Long working hours and course-specific demands can result in musculoskeletal discomfort among design students. However, this has not been thoroughly investigated among students in India. Thus, this study aimed to develop a comprehensive questionnaire using a co-design approach to assess musculoskeletal health and classroom chair-related problems, usage, and needs of design students. It also recommends dissemination strategies for digital data collection in the Indian context to address the challenges associated with questionnaire development and data collection. Our approach comprised five stages: (a) literature review, (b) pilot study on design students, (c) questionnaire refinement using Delphi, (d) questionnaire finalization, and (e) building dissemination strategies. The questionnaire portions developed using Delphi were reliable (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.869). A thematic analysis was performed on the opinions of Delphi experts regarding possible motivations for students to complete online surveys. This analysis exhibited three broad themes: strategizing for reward and incentive, optimizing the questionnaire design, and building tailored engagement and outreach strategies. The questionnaire was accordingly refined, and dissemination strategies were streamlined to a top-down strategy, social media strategy, and snowball strategy. Our findings will help researchers conceptualize similar surveys and devise suitable dissemination strategies for better outreach.
Srivastava et al. (2026) studied this question.