Wickedness of design research practicemethodological issues inbringing knowledge to expression through design
* Stoffel KuenenJohan Redström
27.08.2013 ‘Blending design research and practice’
1455-1
This talk
‣ my research
‣ methodological issues
‣ support in literature
‣ discussion of support found
‣ design research - practice
My research: human murmurations
‣ interaction design
‣ design for qualities of interaction
My research: human murmurations
‣ technological mediation of large group interactions
‣ direct experience of higher order social dynamics
‣ bridging:
‣ individual action and experience
‣ emergent phenomena in population
My research: human murmurations
‣ Research through Design - artifact as carrier and means
‣ Embodying theory
‣ (post-)phenomenology
‣ computational sociology, network science
‣ CogSci, Social Psychology
My research: human murmurations
‣ Slider boxes
My research: human murmurations
‣ evaluation of research artifacts
‣ import of theory from other academic fields
‣ import of systems of evaluation?
‣ (controlled) experiment?
Methodological issues
‣ ‘evaluate’ the opening up of a design space:
‣ How the experience of an individual interacting in and with large group dynamics could develop
Methodological issues
‣ conceptual circles (chickens, eggs)
‣ experience of mediated social dynamics is brought about by the artifact to be designed
‣ how can research be undertaken systematically in order to generate the types of outcomes that fit a system of evaluation, which, in turn, fits the type of work?
Methodological issues
‣ nested wickedness of design research practice
‣ of approach
‣ of subject matter
‣ ... (relation between)
‣ in design practice, wickedness resolved by design acts
Looking for support structures
‣ review of discourse on practice based design research
‣ HCI / interaction design
Looking for support structures
‣The Nature of Design Practice and Implications for Interaction Design Research (Stolterman, 2008)
‣From design research to theory: Evidence for a maturing field (Forlizzi et al., 2009)
‣An analysis and critique of research through design: towards a formalization of research approach (Zimmerman et al., 2010)
‣Establishing criteria of rigour and relevance in interaction design (Fällman & Stolterman, 2010)
‣What should we expect from Research through Design (Gaver, 2012)
‣The logic of Annotated Portfolios: Communicating the Value of ‘Research through Design’ (Bowers, 2012)
‣Annotated Portfolios and other forms of Intermediate-level knowledge (Löwgren, 2013)
Focus of current discourse
‣ knowledge production
‣ describing outcomes, types of knowledge
‣ purposes thereof
‣ yardsticks for evaluation
‣ forms and formats of presentation and dissemination
Wickedness in current discourse
‣ wickedness: identified and characterized
‣ missing: resolving wickedness or what that might mean
‣ i.e. how design research practice unfolds
Navigating design research landscapes
‣ canonical examples - exploratory journeys
‣ missing: explicit treatment of the means by which we navigate such journeys successfully
‣ little support for staking out research trajectories
Tension in research practices
‣ possible reason for missing support:
‣ focus on constituting elements of research
‣ traditional research practice:
‣ break apart circularity of question-answer relation
‣ design practice:
‣ holistic view on how problem-formulation and design-solution evolve
Design research = practice?
‣ research in design practice
‣ individual designer’s needs in a given situation
‣ design research practice
‣ questions related to research context and community
‣ different output
Design research = practice!
‣ resolution of conceptual circles through design
‣ understanding of traditional design circles
‣ what it is like to sit by means of designing chairs
‣ iterations to increase precision of design expression
in Summary
‣ interesting outcomes not by chance
‣ discourse focusses on academic standing
‣ valuable for developing theoretical side
‣ less valuable for supporting the practice of doing the research
in Summary
‣ articulating in what way design research practice
‣ is kind of research practice
‣ is kind of design practice
in Summary
‣ How to:
‣ iteratively and systematically increase the clarity of questions, answers and their relation
‣ refine the resolution of a conceptual circle that we propose
to be continued...
‣ relation of practice and research
‣ ongoing debate
DRS2014 - Design’s Big DebatesJune 16 - 19, 2014 in Umeå, Sweden
‣ General Chairs: ‣ prof. Johan Redström‣ prof. Erik Stolterman‣ prof. Anna Valtonen
‣ Conversations and Debates chairs:‣ Carl diSalvo‣ Jamer Hunt
‣ Papers chairs:‣ Youn-Kyung Lim‣ Kristina Niederer
‣ Deadline for full papers:
‣ 1st October 2013‣ www.drs2014.org
‣ also in Sweden in same period
‣ KEER 2014 conference
