Insights curated by Experientia, the UX research and design consultancy
Insights curated by Experientia, the UX research and design consultancy
In the 20th Century creating a close partnership between copywriter and art director led to a creative renaissance in advertising. In the 21st century the relationship between designer and researcher will do the same, argues Rob Varney, experience design director of FoolProof. This approach liberates…
As we develop smarter “thingsâ€, we’ll have to more smartly research and design them for their human environments, writes Ted McCarthy, XD researcher at ThoughtWorks. “Technology notoriously runs many times faster than government, and we need to design our emerging technologies well in order to…
On Nudging In Public Policy By Alon M. August, University of Redlands (USA) April 6, 2015 This thesis examines nudging, a technique aimed at making individuals act, choose, and behave in the ways deemed rational by policy makers. Nudging has only recently been adopted for…
Kentaro Toyama is a former Microsoft Research Executive and now an associate professor at the University of Michigan. Toyama calls himself “a recovering technoholicâ€â€”someone who once was “addicted to a technological way of solving problems.†Five years in India changed him. After getting his PhD…
Designing Democracy: How designers are changing democratic spaces and processes An inquiry by the UK Design Commission March 2015 Abstract Featuring essays from leading designers, MPs and policymakers, ‘Designing Democracy’ asks what contribution design could make to improving both participation in the democratic process and…
Satin Island: A novel by Tom McCarthy Knopf, 2015 From the author of Remainder and C (short-listed for the Man Booker Prize), and a winner of the Windham-Campbell Literature Prize, comes Satin Island, an unnerving novel that promises to give us the first and last…
The deal we have struck with the information society over the extent to which our lives are shaped and our privacy invaded requires urgent renegotiation, argues law professor Julie E Cohen at the annual Law and Media and Communications lecture at the London School of…
Practical Empathy: For Collaboration and Creativity in Your Work by Indi Young Rosenfeld Media, 2015 Synopsis Conventional product development focuses on the solution. Empathy is a mindset that focuses on people, helping you to understand their thinking patterns and perspectives. Practical Empathy will show you…
Bosch, the German multinational engineering and electronics company, is applying a UX approach to help spark enthusiasm for electric driving, and to develop a “fascinating” user interface for electric vehicles. The project website consists of three sections (some have short videos): Charged up For six…
In 2014, Ericsson and UN-Habitat (United Nations Human Settlements Programme) entered a three-year partnership with the intention to collaborate around Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) and sustainable urbanization. One of the first explorations was driven by the Ericsson User Experience Lab in collaboration with their…
Until developers of wearable devices get the user experience down pat, the technology will struggle to gain adoption, writes Steve McPhilliamy on Medical Device and Diagnostic Industry (MDDI). “Understanding user behaviors, attitudes, and lifestyles is the key to solving the wearables adoption puzzle and can…
New ethnographic and quantitative research from DrivingSales identifies how the growing gap between consumer expectations and the current automotive buying process is suppressing car sales volume. Automotive sales could grow up to 24% if the retail experience improves, according to key findings released today from…
As we moved our lives online, the internet promised an end to isolation. But can we find real intimacy amid shifting identities and permanent surveillance? A long read by Olivia Laing explores this blurring between individuals and networks. In the past few years, two things…
In this week’s Radar Podcast episode, O’Reilly’s Roger Magoulas chatted with Tricia Wang, a global tech ethnographer and co-founder of PL Data, about how qualitative and quantitative data need to work together, reframing “data-driven decision making,” and building the ideal team.
