Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has put wellbeing on the global agenda like never before. Many businesses, organizations, and even governments have recognized wellbeing as a formal policy goal. This paper addresses the question of how to design complex systems to improve the wellbeing of their stakeholders. We present a case of helping a university adopt a systematic approach to wellbeing assessment and improvement during the COVID-19 crisis. To support the improvement of student and staff wellbeing, we adopted a cybernetic perspective. Practically, this involved focusing on the design of a feedback loop that used wellbeing assessments to inform organizational actions. We argue that “off-the-shelf” assessments of wellbeing are often insufficient for supporting a systemic response to data because they lack context-sensitivity and actionability. While a “cybernetic perspective” may evoke a sense of the inhuman or mechanical in the optimization of wellbeing, our case study suggests otherwise. At least from our perspective, a society that aims to improve wellbeing may look more like a deliberative or dialogical democracy than an automated AI system.
Keywords
cybernetics, wellbeing, governance, pandemic, positive design
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2022.771
Citation
van der Maden, W., Lomas, J.D., and Hekkert, P. (2022) Design for wellbeing during Covid-19: A cybernetic perspective on data feedback loops in complex socIotechnical systems, in Lockton, D., Lenzi, S., Hekkert, P., Oak, A., Sádaba, J., Lloyd, P. (eds.), DRS2022: Bilbao, 25 June - 3 July, Bilbao, Spain. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2022.771
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Conference Track
Research Paper
Included in
Design for wellbeing during Covid-19: A cybernetic perspective on data feedback loops in complex socIotechnical systems
The COVID-19 pandemic has put wellbeing on the global agenda like never before. Many businesses, organizations, and even governments have recognized wellbeing as a formal policy goal. This paper addresses the question of how to design complex systems to improve the wellbeing of their stakeholders. We present a case of helping a university adopt a systematic approach to wellbeing assessment and improvement during the COVID-19 crisis. To support the improvement of student and staff wellbeing, we adopted a cybernetic perspective. Practically, this involved focusing on the design of a feedback loop that used wellbeing assessments to inform organizational actions. We argue that “off-the-shelf” assessments of wellbeing are often insufficient for supporting a systemic response to data because they lack context-sensitivity and actionability. While a “cybernetic perspective” may evoke a sense of the inhuman or mechanical in the optimization of wellbeing, our case study suggests otherwise. At least from our perspective, a society that aims to improve wellbeing may look more like a deliberative or dialogical democracy than an automated AI system.