Embracing First-Person Perspectives in Soma-Based Design

Abstract

A set of prominent designers embarked on a research journey to explore aesthetics in movement-based design. Here we unpack one of the design sensitivities unique to our practice: a strong first person perspective-where the movements, somatics and aesthetic sensibilities of the designer, design researcher and user are at the forefront. We present an annotated portfolio of design exemplars and a brief introduction to some of the design methods and theory we use, together substantiating and explaining the first-person perspective. At the same time, we show how this felt dimension, despite its subjective nature, is what provides rigor and structure to our design research. Our aim is to assist researchers in soma-based design and designers wanting to consider the multiple facets when designing for the aesthetics of movement. The applications span a large field of designs, including slow introspective, contemplative interactions, arts, dance, health applications, games, work applications and many others.

Documenting the Elusive and Ephemeral in Embodied Design Ideation Activities

“…It emphasizes the subjective bodily experience of the designer-researcher as the primary focus for interaction and contemplation [44] and as a design tool. The designer-researcher engages with their own body, movement, and "felt emotional experience and sense of aesthetics" [24], letting the EDI feed off their own bodily understanding and experience [24], which is used as a design material [6] and to create and furthering explore potential design ideas [65]. When shared among a designers-researchers' team, this can improve a shared understanding and construction of meaning [24], key to facilitate collaboration and communication.…”

“…The designer-researcher engages with their own body, movement, and "felt emotional experience and sense of aesthetics" [24], letting the EDI feed off their own bodily understanding and experience [24], which is used as a design material [6] and to create and furthering explore potential design ideas [65]. When shared among a designers-researchers' team, this can improve a shared understanding and construction of meaning [24], key to facilitate collaboration and communication. Somatic-oriented HCI designer-researchers (e.g., [5,8,24,45,53,55,65,66]) argued that addressing the felt experience in our research-design can lead to achieving more fulfilling somaesthetic experiences [45].…”

“…When shared among a designers-researchers' team, this can improve a shared understanding and construction of meaning [24], key to facilitate collaboration and communication. Somatic-oriented HCI designer-researchers (e.g., [5,8,24,45,53,55,65,66]) argued that addressing the felt experience in our research-design can lead to achieving more fulfilling somaesthetic experiences [45].…”

“…However, it is widely acknowledged [5,30,45,65,66] that this first-person perspective is usually elusive: it is often tacitly experienced [5]; it is challenging to refer to, and relive; and it eludes language articulations (particularly for people with little or no somatic training [24]). Thus, to effectively transfer, make sense of, and share these first person practices and experiential aspects of them, they need to captured, grounded, and articulated in a systematic manner similar to traditionally done in scientific research, which can be challenging for those without a scientific background [5].…”

“…The three documentation forms represent action from complementing perspectives: the Bodystorming Braid and the Double Diamond (bodystorming EDI) from a third person perspective; and the Somaboard (sensitizing EDI) from a first-person [8,24] perspective. They were primarily developed as tools for the design-researchers' team-yet some of them have also been used to communicate RtD findings [6,7].…”