Solutions or Interventions ?

In week 3 of the Contemporary Design Culture module things were run a little differently. We were greeted by a guest speaker, Kellie Morrisey, a graduate of psychology who went on to study design for her PhD. Kellie was able to give us a psychological view on design and this was very beneficial to us as we would have never experienced design from this point of view before.

To start we had a mini debate by looking at “Marys Bedroom”. It prompted a lot of questions whether the fact did Mary learn something new about the apple? , or is it her first time seeing the colour red? Personally, I believe this whole dilemma creates an understanding that cannot be scientifically proven. We can’t imagine what it is like to be in somebody else’s mind and body. Its like posing the question what’s it like to be a bat? We don’t know

The solution to certain problems may not always be visible or maybe these problems have few solutions. Kellie portrayed various ways of finding these solutions that may be hidden behind certain boundaries. For example, take dementia, it is a condition that results in the loss of mental capability that can result in interaction with a person’s daily activities and actions. The first thing that pops to my mind in trying to reduce the risk of dementia or trying to cure it would be looking at a possible remedy or another area in the medical sector. Would I be taking the wrong pathway here though? Should I dig deeper into the persons personality and use something from there that might trigger the persons memory and bring some happiness back to their life? A video of a man who suffered from dementia was shown to us by Kellie and what was used to help regain some bit of memory was music. This man loved music all his life and after a certain song was played the man was able to retrace his memory and sing along. He became a new man when the headphones were removed. At the start he didn’t show much sign of awareness but once he listened to the music he was a rejuvenated man. This shows that maybe in some cases you shouldn’t look for a direct solution to the problem maybe find something that’ll help the problem in an effective manner.

For the second half of the class we split up into groups. Different scenarios were assigned to each group and we had to give our own individual perception of these scenarios and use them to role-play a situation from theses scenarios. Our group was given the task of using the dating app, Tinder. We decided to focus on one of our group members experience for this task. We decided to select Emily and sketch her experience of using the app. We as a group portrayed her thoughts and perceptions on using the app.

This class portrayed a different outlook on finding ways to solve a problem in design or looking at dilemmas and trying to put yourself within them. It was a unique experience and one I found very helpful in going forward as a designer.