Questionable concepts: critique as resource for designing with eighty somethings

  • Authors:
  • John Vines;Mark Blythe;Stephen Lindsay;Paul Dunphy;Andrew Monk;Patrick Olivier

  • Affiliations:
  • Northumbria University & Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom;Northumbria University, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom;Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom;Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom;University of York, York, United Kingdom;Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
  • Year:
  • 2012

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Abstract

This paper reports findings from a series of participatory design workshops with ten people over eighty years old. The focus of the workshops was new banking technologies for the older old. Participants were asked to discuss their current experiences of banking and given packs of concept cards which contained design sketches and brief outlines of concepts for new financial services. The designs on the cards were deliberately provocative and aimed to encourage criticism and debate. Participants wrote and drew on the cards and the workshops were recorded and transcribed. The participants were extremely critical of current banking practices and most of the new concepts we presented to them. Their questions and comments led to a number of insights and further iterations. The paper argues that critique is an essential resource for design, both in terms of identifying problems and iterating ideas.