Insights curated by Experientia, the UX research and design consultancy
Insights curated by Experientia, the UX research and design consultancy
The title of this New York Times article sounds like a Monty Python sketch (intentionally, I guess). But the article is luckily quite a lot more serious, exploring how the British government – inspired by American behavioral economics – is…
Public service design is about to hit the mainstream. In December the Cabinet Office will launch a new policy lab tasked with using design to “re-invigorate policymaking in the UK civil service”, reports The Guardian. The new lab to be…
Innovative design-based approaches to public service management can rapidly enhance user experience whilst driving effective and efficient policymaking, explains Lucy Kimbell on the site of the Policy Network (the UK’s leading thinktank and international political network based in London). “[The…
Artefact Group, the Seattle based design company, has posted the first installment of its Behavior Change toolkit. “We’ve curated this selection of cards to give you a sample of principles and strategies that you can apply to your own work,…
Richard Heinberg, author of The End of Growth, gave the keynote address at the ‘Seoul Youth Hub Conference 2013, Reshaping the Way We Live’, held in Seoul, Korea from 6 to 8 November 2013. The conference was co-hosted with 8…
The more our data is used to determine our needs and desires, the less chance there is for serendipity, writes Bronwen Clune. Are we willing to make this concession in the name of progress? “Tracking, data mining and collaborative filtering…
Connect: Design for an Empathic Society by Sabine Wildevuur, Dick van Dijk, Thomas Hammer-Jakobson, Mie Bjerre, Anne Äyväri and Jesper Lund BIS Publishers, 2014 216 pages [Amazon link] Abstract The prospects are clear: we will probably live longer. The number…
With 96 percent of the world connected, organizations are using mobile phones to deliver, via texts, water, energy, financial services, health care, even education. “The number of such initiatives seems likely to increase. “The development community is eager to learn…
Changing Behaviours: On the Rise of the Psychological State by Rhys Jones, Jessica Pykett and Mark Whitehead Edward Elgar Publishers 2013, 240 pages [Amazon link] Abstract Changing Behaviours charts the emergence of the behaviour change agenda in UK based public…
Putting People First has been following the work of Alice E. Marwick for a while, first when she published her PhD dissertation, then when her book “Status Update” came out. Now the New York Times has published Walter Kirn’s extensive…
Social: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Connect by Matthew D. Lieberman Crown October 2013, 384 pages [Amazon link] Abstract In Social, renowned psychologist Matthew Lieberman explores groundbreaking research in social neuroscience revealing that our need to connect with other…
Smarter Than You Think How Technology Is Changing Our Minds For the Better by Clive Thompson and Jeff Cummings Penguin Press September 2013, 352 pages [Penguin Press link – Amazon link] Abstract How technology boosts our cognitive abilities — making…
Below a selection of pieces from The Guardian’s sustainable living hub: The power of behavioural design: looking beyond nudging Christoph Burmester – 10 September 2013 Beyond nudging lies the world of applied behavioural science or, alternatively, the domain of behavioural…
Last year, I posted about the very interesting PhD dissertation by Alice E. Marwick (downloadable here). Based on ethnographic research of the San Francisco technology scene, she explains how social media’s technologies are based on status-seeking techniques that encourage people…
Essay: The Nature of the BEast: What Behavioral Economics Is Not 10/16/13 Matthew Darling, Saugato Datta, and Sendhil Mullainathan People are complex; they defy easy summary. Like Walt Whitman, we all contain multitudes. As a discipline, economics has been successful…
More and more, we live our lives according to the unknown auspices of machine codes, writes Frank Swain. “Our lives are influenced by technologies not simply as objects but invisible systems that surround us, and whose architecture shapes the patterns…
Looking at yet another tweet and another post about the Quantified Self, I started reflecting this morning on the Silicon Valley-driven fascination with the quantification of one’s own activities, body and habits. The Quantified Self movement is portrayed as the…
Simon Roberts, the highly engaging, smart and easily approachable chair of the EPIC conference last week, was so absorbed with all the logistics that he didn’t find the concentration to speak his mind during the conference. Now that the conference…
While you are browsing online, you could be squandering memories — or losing important information, according to Swedish research. Contrary to common wisdom, an idle brain is in fact doing important work — and in the age of constant information…
MindLab, a cross-ministerial innovation unit in Denmark, hosted the seminar titled ‘How Public Design?’ for the second time on 2 and 3 September. This event gathered a distinguished group of decision-makers, researchers, experts and consultants of social change. As the…