Because no one ever looks under "About". My research is about health, health behaviour and how design can affect behavioural change. My background is in industrial design engineering. I am particular interested in investigating how health is understood from a sociological, psychological and economical point of view. Methodologies of the kind may proof useful in the process of design. Please feel free to contact me: tjhien.liao[at]taik.fi
Tjhien's blog
keeps track of my doing, reading & thinking, weekly.Turo-Kimmo Lehtonen
Department of sociology. Finland focussed. Family, security and welfare ethos. Connected to MOLE research community. Other research intrests are related to everyday practices of consumption, social theory, history of hygiene, domestication of new technologies, urban studies and material culture studies.
Consultation hours: Tuesday 2-3pm, room 324.
Defining design research according to Keiichi sato
Chapter from Design Integrations: Research and Collaboration, Poggenpohl and Sato 2009
Two types of Design research:
- Project information developments (gathering info)
- Developing geeralized structured body of knowledge (theory, methods, principles) -> We talk about this one!
1. General design research (Methods, models and knowledge)
2. Domain specific Design research (e.g. human artifact interaction, envrionment value in products, etc.)
Design knowledge and formal mechanisms for knowledge development and lifecycles. Knowledge lifecycles in UCD generally comprise: 1. Design related knowledge around designing 2. User related knowledge around the usage
New perspectives in design is considered that part which describes the significant gap between what social sciences based methodologies intend and offer and what design practice expects. Design research can bridge these two different intentions, viewpoints and activities through methodological development. Problem in design is the different viewpoints and the difficulty in producing meaningful and verifiable results when applying empirical deductive research methods. Read the rest of this entry »
Judith Gregory
Contact got through Petra Ahde.
IIT Chicago. Hosting the design and emotion conference 5-7 October. Has a long history in health and medical/clinical patient supportive software.
DOSSIA consortium, personally controlled health record software.
Rethink Health, a health initiative by ID Chicago. Got book chapter in "Design integrations: Research and Collaboration" (Sharon Poggenpohl and Keiichi Sato, 2009)
History in social/cultural human factors including empiric studies on health management systems. Also ethnographar in health related topics. Dissertation on "Sorceerers Apprentice: Creating the Electronic Health record, re inventing Medical records and patient care."
Thesis structure and build-up by Tero Heikkinen
Introduction based on the book "Authoring a PhD" by P. Dunleavy. Main points of the book is:
- Managing readers expectations
- Envisioning the thesis as a whole
How to do this? Thesis is seperated in three parts: NON-CORE, CORE and again a NON-CORE part.
NON CORE - Throat clearing, introduction, what the readers needs to know to appreciate the coming
CORE - Set of articles, original thought, research and contribution
NON CORE - Conclusions and implications Read the rest of this entry »
Aalto University Research Assessment Evaluation, its recent history and the national importance of design
Second seminar on "Introduction to Design Research".
Historically the University has applied a self reflective assessment. More recent developments included a international panel evaluating the university and particularly its research branch on more international criteria (RAE). "Design" as a profession entered people's awareness of its existence and its importance, when the government decreed a resolution in 1999. This resolution proclaimed the importance of design, particularly as a strategy, for the future of its nation and the plan to support this with a large sum of money (30 mill). Design established itself as a discipline within the industry and all its associates. The academic results were, however, rather modest. SHOK was created as a center of excellence in design.
As mentioned "Design" is the promise at a national level. Design is expected to accompany the three other branches in the country: forrestry, b2b machinery and ICT. The decrease in global competitiveness in these three sectors was the motivator to look for a fourth activity to support its economy, this being design. However, research personnel at the TaiK is small and academic production is often relying on a few individuals. Apart from that the school of design remains arts and crafts driven. Design research is coming to maturity, which may make the pioneering mode of the school obsolete Read the rest of this entry »
Finding a tutor
My idea is to attract a tutor that is not directly involved with design but possesses an expertise from a different background. This being from social science, psychology or perhaps economy. I think doing it this way could offer insight that a tutor from within design would not have been able to offer. Apart from the scientific knowledge I also expect some know-how into the methods. This tutor, being from a different background would need to hold an interest in my topic, and in design in general.
Echte economie by Arnold Heertje
I read the book "Echte economie" ("Real economy"). This is by a Dutch author. He points out the misconception of Economy and addresses the underlying social dynamics that drive an economy. These dynamics are usually overlooked, due to our perception of economy being about money, and money only. The author sheds light on definitions like scarcity and the economy being about choices. These choices or options are not always quantifiable. In fact he points out that we are increasingly falling into the illusion of universal measurability.
Despite Finnish, I still want to participate in the courses and get some tutoring
Right now I'm looking into possible courses I can take. These will be courses like "introductions to X" And X here would be, sociology, demography, economics, sociological research, etc. I have to say that the program that they offer doctorates is completely lacking the English side of things. This wouldn't be a problem, since they are in a open agreement with all other universities in Helsinki, but these programs from other universities are mostly offered only in Finnish?! Except the Master programs, but those don't include those "introduction" courses I was talking about. Nonetheless I will try to get in contact with some teachers here at the Helsinki University and see if we can arrange some form of tutoring. As I thought of now perhaps writing essays on the topic, including what the relevance is to health and design. And use these essays as a vehicle in articulating my theoretical background, on which I will try to reflect design methodologies. Will this work?
