Empathy and Design. A new perspective

Devecchi, Alice; Guerrini, Luca

doi:10.1080/14606925.2017.1352932

Cited by 20 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 13 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Perspective‐taking is also effective to build empathetic thinking, as it facilitates reflexive practice (Gasparini 2015). Specifically, perspective‐taking in empathetic design is an essential approach in enhancing ‘the ability to assume another’s perspective, imagining his/her emotions, thoughts, feelings’ (Devecchi & Guerrini 2017, S4359). A structured application of perspective‐taking by considering social, behavioural, emotional and cognitive engagement could be a good pedagogical strategy in design thinking for students to reflect on how they have been engaged with a problem and judge to what extent their solutions are empathetic and reflexive.…”

Section: Case Analysis and Discussion: Identified Strategies For Abdu...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Abductive Reasoning: A Design Thinking Experiment

Dreamson¹,

Khine²

2022

Int J Art Design Ed

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Design thinking fundamentally relies on abductive reasoning. Diverse thinking types such as divergent thinking, systems thinking, and empathetic thinking have been adopted in design thinking education. Yet, it is very rare to address abductive reasoning to be integrated in a design thinking course because of deductive validity and inductive strength. In practice, the quality of design thinking is judged from design outcomes in terms of creativity and innovation rather than the application of abductive reasoning in thinking that is necessary for educators to develop diverse instructional strategies for design thinking. Through a design thinking experiment where abductive reasoning was structured for groups of students to modify their chosen fairy stories by challenging identified lessons/values/beliefs, we articulated relevant strategies from case analysis. As a result, we discovered the following six strategies for abductive reasoning: questioning on socially given identity; restructuring a hierarchy of values; de‐ and re‐contextualisation; perspective‐taking; being intersubjective through body swapping; and developing imaginative empathy for compassion. The six strategies support pedagogical aspects of design thinking such as collaborative problem‐solving and analytic and empathetic engagement; and thus, design educators can use them in developing instructional strategies to facilitate abductive reasoning in design thinking.

show abstract

Section: Case Analysis and Discussion: Identified Strategies For Abdu...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Abductive Reasoning: A Design Thinking Experiment

Dreamson¹,

Khine²

2022

Int J Art Design Ed

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…437–438). More recent definitions of empathic design have tried to humanise design by not considering users as ‘simply the economic bottom line of designers’ (Walther et al 2017, p. 132) and rather frame empathy in design as a set of skills with professional, social and ethical implications (Devecchi & Guerrini 2017; Walther et al 2017; Hess et al 2021). As Batson (2009) explains, ‘a state of distress evoked by witnessing another’s distress… does not involve feeling distressed for the other (see concept 8) or distressed as the other (concept 3).…”

Section: Looking Beneath the Umbrella: Empathy In Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Cultivating ethical thinking through empathy A fourth implication are ethical discussions on the pragmatic implications of empathy in design. Some designers have noticed the utilitarian implications of empathy in design and argued that they are not dehumanising end-users by utilising empathy as a tool (Devecchi & Guerrini 2017;Walther, Miller & Sochacka 2017). Indeed, some authors may highlight the undeniably pragmatic nature of a design process.…”

Section: Limitations Of Designer-user Empathymentioning

confidence: 99%

Under the umbrella: components of empathy in psychology and design

et al. 2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Empathy is argued to be a key factor for a successful design discussion. However, such causality cannot be empirically proven based on how empathy is currently defined in design community. Empathy is used as an umbrella construct, broad and encompassing of diverse phenomena, making it difficult to quantify. We suggest improving such a situation by introducing a definition of empathy based on psychology literature, which provides structure and guidance for studying the role of empathy in design. We first break empathy to components. Then, we review empathy as used in design. Finally, we synthetize the reviewed material. From this synthesis, we conclude that empathy in design shares several key components of empathy in psychology; particularly with state influences, top-down control process and emotional stimuli. These are present in design methods although they have not been studied using such terms. Incorporating psychological components of empathy into design can help conceptualising empathy from a different angle, thus opening interesting new avenues for future research. We hope that our treatment provides present and future designers with some useful guidance.

show abstract

“…", raising ethical doubts about the right of designers to target, interpret, immerse themselves, and tackle the affective state of others, even under the guise of good intentions however sincere (Gerrard & Sosa, 2014). Recently, a more sophisticated perspective of empathy challenges the utilitarian sense and transfers empathy from the designer's ability to design for others or to dictate the relationship or experience of others, and adopts relational aesthetics to denote the capacity to be with others while preserving otherness as a value for "a more collaborative, sustainable, and creative society" (Devecchi & Guerrini, 2017). This angle of empathy shifts from designing with empathy, to designing within an empathic sociability (Devecchi & Guerrini, 2017) -a sense of empathy that connects to creativity as the capacity to change with others.…”

Section: Empathymentioning

confidence: 99%

Teaching (with) Empathy and Creativity in Design

Sosa¹

2019

Insider Knowledge - Proceedings of the Design Research Society Learn X Design Conference, 2019

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Empathy and creativity are desirable core design competencies. The relationship between these concepts, however, has remained largely unexplored-including how this relationship shapes, and is shaped by, design education. This work unfolds the creases between empathy and creativity, identifies their synergies and contradictions in design education, and defines a research programme to improve the teaching of and with creative and empathic dispositions. A comprehensive research programme for the advancement of empathy and creativity in design requires diverse and highly inventive approaches to design knowledge. Design researchers are encouraged to draw from their professional and personal areas of expertise to formulate new research questions that connect empathy and creativity, and to adopt and adapt methods of inquiry to study these connections.

show abstract

Empathy and Design. A new perspective

Cited by 20 publications

References 13 publications

Abductive Reasoning: A Design Thinking Experiment

Abductive Reasoning: A Design Thinking Experiment

Under the umbrella: components of empathy in psychology and design

Teaching (with) Empathy and Creativity in Design

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About