Abstract
With increasing longevity and changes in population demographics; designers, engineers and architects are faced with the challenge of providing older adults with enabling technologies and home environments that facilitate physical activity and wellbeing. To promote acceptance and adoption, making these technologies more desirable and less stigmatizing is crucial. In this paper, we outline a craft-based co-design methodology that we developed working with groups of care home residents designing wearables for research. The research asks care home residents to wear activity-monitoring devices to provide insight into the ways they currently utilise their spaces and where improvements could be made. We propose that a craft-based approach allows designers to understand and uncover people’s capabilities and needs in a non-intrusive and empathic way. Our findings show that using this approach enabled creativity, confidence and connectedness amongst participants. We discuss our reflections and insights that have implications on the approach and future work.
Keywords
wearables; ageing; Craft; co-design
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2016.327
Citation
Lim, C., and Nevay, S. (2016) Crafted with Care: Reflections from co - designing wearable technologies with care home residents, in Lloyd, P. and Bohemia, E. (eds.), Future Focused Thinking - DRS International Conference 2016, 27 - 30 June, Brighton, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2016.327
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Crafted with Care: Reflections from co - designing wearable technologies with care home residents
With increasing longevity and changes in population demographics; designers, engineers and architects are faced with the challenge of providing older adults with enabling technologies and home environments that facilitate physical activity and wellbeing. To promote acceptance and adoption, making these technologies more desirable and less stigmatizing is crucial. In this paper, we outline a craft-based co-design methodology that we developed working with groups of care home residents designing wearables for research. The research asks care home residents to wear activity-monitoring devices to provide insight into the ways they currently utilise their spaces and where improvements could be made. We propose that a craft-based approach allows designers to understand and uncover people’s capabilities and needs in a non-intrusive and empathic way. Our findings show that using this approach enabled creativity, confidence and connectedness amongst participants. We discuss our reflections and insights that have implications on the approach and future work.