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Elderly’s Perceptions of a Meaningful Interaction with Voice-Based Conversational Agents: Integrate into daily routines, Support relatedness, But do not hamper autonomy
No full textVoice, as one of the most natural means of communication for the elderly given their declining physical and cognitive abilities, has the potential to reduce interaction barriers with newly emerging technologies. In parallel to this, studies focusing on the elderly as a user group have escalated in academia due to events such as the increasing ageing population and global epidemics like COVID-19. However, the focus has been mostly on their declining mental and physical abilities. This paper aims to investigate the hedonic aspects of Voice-based Conversational Agents (VCAs) for the elderly. In this respect, we conducted in-depth interviews with 13 participants, 9 of whom were elderly over the age of 75, and 4 of whom were caregivers, to examine the daily life practices and values of the elderly together with possibilities of VCAs to create positive experiences in their lives. This paper presents the perspectives of the elderly on VCAs by taking into consideration their perspectives on life and technology. In the end, the paper makes suggestions on which design decisions can support the positive hedonic aspects in the lives of the elderly. Our main finding shows that VCAs can provide a positive experience for the elderly beyond a pragmatic approach if they can be integrated into their daily routines and increase their relatedness with people without harming the areas where they feel competence and autonomy
Queer cities. Designing inclusive public spaces through participative and social innovative actions and practices.
No full textPublic spaces have historically been designed to support and facilitate the traditional roles of the masculine gender, resulting in male-centric spaces that do not consider other genders or communities. This has created an unsafe and exclusionary environment for queer and trans individuals, who face widespread violence and discrimination in public spaces. While some top-down initiatives such as rainbow street crossings have aimed to increase visibility and reduce hate-crimes, they are not enough and are in dissonance with the true living conditions of queer and trans people. A possible solution is to adopt a bottom-up approach, involving local actors part of the queer communities, associations, activists, and collaboratively working with public administration to develop guidelines designed in a user-and-community-centered way through participatory design approaches. This research aims to explore the relationship between queer communities and the urban public space, define what a queer space is, and propose policies and solutions to make cities more inclusive, cohesive, hospitable, and attractive. The PhD research includes an internship in the public administration, stimulating exchanges and connections with local communities through participatory practices and direct experimentation of possible solutions or policies
Towards a Design Toolkit for Exploring and Specifying Close-proximity Human-robot Collaboration as Leader and Follower: the Case of Collaborative Drawing
No full textClose-proximity human-robot collaboration (HRC) refers to scenarios where humans and robots work together for the same aim at the same time and space without safety fence. Few design tools currently exist to assist designers to think through how to design human-robot interactions, with a focus on turn-taking, coordination, and flow of intention. We present a design toolkit for designers to explore, specify, analyse and document the unfolding interaction between human(s) and robot(s) through a model of interaction where the roles of leader and follower shape the forms of collaborative behaviour. We illustrate our design toolkit in action and demonstrate how it can be used to analyse existing cases of HRC, or aid in exploring new applications and scenarios. We exemplify its use for the case of collaborative drawing, where human and robot jointly create a single drawing on a shared canvas in close proximity
Designing Longevity Planning Blocks through experimental participatory observation and interviews
No full textThe financial industry is under a transformational shift to cater to the change in our demographics. Between 2015 and 2050, the ratio among the world’s population over 60 years old will nearly double (from 12% to 22%) according to WHO (World Health Organization) data in 2022. Without a doubt, financial planning involves a series of large, complicated challenges, especially considering different countries\u27 political situations, diverse cultures, various birth rates, ethical issues, healthcare systems, emerging technologies, and economic conditions. The study explores how the usage of interactive, tangible artifacts and services, informed by Human-Centered Design and creative process, could empower people across all stages of life (e.g., pre-retirement, retirement, and post-retirement), as well as providers of financial advice, to introduce new topics and ideas in the planning process and improve the overall financial planning process to increase financial literacy. The study applied participatory observation and interviewed with the tangible artifact to test the concept of the Longevity Planning Block (LPB), a financial planning toolkit consisting of four phases associated with retirement: 1. managing ambiguity, 2. making big decisions, 3. managing complexity, and 4. living solo. These themes were used to map out financial planning services across intergenerational life-stage changes. We suggested four high-level design considerations: empathy, empowerment, experience, and education to improve LPB product design and service innovation with accessible content and provocative questions, interactive format, inspiring visuals, business and service strategies, and immersive user experiences
Increasing preventive care through increased access to healthy foods
No full textFood deserts are areas that lack the availability of fresh, affordable, and nutritious foods. Almost half of the food in the United States of America is wasted every year, yet somehow there are thousands of food deserts. This lack of nutritious food for people of all ages negatively impacts health outcomes as chronic diseases like obesity, diabetes, and heart disease are rising quickly. Preventive care is a practice in which patients take the initiative to make healthier choices in life to prevent the onset or progression of chronic illness. An example of such initiatives is eating and preparing more nutritious food. Trying to practice preventive care with little to no access to the appropriate resources makes it difficult to achieve for underserved communities. Our design research led to an initiative called Movin’ Grocers. Movin’ Grocers is a mobile grocery truck bringing fresh produce from local gardens to various food desert locations. Accessible healthy groceries to community members at a discounted price, allows them to eat better and practice preventive care to reduce chronic diseases
