MSc Student Research Internships

Students participate, on an individual basis, in the ‘design & emotion’ research project. The student gets acquainted with setting up and executing a research project. Important activities are reading relevant literature, formulating research questions, datacollection, data analysis and writing report or scientific article. More information can be found here: internships

Exploring Interactions

Exploring Interactions is a project within the Master Design for Interaction. It focuses on analysing and conceptualising of human-product interactions in relation to the physical, cultural, technological, and societal contexts in which the product is used. During this project, students will explore the interplay between a product’s properties and behaviour and human abilities and concerns. They will analyse current interactions, generate starting points for innovative design and develop new product concepts. Together with Stella Boess I am responsible for the development and organisation of this design project.
More information; see: http://studiolab.io.tudelft.nl/id4250/

Design for Emotion

In this course, students deepen their knowledge of how product design elicits (and can elicit) emotions and of the relationship between human emotions and happiness. They experience using research techniques that focus on product user emotions. And they envision and formulate design intentions that include effects on the emotions of users and conceptualise products that fit with these intentions. Students work on a series of research and design assignments. Depending on the assignment, students will work either individually or in groups. Lectures will provide psychological principles of emotions and well-being as well as examples of emotion-driven design cases. The course≠s basic frame has a theoretical and a methodological component: a framework of nine sources of product emotion and a four-step approach to emotional design: to disclose, understand, envision, and conceptualise. All aspects of this frame will be explored in depth in a series of lectures, workshops, and assignments. Examples of these assignments are making an emotional product blueprint, formulating appraisal mirrors, developing concern profiles, measuring emotions, and poetic sensitizing.

Product Understanding Usage and Experience

Human-product interaction deals with the way in which we perceive, understand, use and experience products. This interaction is substantiated by our sensory, cognitive and motor systems. In order to understand how we interact with products, knowledge of these systems and how they limit, enable or facilitate interaction is essential. Our knowledge and insights come mainly from the human sciences. In this course, relevant knowledge and insights will be addressed in a thematic approach. Themes include: usecues, emotion, sound, cognitive fixation, touch, safety and risk awareness, discomfort, visual aesthetics, multimodal experience and inclusive design.
The main objective of this course is to enable students to learn the limits and potential of knowledge and insights from the humanities and behavioural sciences as these apply to their understanding of human-product interaction. Students should be able to apply and communicate available knowledge and translate it into design guidelines or variables.



Previous Education

Vision in Product design

The goal of this course is to make students familiar with a new design approach: Vision in Product design (ViP). In this approach the user-product relationship within a context is the central theme and a crucial stage is to develop a vision on this interaction from a personally designed context. The approach is directed towards the design of authentic, impassioned, and user-adapted solutions and (thus)requires personal involvement and responsibility form the designer/student. The course is structured in the form of a workshop in which the student individually carries out a design project. The design problem is formulated in co-operation with an outside partner.

Microsoft Research Design Expo

Every year, Microsoft Research (USA) invites three international universities to compete in a student design contest: the Microsoft Research Design Expo (MSRDE). In the last two competitions Delft University has been one of the three universities that was honored with an invitation to participate. Given the successful results of the Delft students, who have presented their work at Microsoft Research in the USA, Microsoft has decided to invite the ID-Studiolab to select students to participate in the upcoming 2005 contest. More info about the Delft entry:http://studiolab.io.tudelft.nl/msrde2005/unrevealedroutes/