Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
The new product in its lifecycle variously influences experiences, and as a result
expectations and aspirations of individuals. These transfer-, transformation-, and
de/re-contextualization-processes enable modification of the experiences, expecta-
tions and aspirations of the collective, eventually modifying social norms and
motives. Each change operates at a different time scale: formation of individual
experience happens faster than formation of collective expectations, which is faster
than formation of social norms.
9.7 Role of the Various Processes
In the above model, experience and its valuation play a major role. We argue that
the identities of the individual play a significant role in the processes applied in the
formation of the individual's experience, which, as conjectured before, has a major
influence on the construction of expectations and aspirations.
There are various kinds of identity that are held by, or impressed upon individ-
uals. Social sciences speak of five major social institutions: family, education,
religion, politics and economy (
http://sparkcharts.sparknotes.com/gensci/sociol
ogy/section9.php
)
. Each provides a collection of identities; as a result of its unique
history, expectations and aspirations, each such identity provides both opportunities
and barriers to experiencing reality and valuing such experiences. Since identity is
unique for each individual (even within the same family, and particularly since each
individual traverses a different trajectory of identities in her life), the same exposure
to reality could evoke a different experience and its valuation. Further, each identity
exposes one to different sets of experiences, expectations and aspirations, leading to
different possibilities of exposure to new experiences and their valuation. Impor-
tance of identity is well-documented in Indian philosophy (e.g.
http://www.iep.utm.
edu/hindu-ph/
)
, although its role in design has rarely been explored.
Among the processes, de/re-contextualization of experiences—the removal or
modification of context, and their transformation—modification of content play
significant roles. In both, analogical reasoning is important: only some aspects of an
experience are remembered, or only part of the context is taken into consideration.
For instance, an Austrian engineer took a walk in the forest, and experienced a
reality in which many cocklebur seeds stuck to his dog and his overcoat (
http://en.
wikipedia.org/wiki/Velcro
)
. The experience must have been at least partly unpleas-
ant, in terms of 'how badly' the seeds had stuck, and the difficulty experienced in
taking the seeds out of the hair of the dog and fabric of the coat. The engineer
seemed to de-emphasise this part of his experience, and instead became excited by
the fact that these seeds stuck 'so well'. In doing so, he de/re-contextualized the
experience, from one where cocklebur seeds got stuck 'badly' to 'well', and from
an experience of these natural seeds sticking to his overcoat or dog to a goal of
attaching something similar but artificial to specified materials. It therefore became
an aspiration for the individual, which eventually formed a requirement that led to
the invention of 'velcro'.
Search WWH ::
Custom Search