The Impact of Narrative Methods on Deriving User-Centered Product Requirements from Individual Knowledge
Christian Wölfel · KEER2014. Proceedings of the 5th Kanesi Engineering and Emotion Research; International Conference; Linköping; Sweden; June 11-13 · 2014
Industrial design education and practice often sits on the fence between rational approaches as established in engineering design on the one side and free-spirited approaches familiar to fine arts on the other. Especially when in interdisciplinary contexts, this may cause some issues since industrial designers and their methods may be perceived as either too narrow-minded or too chaotic. One example of reoccurring surprise is the use of narrative methods such as personas and use case scenarios in systematic product development processes. Usually, collaborating engineering designers are sceptic in the beginning but later on accept the methods as means of communication and collaboration. However, narrative methods are not only means of team work and presenting concepts or solutions, but also help analysing the task, defining requirements and evaluating design proposals. This paper describes a study that aims at proving the impact of narrative methods in industrial design on an empirical basis.