if past emotions can be recalled, they are fluid in form and tone. Language is another challenge in any discussion about emotions. Words have different connotative meanings, which may be exaggerated when two people speak for the first time, as is often the case between a researcher and a study participant. People may simply be uncomfortable speaking about emotions with strangers. Lastly, emotions are abstractions and cannot be easily observed, documented, and shared with a design team like photographs, video, and artifacts can.

Researching Affinities

Before we can address affinity as a design goal, we must first focus on uncovering people’s emotional connections from a research perspective. Despite the challenges of researching emotions, the good news is there are a number of specific techniques that can help. In general these techniques are discussion-based because of the cognitive, emotive, and social issues tied up in affinities. The traditional observational or ethnographic techniques researchers use are not applicable, because what is being researched is primarily internal and psychological. For the most part, these techniques are also open-ended, as direct questions imply a discussion trajectory, and participants need to define the terms of the exchange. Lastly, to be successful, these techniques depend on the researcher’s ability to build a rapport with the participants so that they will feel safe talking about their emotions.

There are four categories of
techniques useful for exploring
people’s emotional connections
to designs:

September + October 2010