Exploring the galaxy question: the influence of situation and first principles on designers’ judgments about useful instructional methods

Merrill’s (Education Tech Research Dev 50(3):43–59, 2002, First principles of instruction. In: Reigeluth CM, Carr-Chellman A (eds) Instructional-design theories and models: building a common knowledge base, vol III. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale, NJ, pp 41–56, 2009) first principles have become ubiquitous in the instructional design literature and in the syllabi of instructional design graduate programs. Some consider first principles to be universal, that they are applicable to all instructional situations. To examine this closer, this research examines the galaxy question posed by Reigeluth and Carr-Chellman (Situational principles of instruction. In: Reigeluth CM, Carr-Chellman A (eds) Instructional-design theories and models: building a common knowledge base, vol III. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale, NJ, pp 57–68, 2009a), which hypothesizes that universal principles and/or methods of instruction are unlikely. To examine the galaxy question, and to replicate and generalize instructional theory findings from previous research, this research asked two groups of instructional designers (one group from an Introductory instructional design course, and another group in a Capstone course) to rate the usefulness of 26 instructional methods for No Conditions (values), Situation (first principles), and Scenarios (rich conditions). The results show no significant difference in values about methods between the two groups, suggesting that the source of designer values comes from individual learning experiences, and not dominant group socialization as predicted. Furthermore, the results replicate and generalize findings from prior research. Overall, the results suggest that first principles are not universal, and the researcher suggests that another first principle be added to Merrill’s first principles model to better represent the interests of the affective domain.