Cultural probes method in design research: creativity in sketches
Abstract
Despite the abundance of methods and models, the design research is still often entangled in concepts irrelevant to design practice. This paper rethinks the discourse of design research and the evolving role of a designer. The most important attempts to build a design as an academic discipline are mentioned, along with research communities that are operating in the field of design. Art-and-design-based approach in design research in Donald Schön’s works on architecture and design practice, rises the importance of sketches in the creative idea generation. Implementing sketching techniques into the cultural probes, as one of an art-and-design-based research method, opens up ways to innovative design solutions. This paper discusses the relationship between the method and sketching in the context of the case study “When Nobody Sees”. Sketching is discussed as an art-based tool for problem-setting.
Keyword : art-and-design-based approach, creativity in sketches, cultural probes, design research development, research through design
How to Cite
Černevičiūtė, J., & Liebutė, L. (2022). Cultural probes method in design research: creativity in sketches. Creativity Studies, 15(1), 169–181. https://doi.org/10.3846/cs.2022.15473
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
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Zimmerman, J., Forlizzi, J., & Evenson, Sh. (2007, 28 April–3 May). Research through design as a method for interaction design research in HCI. In CHI ‘07: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 493–502). San Jose, California, United States. Association for Computing Machinery. https://doi.org/10.1145/1240624.1240704
Alighieri, D. (2003). The Divine Comedy: The Inferno, The Purgatorio, and the Paradiso. Penguin Books Ltd.
Bereiter, C. (2002). Design research for sustained innovation. Cognitive Studies, 9(3), 321–327.
Boehner, K., Gaver, W., & Boucher, A. (2014). Probes. In C. Lury & N. Wakeford (Eds.), Culture, economy and the social. Inventive methods: The happening of the social. T. Bennett, P. Harvey, & K. Hetherington (Series Eds.) (pp. 185–201). Routledge.
Bonsiepe, G. (2007). The uneasy relationship between design and design research. In R. Michel (Ed.), Design research now: Essays and selected projects (pp. 25–39). Birkhäuser Verlag AG. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-7643-8472-2_2
Boucher, A., Brown, D., Gaver, B., Matsuda, N., Ovalle, L., Sheen, A., & Vanis, M. (2019). Probe tools: Unconventional cameras and audio devices for user research. Interactions, 26(2), 26–35. https://doi.org/10.1145/3305358
Branzi, A. (1988). Learning from Milan: Design and the second modernity. The MIT Press.
Celikoglu, O. M., Ogut, S. T., & Krippendorff, K. (2017). How do user stories inspire design? A study of cultural probes, Design Issues, 33(2), 84–98. https://doi.org/10.1162/DESI_a_00441
Cross, N. (2006). Designerly ways of knowing. Springer.
Cross, N. (2001). Designerly ways of knowing: Design discipline versus design science. Design Issues, 17(3), 49–55. https://doi.org/10.1162/074793601750357196
Debord, G. (2011). Society of the spectacle. Bread and Circuses Publishing.
Dewey, J. (1925). Experience and nature. Open Court Publishing Company.
Frayling, Ch. (1993–1994). Research in art and design. Royal College of Art Research Papers, 1(1). https://researchonline.rca.ac.uk/384/3/frayling_research_in_art_and_design_1993.pdf
Gall Krogh, P., & Koskinen, I. (2020). Design research foundations. Drifting by intention: Four epistemic traditions from within constructive design research. I. Koskinen & P. E. Vermaas (Series Eds.). Springer Nature Switzerland AG. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-37896-7
Gaver, W. W., Boucher, A., Pennington, S., & Walker, B. (2004). Cultural probes and the value of uncertainty. Interactions, 11(5), 53–56. https://doi.org/10.1145/1015530.1015555
Gaver, B., Dunne, T., & Pacenti, E. (1999). Design: Cultural probes. Interactions, 6(1), 21–29. https://doi.org/10.1145/291224.291235
Herriott, R. (2019, 2–5 September). What kind of research is research through design? In Proceedings of International Association of Societies of Design Research (IASDR) Conference 2019, Design Revolutions. Manchester, England, United Kingdom. https://iasdr2019.org/uploads/files/Proceedings/op-f-1078-Her-R.pdf
Júdice, A., & Júdice, M. (2007). Designing cultural probes to study “Invisible” communities in Brazil. In Design Inquiries.
