when a prototype becomes part of the users’ transformed practice, or when researchers end up with a strong personal commitment to the users. This is good but also a challenge to the researchers in terms of planning. Additionally, in many cases, one may ask: Are we the right people to step in and work with these particular people and situations?

We can do only limited things; we have a technology-design focus; and sometimes other competencies are needed. Others in the community have also discussed problematic issues with technosolutionism, our at times arrogant perspective of believing we can solve very complex social problems just by introducing technology. How do we know when we have reached our own limits?

As publicly funded researchers, we have an obligation to think about what kinds of results we achieve and to spread knowledge to a wider audience.

If this cannot be done directly as generalization from particular cases, how else then can we disseminate the results?

We see a further challenge in the tension between doing particular research and the publish-or-perish mentality. This is mainly because projects take a long time and outcomes may be unclear beforehand. The research may need new methods and theories to first be invented, further adding to the complexity and uncertainty of one’s personal career.

Lastly, when we say the particular, people always mention Erik Stolterman’s work [ 3], where he focuses entirely on the difference between what is needed for design (the ultimate particular) and what is normally seen as needed for research (general findings, theories, etc.).

However, our agenda focuses on how to work with the particular in research, a topic that Stolterman does not address.

 

RECONSTRUCTION OF THE PARTICULAR IN HCI RESEARCH

To reconstruct the particular in HCI research, we take a humble stance. We prioritize the ordinary, favor richness and heterogeneity over generalization, seek sustained results across successive participation projects, and value triangulation on a broad spectrum of methods and approaches. T

The particular does not mean extraordinary groups of people. If very particular research is done, we argue that it tends to be either with someone like Stephen Hawking, who was quite privileged, or with extraordinary groups of people, because, as a community, we find it interesting to read those papers.

Our suggestion: There are so many particular people or cases that can be studied and many other instances of the particular that we could consider.

As researchers, we do not necessarily have to do research with an unusual group of people to report interesting findings.

Kvale’s method as an alternative approach to HCI research for the particular. In Kvale’s method for the qualitative research interview [ 4], understanding the interviewee’s world requires the interviewer to tap into the interviewee’s subjective account.

This is a mutual process between the interviewer and the interviewee, co-constructing a subjective account. The qualitative research interview does not see subjectivity as a hindrance or as a source of error, but rather as the very basis for the production of valid and valuable knowledge. Another process of generalization also takes place: Instead of eliminating the subjective, new interviewees are added until the point of saturation, when no significant new knowledge occurs.

Our suggestion: Kvale’s method can be used as a model for research for the particular in HCI, as a supplement to how research mostly manifests knowledge in the resulting technological arrangement and organizational change.

Generalizability is a bonus, not the main goal. Originally, Eric von Hippel’s notion of lead users focused on users who, on their own initiative, developed innovative processes or products for their own use. Somehow, this analytic research has been reframed into an innovation strategy that focuses on involving lead users in generalization, which is an entirely different agenda.

That being said, it is possible to
design for particular people and also
obtain generalizable results. For
instance, Gajos et al. [ 5] explored an
alternative to mass-market, one-size-
fits-all interfaces by automatically
generating custom interfaces that are
optimized according to every user’s
particular abilities and preferences.

Interestingly, they found that their approach also benefited able-bodied users in terms of speed and accuracy.

Similarly, many accessibility researchers apply their techniques to other situations in which people are situationally impaired (e.g., when reading a mobile device in sunlight).

Our suggestion: We should strive for the value in the particular, not for the potential generalizability of these techniques, results, methods, and theories. A reasonable goal could be to study the particular instead of deliberately aiming for more general results. We could change our research intentions by being more reserved in our striving for generalizable results.

Triangulation as a method for the particular. In-the-wild methods are one approach to research for the very particular. However, they don’t help researchers to attack one particular situation or design with as many different perspectives and methods as possible.

Our suggestion: When approaching research for the particular, we should use the broadest possible set of perspectives and methods. This changing of perspectives may also help us step out of an overcommitted mindset where we are too close to the particular group of people we are working with. Accordingly, triangulation of methods [ 6] is helpful when it comes to exploring and connecting several methods in a particular setting.

Participatory design. Historically, participatory design (PD) did not see itself as only working with particular people, yet it actually had a lot of similar goals and issues in mind and could be used in particular situations.

In our interpretation of Pape and Thoresen’s approach [ 7], cumulation means working specifically on one case, then shifting to the next, somewhat similar case, bringing along technological prototypes, research findings, and methods. Such an approach provides the researcher with an outstanding possibility to study and learn from situated practices and different appropriations of technology.

Successful rapport puts researchers in the position of a privileged insider, but can we dissolve these bonds and become an outsider again? Stepping