Insights curated by Experientia, the UX research and design consultancy
Insights curated by Experientia, the UX research and design consultancy
Apple Watch usage is dropping off as the novelty factors fades away, according to a qualitative study by MBLM, a “brand intimacy agencyâ€, reports Luke Dormehl in Cult of Mac. While Apple’s wearable has found a place in many owners’…
Data & Society is a NYC-based research institute focused on the social and cultural issues arising from data-centric technological development. The institute that was founded by danah boyd, principal researcher and Microsoft Research and frequently featured on this blog, looks…
By taking into account psychological drivers, the health-care industry can create products and services that will help individuals improve the way they manage their health and well-being, writes Becky Slack in an article in the New Statesman (published in association…
On Friday, 27 November 2015, Ljubljana (Slovenia) hosted the third international symposium ‘Why the world needs anthropologists‘. The theme of this year’s event was ‘Burning issues of our hot planet’. The main purpose of the symposium, which was attended by…
While patient-centricity is at the top of the agenda of most Life Science organizations, there is an urgent need for commercial teams to evolve their market research practices to cultivate a richer understanding of patients. But how do we cultivate…
Swedish Design, An Ethnography By Keith M. Murphy Cornell University Press April 2015, 264 pages Swedish designers are noted for producing distinctive and elegant forms; their furniture and household goods have an especially loyal following around the world. Design in…
Today we received a hard copy of Peeps, a new and impressive magazine that presents itself as “anthropology for non-anthropologists”, aimed at putting “culture and context before events, bringing investigative stories from corners around the world, and offering readers engaging…
Aging the technoscape Do technologies like chairs and walkers have a place in our imagination of the technoscape? How might this image help us to think differently about Mauss’s concept of “techniques of the body” from the perspective of the…
What happens when robot cars meet complex social interaction, like head nods, horn honks, or even road rage? Dr. Melissa Cefkin “is here to teach autonomous cars how to behave”. A design anthropologist based at the Nissan Technical Center in…
The Quantified Self By Gina Neff and Dawn Nafus MIT Press, 264 pp. April 2016 Oops, that is confusing: two books by sociologists on the quantified self movement, both entitled “The Quantified Self” and both appearing in April 2016. The…
Digital Ethnography: Principles and Practice By Sarah Pink, Heather Horst, John Postill, Larissa Hjorth, Tania Lewis and Jo Tacchi (RMIT University) SAGE Publications October 2015, 216 pages Abstract This sharp, innovative book champions the rising significance of ethnographic research on…
Sociologist Brooke Harrington realized that if she were ever going to understand global inequality she would have to become one of the people who helps create it. So she trained to become a wealth manager to the ultra-rich. Although she…
Watching Closely: A Guide to Ethnographic Observation by Christena Nippert-Eng Oxford University Press, October 2015 296 pages Ethnographers rely on three related activities to conduct research in the field: observation, conversation, and participation. Observing others in their environments and using…
Design for Ageing Gracefully Rethinking Health and Wellness for the Elderly: Public Services Asian Insights & Design Innovation, DesignSingapore Council October 2015
Applying Design Approaches to Policy Making: Discovering Policy Lab Written by Lucy Kimbell Illustrated by Holly Macdonald Published by the University of Brighton September 2015 This report reviews what design-based approaches bring to policy making. It results from an academic…
The 2015 edition of EPIC, the premier international gathering on the current and future practice of ethnography in the business world, will take place in Sao Paulo, Brazil next week. The draft proceedings have just been posted. Here is the…
As we age, we increasingly depend on public services and the community for support. Well-designed public services can greatly affect the lives of the elderly and their experiences of healthcare. Experientia collaborated with DesignSingapore Council on understanding how the elderly…
Our world is continuing to become more complex, more intense and more data driven. Yet counter-intuitively, this is making the human element more and more important. In an interview at Intel’s Transform IT show, Genevieve Bell, Vice President and Fellow…
When business anthropologists work with the C-suite of large companies, the clients or employers tend to be the chief marketing officer (for consumer research), the chief strategy officer (for strategy work anchored in an outside-in perspective), the chief innovation officer…
Swimming with Sharks: My Journey into the World of the Bankers by Joris Luyendijk Guardian Faber Publishing September 2015 – 288 pages Joris Luyendijk, an investigative journalist and anthropologist, knew as much about banking as the average person: almost nothing.…