Generating visions: future workshops and metaphorical design
Design at work
Personas in action: ethnography in an interaction design team
Proceedings of the second Nordic conference on Human-computer interaction
From user to character: an investigation into user-descriptions in scenarios
DIS '02 Proceedings of the 4th conference on Designing interactive systems: processes, practices, methods, and techniques
Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
Proceedings of the 2003 conference on Designing for user experiences
Designing exploratory design games: a framework for participation in Participatory Design?
Proceedings of the ninth conference on Participatory design: Expanding boundaries in design - Volume 1
Make it so! Jean-Luc Picard, Bart Simpson and the design of e-public services
Proceedings of the ninth conference on Participatory design: Expanding boundaries in design - Volume 1
The use of theatre in requirements gathering and usability studies
Interacting with Computers
Pastiche scenarios: Fiction as a resource for user centred design
Interacting with Computers
Using dramaturgical methods to gain more dynamic user understanding in user-centered design
Proceedings of the 6th ACM SIGCHI conference on Creativity & cognition
DPPI '07 Proceedings of the 2007 conference on Designing pleasurable products and interfaces
Cognition, Technology and Work
Data-driven persona development
Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
CHI '08 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems
Personas: from theory to practices
Proceedings of the 5th Nordic conference on Human-computer interaction: building bridges
Representing older people: towards meaningful images of the user in design scenarios
Universal Access in the Information Society
Pursuing aesthetic inquiry in participatory design
Proceedings of the Tenth Anniversary Conference on Participatory Design 2008
Collaborative design as narrative
Proceedings of the Tenth Anniversary Conference on Participatory Design 2008
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In recent years, the discourse concerning the relationship between narrative theory - storytelling in general - interactivity, and design is undeniably noteworthy. A significant part of this discourse concerns the use of fictional characters in design. Fictional characters have been used as user representatives, either substituting actual users or supporting idea generation, and their foremost objective is to facilitate the identification of user needs and goals and to support the development of detailed and comprehensive scenarios. Motivated by the aforementioned ongoing discourse and inspired by relevant approaches in the use of fictional characters in design, we aim to investigate the applicability and effectiveness of their use as a creative technique in participatory design sessions. We present a novel approach to using fictional characters in collaborative design of educational software with students, one that asks the participants for the formation and use of their own fictional characters - we introduce the term ''design alter egos'' - as a means to eliciting requirements and design ideas. In order to evaluate our approach, we conducted 20 collaborative design sessions with the participation of 94 undergraduate university students (aged 19-24) for eliciting requirements for the design of an ideal course website. The analysis of the results suggests that the design alter egos technique liberated the majority of the students from the fear of straightforwardly exposing themselves, supported and enhanced their introspection, stimulated their creativity, and helped to establish an informal and constructive atmosphere throughout the design sessions. We suggest the use of design alter egos as an engaging and effective supportive technique for co-designing educational software with students.