Gimme Shelter: Implications of the Simple and the Humble in a Cardboard Fort in Context

A small cardboard ‘fort’—four low walls and a roof—was used by a team of design students to investigate the relationship between technology, purpose, and meaning. Placed in a busy hallway in a University setting, the simple structure was intended to provide a space for users to respond to a written prompt. It was the structure itself, however, that elicited the strongest reactions, revealing a longing for childhood and a desire to be sheltered from the complexities of their everyday experience. This paper attempts to make connections between such responses to notions of physical simplicity, humbleness, and self-imposed isolation

Performing Pregnancy: Young Moms-to-Be and the Public Performance of Self-Esteem and Support

This paper describes the current development of an interactive community health education piece that targets young, pregnant women using an interactive wall. Foregrounding the pregnant form of the women, and working within the constraints of conventional media, we attempt to reverse the stigma associated with pregnancy in the lower end of the age range through positive and playful messages that give voice to the child-to-be and enlist the help and support of others

Team Directed, Project Based Education: A Case Study of an Entrepreneurial, Trans-Disciplinary, Design Studio Abroad

This is a report from the trenches. This article offers a critique of a pilot project undertaken by Art Center College of Design, in Pasadena, California. In the summer of 2005, I (along with 1 other Art Center instructor) accompanied 14 Art Center students to participate in a unique, trans-disciplinary, design and project based “start-up” studio in Copenhagen, Denmark. The 14 design students came from various fields (the trans-disciplinary part), who were challenged to produce a professional project (the design and project based part), with no pre-existing working structure (the start-up studio part). How did this project work? What was its outcome? How did its structure emerge? How did we deal with decision-making, establish common goals, insure progress, and satisfy our client, our school, our students, and ourselves as instructors? And what lessons were learned? This is our story, told in 3 parts, with 15 key points for those attempting similar projects

Re-thinking recruitment for community-based research using service design methods: CLIC*: Communicating Life in Our Community/Communicando la vida en nuestra comunidad

poster abstractIn summer 2011 the IU School of Medicine along with faculty from the Herron School of Art and Design embarked upon a study to learn more about the lives of Latino Adolescents and how to better engage them in research. While Communicating Life in Our Community / Communicando la vida en nuestra comunidad (CLIC) was developed to assist with research project recruitment in the Near West Side, the methods used in the study also point to a way to start a bi-directional, mutually beneficial dialogue between residents of Indianapolis and the School of Medicine. In effect, the CLIC study methods extended the scope of the project and built on its potential to extend to overall community development. Using methodology from design research, participants told the story of their daily lives with photography, video, blogs, and drawings. Through such activities, community participants in CLIC and researchers together started to develop an infrastructure for ongoing, bi-directional and mutually beneficial engagement

Fun with Facebook: The Impact of Focus Groups on the Development of Awareness Campaigns for Adolescent Health

This project presents a model for developing effective communication by directly engaging designers with their adolescent audience. By conducting focus groups with local youth, we wanted to learn about 1) attitudes and prior knowledge about the areas identified in Indiana's Adolescent Health Plan, and 2) consumption of media (how they consume popular culture and current events) and preferences in programming (what they consume—favorite shows, videos, music, etc.). An additional aspect of this project was the capacity of the design team to interpret and utilize focus group data. A related poster presentation is available from: http://hdl.handle.net/1805/459

Street Vending and Design Thinking: A Provocation

The spontaneity of make/do culture of street vendors in Bangkok is an example of the practice of integrative thinking and contextual praxis that predates and parallels the postmodern integrative and contextual advocacies of Design Thinking. It is materialized as resourcefulness and flexibility in the eclectic creation of vending stalls whether mobile or otherwise, and also as the improvisational intervention of street vendors in public space. It taps into the indigenous cultural condition of Buddhism of ‘an aware mind’ which according to Julia Cameron is the state of creativity. Contemporary designers can learn from the practices of the street vendors in Thailand. As such, Thai street vending reveals a link between Thai culture and Buddhism, and Design Thinking

Listening to Patients and Talking to Doctors: A Case for Design in Medicine, & A Call to Action

This paper describes how design can work at a fundamental level to improve health in the United States. It argues for a design application that levels the playing field between the doctor and the patient in a way that re-establishes the person as the center of medical advancement. It uses the inclusion of a design research oriented Patient Engagement Core within a current study at the Indiana University School of Medicine as a way to demonstrate the relevance of design to health research. We touch upon the research environment established by the National Institutes of Health as a driver for the relevance of design in medicine, and finally, we suggest that designers use their visual communication and design research skills within health research to increase its relevancy to patients and the population, and ‘make the science stick’ through better understanding of patient perspectives. We assert that by entering discourse in health at this foundational stage we contribute to a new understanding of what health is, who might contribute to its improvement, who determines the relevancy of research, and how such research is used

The impact of design on research teams in health services: A case study of the significance of the design artifact for interdisciplinary research and the generation of theoretical and applied lines of inquiry

The development of patient communication tools in health services research often requires the skills of a designer who will give the tool its final, usable form. However, research teams frequently overlook the demands of implementation and focus instead on the delivery of content to the patient. In the study considered here, shared decision making in cancer treatment research was initiated by an interdisciplinary team without the participation of a designer. Once a designer began working on the team, the benefits she brought to the production of the designed artifact were evident. Design improved the team’s effectiveness through better communication, and allowed for further studies based on application and theory. Researchers responded positively to design and saw the potential for its application to a range of health research

FUN WITH FACEBOOK: THE IMPACT OF FOCUS GROUPS ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF AWARENESS CAMPAIGNS FOR ADOLESCENT HEALTH

poster abstractAbstract Efforts at improving adolescent health through mass communication are frequently undertaken by corporate design firms using traditional design development methods. While such methods may create work that is aesthetically significant, their effect on their intended audience is often overlooked in the process. Left unaddressed are youth media consumption, existing knowledge of health issues, and youth social patterns. By conducting focus groups with local youth, we wanted to learn about 1) attitudes and prior knowledge about the areas identified in Indiana’s Adolescent Health Plan, and 2) consumption of media and preferences in programming Results Knowledge of adolescent health issues Designers learned first-hand youth attitudes toward adolescent health issues and relied on their findings to develop storylines, dialog, and casting decisions. Media consumption While television remains the most popular method of media consumption, social networking sites play a large role in determining what media youth consume. The connection to peers and information sharing enabled by Facebook presented the most potential for effective media development. Design deliverables These data resulted in development of public service announcements (PSAs) and a health survival booklet. PSAs resembled instant communication or ‘chats’ on Facebook and addressed topics of obesity, stress, vehicular safety, and substance abuse. The PSAs provide a familiar visual reference for youth while leveraging its social networking function for emotional impact. The booklets balance practical information with content intended to entertain as well as inform the reader