John Edson explains why the future of cars is about experience versus ownership. Three major shifts, he says, will move the car from a depreciating asset that every family owns to a mesh of hardware, software, and services that meet our transportation needs in a…
The MIT Technology Review has just published a special business report on persuasive technology, i.e. how technologies from smartphones to social media are used to influence our tastes, behavior, and even habits. Free registration is required to read all the articles. Technology and Persuasion Persuasive…
Two inspiring posts by Dr. Lucy Kimbell, a visiting Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Fellow at the UK-based Policy Lab, an experimental policy innovation center within the Open Policy Making team of the UK Cabinet Office: Ethnography in policymaking: Barriers and opportunities The value…
Two methodological critiques on Big Data that caught our attention: In the Financial Times, economist and journalist Tim Harford points out that sampling bias and statistical errors are, if anything, magnified in Big Data research, and that theory-free analysis of mere correlations is inevitably fragile.…
The Gov.uk open policy making toolkit is a practical guide to techniques that can help you make better policy. The toolkit, which brings together the latest techniques to improve making and delivering policy, is based on the principles of open policy making – to be…
Over the past couple of decades, a small number of psychologists, communication theorists, and organizational scientists have articulated ideas of sensemaking into theories, frames, and methods that we can and probably should incorporate into our work, writes Laura A. McNamara, an organizational anthropologist and Principal…
University of North Texas students, guided by Professor Christina Wasson and highly acclaimed corporate anthropologist Dr. Brigitte Jordan of Nissan’s Research Center in Silicon Valley to find out how people use their cars. The project entitled “The Social Life of the Car” involved observing participants…
In a long Fortune Magazine article on IKEA’s successful global expansion, author Beth Kowitt devotes quite a few paragraphs to the importance of qualitative, ethnographic research: “Today research is at the heart of Ikea’s expansion. “The more far away we go from our culture, the…
The 11th and 12th of March, the International Energy Agency [IEA] in Paris hosted a workshop on energy efficiency and behaviour in the buildings sector. The goal of this workshop was for representatives from IEA member countries and key emerging economies to share experiences with…
In many hospitals and clinics around the [USA], oncologists and surgeons simply tell cancer patients what treatments they should have, or at least give them strong recommendations. But [at UC San Francisco], under a formal process called “shared decision making,†doctors and patients are working…
Calling the shots? is the title of a new Citizens Advice Bureau report that analyses consumer problems in the mobile phone market and explores opportunities for stronger consumer protections. From the executive summary: “The mobile phone market has transformed in the past 30 years as…
Over the summer of 2014, Northstar, in collaboration with the London School of Economics, conducted an ethnographic study at the Royal Academy of Arts, exploring the Summer Exhibition audience and their motivations. The study was designed to help the Royal Academy to understand their customers…
People talk about the future of technology in education as though it’s right around the corner, but most of us get to that corner and see it disappearing around the next. This innovation-obsessed cycle continues as we are endlessly dissatisfied with how little difference these…
The stories we tell ourselves about technology – typically, optimistic ones from would-be innovators, pessimistic ones from their critics – are usually too simple. Making them more complex can support a richer discussion about where a technology might be going, and the kind of futures…
Psychologist Susan Pinker on the importance of face-to-face contact in our era of disbanded families and virtual connections. “Research shows that people who feel socially disconnected are at a greater risk of dying young – especially if they are men. Women are more prone to…
The considerations and limitations of feedback as a strategy for behaviour change Garrath T. Wilsona, Tracy Bhamraa & Debra Lilleya, Loughborough Design School, Loughborough, UK Published online: 12 Mar 2015 – Taylor & Francis Design for Sustainable Behaviour (DfSB) is a maturing research area concerned…
Just as the automobile defined the twentieth century, the smartphone is reshaping how we live and work today. Boston University sociology lecturer Nicole Aschoff explores it aLL. Half way down her leftist criticism of how the smartphone exemplifies and accentuates neoliberal capitalist economic relations, she…
FAIR Money, a small research collective consisting of anthropologists and design researchers based in the San Francisco Bay Area, has just published its first report, Good with Money: Getting by in Silicon Valley. The report, which is based on interviews and a diary study with…
For those in Torino: Workshop_40/Wild energies: wind, fire and people in movement Conducted by Marguerite Kahrl e Marjetica Potr? Friday, March 20 3.30 – 5.30, meeting with stakeholders Saturday, March 21 10.00 – 4.00, Participatory design in groups In contrast to maps showing urban elements…
EPIC, the premier international gathering on the current and future practice of ethnography and design in the business world, will take place in Sao Paulo, Brazil this year. The EPIC 2015 program committee is now calling for submissions of Paper Abstracts, Pecha-Kucha Abstracts, and Tutorial…
Invitation: sharing session, Singapore, 30 March 2015 What are the hopes and fears of the elderly in Singapore? How can designers offer solutions that support the elderly in managing their health and wellness? What can healthcare professionals do to help them keep active? What role…
Nudging and Choice Architecture: Ethical Considerations by Cass R. Sunstein Yale Journal on Regulation January 17, 2015 50 pages Is nudging unethical? Is choice architecture a problem for a free society? This essay defends seven propositions: It is pointless to object to choice architecture or…
In the not so distant future, every object in your life will be online and talking to one another. Although it will transform the way we live and work, Marc Goodman wants to know if the benefits will outweigh the dangers. “For all the untold…
Reduced budgets mean innovation in the public sector is vital if our public services are to become more effective and improve the experience for users, argues Anna Whicher, Head of Policy, at the National Centre for Product Design and Development Research (PDR) of Cardiff Metropolitan…
Natasha Dow Schüll is a cultural anthropologist and associate professor of Science, Technology and Society at MIT. Her first book, Addiction by Design, examines technology design and addiction in the world of electronic gambling. Her forthcoming book Keeping Track will be about the “quantified self”…
In the broader business world, writes social anthropologist Jay Hasbrouck, design thinking “is already a stale buzzword — a concept that spread widely as a panacea for dull and slow-moving corporate cultures.” “Some say it’s now “the happy meal†of business solutions peddled by a…