledge is embedded into it.

Many architects and designers have attempted to materialize the context for social learning leveraging their experience and intuition about the theories. Here are some examples [3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 13, 17, 19, 20, 27]:

• In the 50s, open plan office design known as Bürolandschaft encouraged high flexibility to maximize choice and transparency in favor of more communication. The concept is still considered progressive in workplace planning and design.
• During the early 60s, Herman Hertzberger designed Delft Montessori School around the idea of articulated spaces – they allowed multiple learning activities take place simultaneously without disrupting each other.
• A few years later, Hertzberger designed Centraal Beheer offices to resemble a vibrant permeable city encouraging various scales of social interactions and serendipitous encounters.
• In the early 2000s, Clive Wilkinson created a 250 feet long concrete worktable for the advertising agency, Mother, to encourage employees from different departments to come together and cross-pollinate.
• OMA’s mid-2000 Seattle Library attempted to challenge the institution by reframing the library as an information hub supporting people’s interactions with all forms of media not just books.
• In the late 2000, projects like Nueva School, Manassas Park Elementary School, Homer Science & Student Life Center, and UMD’s Bagley classroom building were conceived as teaching tools. They all model sustainable principles through their educational spaces and showcase design elements as teachable moments dovetailing with the schools’ mission and curriculum.
• Frank Gehry’s Facebook office design in 2018 perfected the idea of flexible interior neighborhoods to build team identity around workstyle.

I admire every single one of these projects because with all the complexities that go into creating physical architecture, each still manage to tell a few stories about learning. Now let's lift limitations of the physical world and revisit social theories of learning in the Metaverse. ?

Architecture of Social Learning in the Metaverse: 14 Principles

Imagine a kind of architecture, if you will, that the experience of navigating its physicality is learning - a malleable, spatial curriculum that listens to, interacts with, and guides learners to co-create the most inspiring learning trajectories. Imagine a built landscape that is home to a collection of neighboring communities of practice with boundaries that touch, cross, or overlap; and learners who can choose to become explorers of peripheries to found new realms of knowledge, collaborate with visiting knowledge brokers from other realms, or literally climb hills of competency and complete levels to develop mastery.

The architecture of social learning in the Metaverse is similar to and different from the architecture in the physical world. Under this premise, below I list 14 principles for the architecture of social learning in the Metaverse. To visually imagine the second set of principles, I used Midjourney – an AI-powered tool that generates visuals based on a description.

I’ll start from the similarities. The architecture of social learning in the Metaverse is similar to the architecture in the physical world in the following seven ways:

1. It leverages principles of good shape, form, scale, light, color, and material to evoke a sense of awe, wonder, and inspiration.

2. It provides the right mix of prospect and refuge, focus and collaborative, individual and community, and confidential and public spaces.

3. It offers moments for reflection, restoration, and recharge to increase focus, presence, and future performance.

4. It fosters a sense of place and place attachment by incorporating memorable or meaningful design moments.

5. It creates a sense of mystery and invites exploration and discovery through crafting a thoughtful sequence, rhythm, and tapestry of spaces.

6. It becomes the physicality of representation by respecting and celebrating the culture and stories of users.

7. It incorporates anchors, magnets, and triangulators to not just build community but also encourage serendipitous encounters among learners.

And it is different in the following seven ways (below visuals are co-created by Midjourney and I):

1. It’s not fixed in time and space; it’s being shaped and co-created in the moment by the members of the community that inhabit it (apprentices, old-timers, brokers, etc.). ↓

2. It’s not limited to geographic boundaries; it has portals to other realms and communities and its boundaries are programmed with peripheral or boundary activities. ↓

3. It’s not owned by an institution or corporation; it doesn’t require gaining privileged access or status for participation or crossing communities. ↓

4. It’s not bound to constraints of material and structure; its fantastical and surreal presence evokes imagination and encourages multi-modal storytelling. ↓

5. It’s not made out of dead, mute materials; its physicality is smart, alive, and programmable. ↓

6. It’s not a container; it’s intertwined in and inseparable from the fabric of the learning community. ↓

7. It’s not designed for personas or user groups; it’s aware of each learner’s individual learning trajectory and proactively connects them with the right people and things (such as novices, old-timers, boundary objects, brokers, etc.) that are supportive of their trajectory. ↓

Of course, there might be more principles. The above 14 can be used as a springboard for ideating useful, inspirational, and equitable learning environments in the Metaverse that use social theories of learning as theoretical lens and architecture as a resource. To test and iterate the principles, however, we need to go beyond merely consulting the theory and engage learning theorists and practitioners in the translation and co-creation process.

?

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