Presentation
Not A Concept: the use of archetypes as a framework for designing and researching potential use cases
SessionDigital Design
Event Type
Oral Presentations
TimeThursday, June 9th4:00pm - 4:30pm EDT
Location
DescriptionEarly concept exploration can often lack focus, make sweeping assumptions or over define an interaction to the point that gaining useful feedback from users is not possible. In order to avoid this a proposed use-case, as a hypothesis for a how to create a better user experience, should be created, prototyped and researched prior to concept exploration. It’s akin to designing the racing stripe on a sports car only to find out that the user really needs a minivan.
In this talk we look at the challenges of early user research and design when stimuli is overly prescriptive and creates biases well before the desired use case has been defined. Identifying a desired use-case prior to concept development through the use of Archetypes brings benefits to projects, stakeholders and ultimately the project and users. Archetypes enable designers to develop constructs for use cases and the stimuli to assess them by setting the right expectations and constraints for the stimuli.
In this talk we will provide definition, characteristics and share working examples of archetypes from our own experience and highlight the benefits and value of clearly identifying the desired use case as an input to concept development. We will cover the practical application in research and the importance of team and process alignment to create the right context and mindset for facilitating research using archetypes. We will also discuss how they provide researchers the space for qualitative discussion and co-creation to give users the construct of simulated use early in development.
In this talk we look at the challenges of early user research and design when stimuli is overly prescriptive and creates biases well before the desired use case has been defined. Identifying a desired use-case prior to concept development through the use of Archetypes brings benefits to projects, stakeholders and ultimately the project and users. Archetypes enable designers to develop constructs for use cases and the stimuli to assess them by setting the right expectations and constraints for the stimuli.
In this talk we will provide definition, characteristics and share working examples of archetypes from our own experience and highlight the benefits and value of clearly identifying the desired use case as an input to concept development. We will cover the practical application in research and the importance of team and process alignment to create the right context and mindset for facilitating research using archetypes. We will also discuss how they provide researchers the space for qualitative discussion and co-creation to give users the construct of simulated use early in development.
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