Year

2017

Deliverables

Research paper
Prototype

Expertise Area

Math, Data and Computing
User & Society

Design Research

In this project I did a study with a team that addresses the issue of people being left out of conversations or having problems joining the conversation. A device was created for this study. A device that regulates the conversation so that all participants approximately talk the same length of time and no one is left out. The purpose of the study is to explore this phenomenon, what they could possibly do to change this and the understanding of the impact of the enhanced dining experience on family members.

Two user-tests were done for testing the design and interviews were held afterwards to establish the impact of the design. The results of the user-tests showed that the participants liked dining with the prototype and the conversations were better balanced.

The project concluded that there are several factors influencing a physical conversation guidance system on table conversations between people who have a different share of conversation during dinner such as dinner time, turn-taking and conversation participants.

My reflection about the project

This project introduced and taught me the approach of research through design. By creating a prototype to generate more knowledge we were able to gain insight about our topic of the dynamic between people at the dinner table. The Course and project didn’t go without a hitch. It really challenged me to not only go through the study but also think about how to do research and why research was done in this particular manner. However this knowledge stuck with me for the rest of the Bachelor.