In empathic design and co-design, stakeholders play a crucial role in the design process. Mattelmäki, Vaajakallio, & Koskinen (2014) asserted that at first, cultural probes inspired empathic design. Through an interpretive exercise, empathic designers immerse themselves in understanding the user by interviewing people and learning about their emotions and needs before the design process. Then, designers followed a Co-design concept where the attention shifted from experience-driven user studies to focus on the social aspects of stakeholders. Mattelmäki, Vaajakallio, & Koskinen (2014) stated that “The practice and the mindset remained the same, but research was geared to finding ways to inspire and sensitize not only designers, but also other stakeholders” p. (76).
I believe involving the stakeholders in the design process is justifiable in order to design solutions that serve their needs and emotions but, what happens when the end-users do not have the knowledge or skill to participate in a design process, or when the end users have no foundation on which to formulate their opinions. How can empathic design help in this case? How can we design solutions for these end-users?
References
Mattelmäki, T., Vaajakallio, K., & Koskinen, I. (2014). What Happened to Empathic Design? Design Issues, 30(1), 67–77. https://doi-org.ezproxy.royalroads.ca/10.1162/DESI_a_00249
Attribution
January 16, 2020 at 12:54 pm
Hi Tala,
You posed some great questions in your blog post. Often times we forget that people don’t know what they don’t know.
I believe that this is where industry leaders, along with subject matter experts are important collaborators during the empathetic design process. Depending on the age and content, I think it is still possible to incorporate inexperienced learners into the design process. It might take more work to scaffold and design questions that can help instructional designers gain a better understanding of who their end users are. Sometimes not having the knowledge, skills, and understanding can also be a good indicator of where the gaps are and what steps need to be taken to fill it in. Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
Cheers,
Eunice