What I've learned - Theme 5. Design research

Design research is to me an existing area of research. Someone asked at the lecture “is this really research?” and I think that comment was based on how exciting and inspiring research can be compared to how boring some other research might seem. Sometimes I even think that articles strive for being boring and through that be regarded as more reliable. During this course we have up until now only been reading really theoretical and not so practical research articles. I always find it more inspiring research in its physical format and I think that is why I enjoyed this theme so much.

After this week, I see the positive aspects of using prototypes and models in research projects. I believe that the contact between the research subject and tester will be more realistic if the research subject is something physical and the testers would be able to interact with the subject instead of just responding to theoretical question about it.

I came to think about something else during this week. And that is that not only does the research projects use design as inspiration and as additional functions to a subject. Recently, the trend of info-graphics has spread all around the web. Info-graphics is research results presented in easy interpretative graphics. 

Of course, since everyone can create info-graphics they are not as reliable as articles found in the research journals. At the same time, researchers applies for money in founding their research and if the research would get renowned, the money seeking process would probably be easier for the researcher. So maybe it should not only be the “design research” area that takes inspiration and use design in the research process; maybe all research processes should get inspired by design. With that I mean not only during the research process but also in the final state in presenting the result, making it more available to people (and especially to the people not having the time or the habit of reading expensive journals).

Anyway, now I’m getting a bit out of context for what this text is about – what I’ve learned this week.

I looked up the “Design Research” on the course web and there it says that Design Research has “the explicit intention of improving the functional performance of the artifact”. There are also different flowcharts on how Design Research works and how the use of prototypes and iteration fits in the mix. And this is of course important and smart. I learn the best when I get examples of what it actually means. For me the article about how to use design to change robots behavior, such as Pleo the dino was a great example of what changing the functional performance through design means. When on youtube, checking Pleo out I decided to find other cool and inspiring research projects where the change of design has encourage a change of behavior in the surroundings. 

I found "Rolighetsteorin". They use technology and design to inspire and change the behavior in their surroundings. 

If you want to check out a nice examples, this is a piano staircase, making people choosing the stairs instead of the escalator.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lXh2n0aPyw