For a scientific basis behind industrial design, you may want to get into design methodology and look for scientific publications through ScienceDirect for example. The field is called Design Theory and Methodology.
To get started, the classic science-minded formalist education type textbook over here is
‘Product Design: Fundamentals and Methods’ by Roozenburg and Eekels. It treats design essentially as one of the processes utliized to generate value from the streams of knowledge, energy, and material that make up a business, and the idea of the science of course is to optimize that value through methodical practice.
By the way, going in-depth in the area of constructing with plastics, I find industrial design also to become quite mathematical and scientific at times. It will always be a tiny little brother of the exact disciplines…
Also, for a classical introduction to the field of ID, we cannot omit ‘Industrial Design’ by John Heskett and ‘Pioneers Of Modern Design’ by Nikolaus Pevsner but you probably know those. They are a bit in between an essay and introductory academic textbook.