Kafka, F. (2010). The metamorphosis. Tribeca Books.
Kärnä-Behm, J. (2016). Promoting design probes in interior design and in the user-centred analysis of a space in the context of Finnish Higher Education. Art, Design and Communication in Higher Education, 15(2), 175–189. https://doi.org/10.1386/adch.15.2.175_1
Koskinen, I., Zimmerman, J., Binder, Th., Redström, J., & Wensveen, S. (2011). Design research through practice: From the lab, field, and showroom. Elsevier Inc. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-385502-2.00004-3
Levy, J. (1995). Surrealism. Da Capo Press.
Liebutė, L. (2021). Kultūrinio zondavimo metodas kaip dalyvaujamojo dizaino priemonė kuriant komunikaciją panikos priepuolių tema [Master’s Thesis, Vilnius Academy of Arts]. Vilnius, Lithuania. https://vb.vda.lt/object/elaba:95107906/ATTACHMENT_95139669
Margolin, V. (1989). Introduction. In V. Margolin (Ed.), Design studies. Design discourse: History, theory, criticism (pp. 3–29). The University of Chicago Press.
Molotch, H. (2003). Where stuff comes from: How toasters, toilets, cars, computers, and many other things come to be as they are. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203011638
Murphy, P. (2017). Design research: Aesthetic epistemology and explanatory knowledge. She Ji: The Journal of Design, Economics, and Innovation, 3(2), 117–132. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sheji.2017.09.002
Mutlu, B., & Er, A. (2003, 28–30 April). Design innovation: Historical and theoretical perspectives on product innovation by design. In Proceedings of the 5th European Academy of Design Conference. Barcelona, Spain. http://www.ub.edu/5ead/PDF/1/MutluEr.pdf
Nielsen, L. (2004). Engaging personas and narrative scenarios – a study on how user-centered approach influenced the perception of the design process in the e-business group at AstraZeneca [Doctoral/PhD Thesis, Copenhagen Business School]. Copenhagen, Denmark. https://1library.net/document/yn9ew3kq-engaging-personas-and-narrative-scenarios.html
Niimi Longhurst, E. (2018). Japonizmas: menas džiaugtis gyvenimu. Vaga.
Pruitt, J., & Grudin, J. (2003, 6–7 June). Personas: Practice and theory. In DUX ‘03: Proceedings of the 2003 Conference on Designing for User Experiences (pp. 1–15). San Francisco, California, United States. Association for Computing Machinery. https://doi.org/10.1145/997078.997089
Schön, D. A. (1984). The reflective practitioner: How professionals think in action. Basic Books.
Seymour, J. (2011). Design situations: Interview with Jerszy Seymour. In J. Huber, B. Meltzer, H. Munder, & T. von Oppeln (Eds.), It’s not a garden table: Art and design in the expanded field (pp. 212–214). JRP/Ringier.
Shakespeare, W. (2012). The New Folger library Shakespeare. The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. B. A. Mowat & P. Werstine (Eds.). Simon & Schuster Paperbacks.
Tovey, M., Porter, S., & Newman, R. (2003). Sketching, concept development and automotive design. Design Studies, 24(2), 135–153. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0142-694X(02)00035-2
Verbeke, J. (2013, 22–23 May). Knowing (by) designing. In Proceedings of the Conference Knowing (by) Designing (pp. 18–20). LUCA, Sint-Lucas School of Architecture Ghent/Brussels. Brussels, Belgium.
Verganti, R. (2009). Design-driven innovation: Changing the rules of competition by radically innovating what things mean. Harvard University Press.
Zimmerman, J., Forlizzi, J., & Evenson, Sh. (2007, 28 April–3 May). Research through design as a method for interaction design research in HCI. In CHI ‘07: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 493–502). San Jose, California, United States. Association for Computing Machinery. https://doi.org/10.1145/1240624.1240704