Abstract
Representation tools in More-Than-Human Design (MTHD) are growing rapidly as researchers increasingly seek to include nonhuman perspectives in design. However, guidance for selecting, designing, and evaluating such tools is limited, leaving designers to navigate trade-offs in user-friendliness, empathy, and resources without a shared structure. While recent work has attempted to address this by introducing parameters for MTHD representation tools, their relevance and usefulness remain unexamined. We explore how these parameters resonate in practice through workshops with 12 MTHD researchers, demonstrating that the parameters serve as decision supports during design and use, as lenses for reflection, and as a shared vocabulary for communication. We discuss how participants treated them not as checklists but as flexible frames of reference that help articulate intentions and reflect on design practices. We also discuss a tension between ambiguity, which enables plurality, and structure, to help accumulate knowledge and advance the field.
Keywords
more-than-human design, representation, design tools, nonhuman
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.1928
Citation
Demir, B., and Coskun, A. (2026) Towards a common language for representation tools in more-than-human design, in Simeone, L., Gray, C. M., Verhoeven, A., de Götzen, A., Bakırlıoğlu, Y., Zohar, H., Stead, M., and Buwert, P. (eds.), DRS2026: Edinburgh, 8–12 June, Edinburgh, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.1928
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Included in
Towards a common language for representation tools in more-than-human design
Representation tools in More-Than-Human Design (MTHD) are growing rapidly as researchers increasingly seek to include nonhuman perspectives in design. However, guidance for selecting, designing, and evaluating such tools is limited, leaving designers to navigate trade-offs in user-friendliness, empathy, and resources without a shared structure. While recent work has attempted to address this by introducing parameters for MTHD representation tools, their relevance and usefulness remain unexamined. We explore how these parameters resonate in practice through workshops with 12 MTHD researchers, demonstrating that the parameters serve as decision supports during design and use, as lenses for reflection, and as a shared vocabulary for communication. We discuss how participants treated them not as checklists but as flexible frames of reference that help articulate intentions and reflect on design practices. We also discuss a tension between ambiguity, which enables plurality, and structure, to help accumulate knowledge and advance the field.