Compass for the Voyage of Ideation：Unlocking the Stimulation Potential of Service Design Heuristics
No full textDesign heuristics facilitate the generation of innovative solutions by pooling expert knowledge and experience through external stimuli. While heuristic tools have been widely studied in various design domains, most research has focused on evaluating their efficacy in enhancing creativity and usability rather than examining how they stimulate the the process of design. In this study, based on Service Design Heuristic Cards (SDHC), we explored the stimulating effects of design heuristics on the ideation process, filling a relevant research gap. We confirmed the existence of four types of stimulation of heuristic tools, compared the effects of stimuli on different levels of design capability, categorized the stimulus preferences and the types of ideas generated by each stimulus, and attempted to summarize the thinking shuttle routes induced by heuristic. These findings provide insights for modifying heuristic-based design pedagogy methods to improve the comprehensive thinking abilities of novices on the path to becoming experts, as well as lay the groundwork for stimulating and regulating concept generation and enabling appropriate problem-solution jumping
Human-AI system co-creativity for building narrative worlds
No full textThis paper explores the human-AI system co-creativity for building narrative worlds (NWs) through active human-machine collaboration. It proposes a hypothesis of structuring a narrative world for the AI system, working on the gap between the main disciplines of Design Studies and Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). Through the lens of the creative collaboration between humans and AI, this paper finds the emerging field of Interactive Digital Narrative (IDN) that stands in the abovementioned gap. Creativity has long been considered unique to humans, but in this contribution, creativity is considered in collaboration with an AI entity. The AI system becomes a tool for designers, in this case, a collaboration tool, to find novel ideas to write stories, accelerating the storytelling process. This contribution proposes a method to explore the influences of AI systems on human creativity within the design process of creating stories. The study begins with a review of the literature on the meaning of creativity as perceived through the collaborative activity of human and AI systems. The topic of interest is related to the process of story construction, the phase of crafting narrativity, through which it is possible to find creative ideas for narrative world-building. The aim is to explore the AI system\u27s computational creativity potential as a supporting tool for the designer in world-building
User decision making for end of use product: Exploring the reasons for keeping and care motivations for responsible sharing
No full textUsers\u27 decision to care for end-of-use products and share them with other users or return them to the manufacturer offers the potential to extend a product\u27s lifespan and material circulation. Applying the theory of care practice in the design process for product detachment has potential implications for sustainable design and can increase the efficiency of resources. This paper presents the findings of a survey of 257 hibernating end-of-use products and interviews with ten families who have experience moving houses. The survey explored product ownership and reasons for keeping end-of-use products. Two types of lingering attachment have been identified that suggest opportunities to promote sharing. A relationship among these factors was observed, leading to the theoretical construction of the care motivation model for sharing. Furthermore, understanding owners\u27 product care motivation to re-recognize its value and provide a choice to share products is vital to reduce the product hibernation period for material circulation. Therefore, four motivational caring themes, for which insights were taken from behavioural change and interviews, were introduced. The communicable knowledge is gathered under the concept of caring factors for sharing in the form of a design toolkit. Through action research processes of iterative development and evaluations involving a workshop method with designers in specific industry sectors, these insights were integrated into a toolkit for designers
Changing the Narrative: Co-designing Awareness about Environmental Sustainability with Children in Denmark
No full textThe world is facing pressing environmental challenges calling for urgent actions in different levels. In this type of a picture, the earlier the actions are taken, the better future for next generations could be created. In the context of sustainable innovation, by codesigning activities that promote sustainability, young minds can become much conscious about environmental sustainability in a joyful and interactive way. This paper investigates how design can trigger sustainable behavioural change in people with a specific focus on engaging with children. The investigation is done through 3 cases which were created during a first-year master’s course in collaboration with Aarhus Municipality. By co-designing with children in the process and helping them understand the importance of recycling and reusing, designers can help to create a new generation of environmentally conscious citizens by empowering them to take actions in everyday life
The agency of graphic design towards promoting collective awareness of heritage inscriptions: A study on the erosion of Palestinian traditional iconography
No full textThis article discusses research to establish the extent of contemporary Palestinian graphic design\u27s knowledge of traditional iconography and inclination towards its application in modern-day workflows. What new perspectives can graphic design contribute to heritage design? This paper discusses answers to these questions by examining the meanings and contents of the traditional Palestinian inscriptions by confirming those meanings and realizing the value of employing these inscriptions in the context of vibrant and developed creative industries in Palestine. Heritage has become an important research topic in recent decades and is now emerging as a priority area with research councils. Increasingly framed as cultural heritage, the role of graphic design in heritage management and heritage protection needs to be addressed. As well as contemporary reviews of the creative industries, graphic design has been shown to provide a uniquely holistic perspective on the design challenges associated with the human experience of heritage