i+D - January/February 2019 - 31
By Brian J. Barth
Using the philosophy of design
thinking to build a better world
At Entro, a global design firm focused on wayfinding systems and
environmental graphics, research always has been a big part of the design
process. Past research methods often consisted of things like user group
surveys and stakeholder charrettes. But, recently, it's gotten a little more
high tech.
These days, visitors to Entro's Toronto headquarters might be treated to a
tour of the company's new research lab, run by Vedran Dzebic, who arrived
at the company in 2017, fresh from a PhD in cognitive neuroscience from
the University of Waterloo. Currently, Dzebic's lab amounts to little more
than a cubicle with a desk, but the experiments he runs are breaking new
ground in "design thinking," the philosophy of iterative invention behind
fields ranging from architecture and engineering to user experience (UX)
design in IT systems-and far beyond. If you're lucky, you'll arrive on a day
when Dzebic has one of his coworkers, aka guinea pigs, strapped into an
electroencephalography (EEG) headset, from which a dozen or so brainwave
sensors extend around the skull like some sort of robotic octopus. Those
sensors feed into software that produces a 3D visualization of the subject's
brain, which lights up in different areas depending on the cognitive and
emotional experience the individual has as Dzebic shows them images of
various design solutions.
"It's always interesting when somebody puts on the headset and you
show them their brainwave activity," notes Dzebic. "It's all these little
squiggly lines."
Reading those squiggly little lines is a means of finding out if a proposed
design solution succeeded in producing the desired effect. Dzebic says
simply asking someone whether a rendering makes them feel, say, confused
and anxious or alert and at ease, is not as reliable as reading their experience
through their brainwave activity. In the most simplistic sense, "alpha"
waves are produced when a person experiences their environment as clean
and uncluttered, producing a pleasant, relaxed sensation. In contrast, an
environment of great complexity and activity produces a preponderance
of "beta" waves, resulting in a higher degree of cognitive stimulation and
physiological arousal-sweating or an increased heart rate, for example.
One-dimensional feelings like pleasure and arousal are building blocks that
allow neuroscientists to decipher more complex emotional experiences,
according to Dzebic.
i+D - January/February 2019
31
i+D - January/February 2019
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of i+D - January/February 2019
Contents
i+D - January/February 2019 - Cover1
i+D - January/February 2019 - Cover2
i+D - January/February 2019 - 3
i+D - January/February 2019 - 4
i+D - January/February 2019 - 5
i+D - January/February 2019 - 6
i+D - January/February 2019 - 7
i+D - January/February 2019 - 8
i+D - January/February 2019 - 9
i+D - January/February 2019 - Contents
i+D - January/February 2019 - 11
i+D - January/February 2019 - 12
i+D - January/February 2019 - 13
i+D - January/February 2019 - 14
i+D - January/February 2019 - 15
i+D - January/February 2019 - 16
i+D - January/February 2019 - 17
i+D - January/February 2019 - 18
i+D - January/February 2019 - 19
i+D - January/February 2019 - 20
i+D - January/February 2019 - 21
i+D - January/February 2019 - 22
i+D - January/February 2019 - 23
i+D - January/February 2019 - 24
i+D - January/February 2019 - 25
i+D - January/February 2019 - 26
i+D - January/February 2019 - 27
i+D - January/February 2019 - 28
i+D - January/February 2019 - 29
i+D - January/February 2019 - 30
i+D - January/February 2019 - 31
i+D - January/February 2019 - 32
i+D - January/February 2019 - 33
i+D - January/February 2019 - 34
i+D - January/February 2019 - 35
i+D - January/February 2019 - 36
i+D - January/February 2019 - 37
i+D - January/February 2019 - 38
i+D - January/February 2019 - 39
i+D - January/February 2019 - 40
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i+D - January/February 2019 - 43
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i+D - January/February 2019 - 45
i+D - January/February 2019 - 46
i+D - January/February 2019 - 47
i+D - January/February 2019 - 48
i+D - January/February 2019 - 49
i+D - January/February 2019 - 50
i+D - January/February 2019 - Cover3
i+D - January/February 2019 - Cover4
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