Generative
Design Research
Situated Maketools

Cultural Probes

Design + Emotion Design Probes

Generative
Tools

Visualization and Storytelling

Design Documentaries

User-Centered Design

Expert Mindset “users” seen as subjects (reactive informers)

Designing with Video

Design Games

Participatory Design

Contexual Inquiry

Usability Testing

Lead-User
Innovation
Mobile Diaries

“Scandinavian” Methods

Participatory
Mindset
“users” seen
as partners
(active co-creators)

Human Factors + Ergonomics

Applied
Ethnography

Research-Led

• Figure 5. Map of Design Research−New Tools and Methods

sentation called: “Methods or Mind-set? Issues of concern in designing for a global world and with the goal to improve lives.”)

Anne has changed the map by relabeling some of the areas (e.g., participatory design becomes people centered innovation) and by changing the size and manipulating the areas of overlap between some of the bubbles. She also chooses to leave certain bubbles off the map (e.g., generative design research) [ 10].

Loose Ends

An unresolved issue is what to do with the explosion of interest in co-creation from a marketing perspective. This view appears to be focused primarily on digital forms of co-creation that takes advantage of the social networks in harnessing enormous amounts of input at a low cost. Marketing-driven approaches to co-creation are generally not being practiced from a participatory mind-set as is evidenced by their (over) use of the phrase “customer co-creation.” If people were truly valued as co-creators, they would likely be seen and referred to as “partners” or “co-creators,” not “customers.” It is as though the co-creative marketers are not on the map, but are seeing/sensing the landscape and figuring out how to take advantage of the activity for their own gain. It is interesting to see how this will turn out.

[ 14] Jonsdatter, G. and J. Gregory. “Innovation play: Visualization and storytelling for engaging participation in design.” Workshop presented at Participatory Design Conference, Trento, Italy, August 2006.

How Is the Map Evolving?

The map of design research methods can be used as a framework for organizing design research tools and methods and also as a net for capturing and revealing ideas about possible futures. It is clear that the current growth in design research is on the design-led (versus the research-led) side of things. We can expect to see more definition on this side of the map in the near future as we look to the arts and design for inspiration. Some of the new tools and methods for design research are listed below. It is interesting to note that most of them are from the European design research community. (See Figure 5.)

• design games [ 11]

• design probes [ 12]

• design documentaries [ 13]

• visualization and storytelling [ 14]

• playful triggers [ 15]

• designing with video [ 16]

• Mobile Diaries [17]

• Situated Make Tools [ 18]

[ 15] Loi, D. “Reflective probes, primitive probes and playful triggers.” Working paper, EPIC07: Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference, Keystone, Colo., October 2007.

[ 16] Ylirisku, S. and J. Buur. Designing with Video: Focusing the User-centered Design Process. London: Springer, 2007.

Thanks to Carolina Gill (assistant professor in design at OSU) for the title of this article.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Liz Sanders is the founder of Make Tools, a company that explores new places on the emerging design research landscape. She is a visionary in applied design research, having introduced many of the tools,

techniques, and methods being used today to inform or inspire design from a human-centered perspective. Liz has practiced across all the design disciplines. Her current focus is on bringing participatory, human-centered design thinking to the experience of future services and spaces.

[17] Hagen, P. and D. Underwood. “Understanding motivation and enabling action towards change.” Working paper, Pervasive 2008, Sydney, Australia, May 2008.

[ 18] Vaajakallio, K. and T. Mattelmaki. “Collaborative design exploration: Envisioning future practices with make tools.” In the Proceedings of the 2007 Conference on Designing Pleasurable Products and Interfaces, 223-238, Ne w York: ACM Press, 2007.

November + December 2008

DOI: 10.1145/1409040.1409043
© 2008 ACM 1072-5220/08/1100 $5.00