Research

My research focuses on the problem of agency, drawing on the most recent advances in semiotics to address the following questions: What kind of agency is inherent to artifacts and how does it affect human agency? What kind of intentions are involved in the activity of designing? What is specific to humans regarding agency and design? And from this last question, a fundamental concern: How can we explain the origin of the ability to design in humans and how has this ability evolved?

In the [ Publications ] section, the research products generated so far from these questions are available.

Research group: MIMAPRO Micro and macro ergonomics in products and processes.

Director of Student Research Group on Semiotics (in Spanish).

Grants and Funding:

94522-Stiftelsen Roy fond ID RFv2020-0325. Lund University, Sweden.

94522-Stiftelsen Roy fond ID RHv2022-0067. Lund University, Sweden.

Research Grant of the Faculty of Arts 2015 ID 31510. National University of Colombia.

Research Grant for the use of infrastructure and equipment in the laboratories of the Faculty of Arts 2024 ID 60067. National University of Colombia.

Research Grant for pedagogical innovation and authentic performances of the discipline with high academic value in teaching-learning tasks 2018 (not executed due to Phd commitments).

On going research:

Collective agency and social innovation

This research proposal focuses on the study of collective agency of vulnerable communities in social innovation processes with special emphasis on design actions that emerge from the territories and communities themselves. It is derived from the article by Mendoza-Collazos, Ríos and Loschiavo "Colombia-Brazil Dialogues: In search of a Latin American epistemology for design" presented to the Design Research Society in 2024.

Image based on Mendoza-Collazos and Zlatev, 2022.

Intersemiotic Translation and GAI

This research involves developing applications of the semiotic translation method (Mendoza-Collazos, 2025), which has been proposed as a form-giving strategy in the arts and design. Applications of the method have demonstrated that it facilitates creative processes, fosters the generation of novel forms, and supports the development of cognitive skills such as abstraction, conceptualization, and metaphorical thinking. Mendoza-Collazos's Intersemiotic Translation Method (ITM) is situated at a critical intersection: the mediation between concept (signified) and form (signifier) through the analysis of meaning structures. Integrating Generative AI (GAI) is not simply adding a tool; it is introducing a "translating agent" with its own logic for the formal generation process. GAI represents a paradigm shift: semiotic translation no longer depends exclusively on human abstraction capacity, but rather on the interaction between the designer's intention (prompt) and the model's interpretation.

References

Mendoza-Collazos, Juan (2025). Traslación Semiótica como Método para la Generación Sistemática de la Forma [Intersemiotic Translation as a Method for the Systematic Generation of Form] [Preprint] https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/etpm3 v1

Design science [on hold]

This research proposal addresses design as a science and design projects as research in their own right. The concern arose from the experience of the SEVEN project. It seeks to avoid the "positivist" stigma of science and validate other forms of knowledge generation based on the design paradigm.

Image taken from the final report of the SEVEN project.

Cognition and semiotics [on hold]

This proposal addresses the most recent studies in semiotics to investigate the structure of human experience as a key variable in design.

Investigating semiotics in relation to cognition allows us to understand the relevant cognitive processes underlying user experience.

Cognition is critically addressed under the 4E approach, that is, cognition is not a "brained" phenomenon but rather involves the whole body (Embodied), situated in specific circumstances (Embedded), emerging from the relationship with the environment (Enactive) and distributed, negotiated and shared with other minds and with artifacts (Extended).

Image taken from my notes from the doctoral course on fMRI.