Session 8: Participatory Approach of Design -> Theory vs Reality

Participatory Design: This is an approach used to design technological and organizational systems incorporating end user as a member of design team. By involving end user as active participants in the design process makes design effective within the context of usability.

Alan Dix (2004) suggest three specific characteristics of the participatory design. [1] This makes the design work oriented instead of system oriented as it tries to improve work environment. [2] This is based on the collaboration of design team and end user as a designer. [3] This is an iterative approach, which makes it flexible.

This design proscess uses different methods for effective communication between designer team and users. (Alan Dix, 2004). few of them are

1. Brainstorming Sessions
2. Story Boarding
3. Workshops
4. Pencil and paper exercises and so on.

Analysis of PD in reality: While writing this blog i come across very good websites which are very good examples of PD. few of them are as follows:

• Conversations That Work http://www.conversationsthatwork.net/
• Information & Design http://www.infodesign.com.au/usability/participatorydesign.html
• Interface Hall of Shame by Isys Information Architects Inc. http://www.iarchitect.com/mshame.htm

While browsing through these, i come across few examples of bad designs from real world. Let us have a look on few of them (Taken from http://www.baddesigns.com/index.shtml)

Example-1

Men's room sign This sign is on a men's room door at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. I was going to go in, but it seemed that maybe this restroom was for handicapped men only. Just to be sure I watched some guys walk up to the door, look at the sign and then walk away, presumably to go down stairs to the IMAX lobby, like the sign says. Other guys went on in, so I did too. It was a perfectly normal men's room. I don't really know what I was expecting!

Design suggestion: The words Men and handicapped need to be separated on the sign. By putting them next to each other and giving them about the same amount of salience, one is misled into thinking that the room is only for handicapped men.

Example-2

This is my cell phone. In addition to using it as a phone, I use it to see the time of day. The cell phone has the time on the display, so all I have to do it pull it out of my pocket and look at the display (See photo C.) Like many other people who carry a cell phone, I don't wear a wrist watch anymore.
The cell phone has a keypad lock feature which keeps buttons from accidentally being pressed and making "pocket" calls, while the phone is in my pocket. When the phone is not in direct light and you want to see what time it is, you can not easily read the display without the display light on (See photo A). If you press any button, the display will light up (See photo B.) Unfortunately, this also brings up a message instructing you how to unlock the phone, which covers up the time. You have to wait for two seconds until the message disappears and reveals the time (See photo C.) Two seconds doesn't seem like much time to wait, but it is annoying because it happens frequently.

Design suggestion

One solution would be to make the message smaller so it doesn't cover up the time (See photo D.) This could be done by having the message only describe how to unlock the phone, since that is what the person needs to know to use it. For me, and probably many others, seeing the time immediately is important, since this is our primary way of telling time.

Excellent videos on participatory approach:

References:
1. http://www.baddesigns.com/index.shtml
2. Dix Alan, Finlay Janet, Human Computer Interaction, second edition.
3. http://www.youtube.com