How design professionals learn within collaborative research projects

Collaborative research projects are great opportunities for the involved design professionals to learn. Many design professionals join in such collaborations to contribute with their existing professional expertise, but also to further develop and extend that expertise. However, learning by individuals is usually not the main aim, and we lack...

Using Empathy-Centric Design in Industry: Reflections from the UX Researcher, the Client, and the Method Expert

Empathic design provides tools and frameworks supporting designers to understand users’ experiences with products or services. However, how does one hand over this empathic understanding of users to other internal stakeholders shaping the service experience? In this contribution, we reflect on a three-year implementation of an empathy-centric...

What makes design research more useful for design professionals?: An exploration of the research-practice gap

Academic design research has developed a rich collection of knowledge and tools, but often the results fail to land in design practice. We conducted an interview series with experienced design professionals to study how the knowledge that they derived from research projects was of use to them. They used tools, papers, books, and their own...

Making design research relevant for design practice: What is in the way?

Knowledge from academic design research projects does not always help design professionals to actually strengthen their work. Based on a multi-case study, this paper describes how researchers view the impact of their design research projects on design practice and what they do to achieve this. Even in projects where impact on design practice...

Towards Actionable Forms of Communicating and Sharing Design Knowledge

Design research aims to construct knowledge that is useful for designers and non-designers in the processes of designing for various types of challenges: from making products to solving complex<br/>social problems. Designers and non-designers seek information and inspiration for their work both in a non-design world, e.g., in films, illustrated...

MyFutures: Imagining speculative care and support futures in The Netherlands

In many Western societies, decisions about leaving home and spending your last years in a care home are often taken suddenly. Immediate health issues force family, friends and neighbours who offer informal support to ask for immediate formal support. Such urgent situations do not lead to the best solutions.

Structuring roles in Research through Design collaboration

In Research through Design knowledge is generated, but not always captured and shared effectively. When working in a multidisciplinary team of, e.g. designers, design researchers, academic researchers and domain practitioners confusion about<br/>roles, processes, and results easily occurs. In a series of three Research through Design cases we...

Meta-levels in design research: Resolving some confusions

Doing design and doing research are related activities. When doing design in a (PhD) research project, a number of confusions pop up. These confusions stem from the fact that most of the basic terms, such as ‘designer’, ‘research’, and ‘product’, have many connotations but not a shared definition. Because design research often happens in a multi...