Probing the Probes
Karen Clarke, Mark Rouncefield, Tom A. Rodden, Terry Hemmings, Andy Crabtree · Lancaster EPrints (Lancaster University) · 2002
Ethnographic studies of technology have focused on trying to understand the socially organised, naturally occurring uses of technological artifacts in socio-technical systems. This paper describes the design work of two separate research groups utilising as a mode of participatory design for domestic settings. The first group created specially designed probes to analyse the motivations that shape life, to inspire future designs. The second group used a cultural probe derivative as an adjunct to an ethnographic study of a home setting - a sheltered housing complex - and used them for information rather than inspiration. The paper outlines an innovative evaluation of the production, use and methods that inform the use of probes for a participatory design and explore the ways in which cultural probes and probes hybrids might present alternative strategies for exploring sensitive settings.