How do other disciplines look at health
Right now I am like in this cloud of possibilities but also uncertainties. As the plan stands I am still all about health. But my approach is a very broad one, and does not start with design. Instead I start by looking at health as a concept, looking at it from different perspectives. E.g. How do sociologists look at health. What do they understand of health. How do economists look at health, how does health function as capital? And with each of these perspectives I want to look at how they (those people in those professions) articulate their problems and tackle their problems? How do they evaluate things and what methodologies do they use. Then I will try to bridge this knowledge, into design thinking. How does this affect our thinking in design. How would this change the way we do things, our methodologies.
On health economics
Articles:
Moral hazard: why risk is good, Frank Ahrens
Grossman, Michael. "On the Concept of Health Capital and the Demand for Health." Journal of Political Economy. March-April/1972. 80(2): 223-55
Frank Ahrens (2008-03-19). "Moral Hazard': Why Risk Is Good'". The Washington Post. Retrieved 2009-03-17.
Peter Orszag, "Behavioral Economics: Lessons from Retirement Research for Health Care and Beyond," Presentation to the Retirement Research Consortium, August 7, 2008
Arrow, Kenneth (1963). "Uncertainty and the Welfare Economics of Medical Care". American Economic Review 53 (5): 941–973. doi:10.2307/1812044.
Books:
Kenneth J. Arrow, 1951, 2nd ed., 1963, Social Choice and Individual Values. ISBN 0-300-01364-7
Whittington, Ruth (2008). Introduction to Health Economics: A Beginners Guide Preview. ISBN 978-0954549459.
The economics of health and health care, Folland S., Goodman AC. and Stano M. - (4th edition). New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 2001.
Handbook of health economics, Culyer AJ. and Newhouse JP. (eds) - Volumes 1A and 1B. Elsevier: Amsterdam, 2000.
Institutions and links:
Health Economics education (HEe) - UK-based site for teachers of Health Economics
Health Economics Network; a research network from the Social Science Research Network
Michael Grossman
introduces his 1972 model of health production. It's an economic evaluation and consider health as capital. It views each individual as producer and consumer of health. The model acknowledges that health care is both a consumption good that yields direct satisfaction and utility, and an investment good, which yields satisfaction to consumers indirectly through increased productivity, fewer sick days, and higher wages.
Alan Williams
created a plumbing diagram describing a scope of health economics. He poses the following questions:
What influences health?
What is health and what is its value?
The demand for health care
The supply of health care
Micro- economic evaluation at treatment level
Market equilibrium
Evaluation at whole system level
Planning, budgeting and monitoring mechanisms
Kenneth Arrow
is often credited as a great contributor to health economics as a discipline. He drew conceptual distinction between health and other goals. He points out a asymmetric distribution of information amongst the including parties. for example, the doctor - patient or the insurance - patient. This asymmetric relationship may lead to e.g. moral hazard as a behavior.
This occurs when a party insulated from risk may behave differently than it would behave if it were fully exposed to the risk. Two types ex ante, ex post moral hazard.
Utilitarianism
Jeremy Bentham, great contributor in social welfare reform, applied the term utilitarianism. This argues that the right act or policy is that which causes "the greatest good for the greatest number of people". This is also known as the greatest happiness principle. He actually proposes a formula that describes and evaluates the happiness factor, the felicific calculus. This is based on a classification of 12 pains and 14 pleasures. Utilitarianism has its roots also in the classical thought by Epicurus who describes it as "The moral worth of an action is determined solely by its utility in providing happiness or pleasures as summed among all people".
Secrets behind succesful paper writing, submission and acceptance by Giulio Jacucci
See also ppt of Giulio Jacucci here. Writing papers is considered your first and foremost responsibility and obligation as a researcher. To get your paper accepted isn’t easy and deserves further attention. Allow your ideas to fluctuate during the writing process. In fact the process of writing may spark new thoughts that may eventually change your research process or set up. Some factors that can affect this change:
Audience. Remember the first reader is most likely the chairman of the conference or a joint committee. Their choice of acceptance is subject to personal preferences. Be smart in this.
Type of publication. Theoretical, design, system, etc. paper. Also look at the contribution types mentioned on this page and this page.
Approach.
Schedule.
Authorship. There are different guidelines with naming and crediting authors. Here is one of the American Psychology Guidelines on authorship order.
Each conference has their own rules on paper format, deadline, etc. Best is to decide which conference you’re aiming for and to investigate their specific guidelines. Read the rest of this entry »
The Machine in Me: An Anthropologist Sits Among Computer Engineers by Gary Lee Downey
I read and was very inspired by the book "The machine in me". Here the author points out a specific problem. The problem is socially oriented and he takes on a cultural anthropological approach. My question here would be: How does this knowledge transfer to design? How would this affect design? How can this produce wisdom that could aid us in design thinking. And actually I think this should be the core process in my design research, meaning this "road" is what "design research" means to me.
How do sociological perspectives affect design thinking
How do sociological perspectives affect design thinking, in what way would this be applicable and how would design methodologies look like if these factors are taken into account. I am increasingly thinking about concentrating on social sciences as a methodological fruit bearing ground for my research. There must be something interesting to find there. Things that I want to look into are behavioral studies and methodology. Of my understanding this borders also with the study of marketing and consumer behavior. At the same time I am interested in the more fundamental approaches of economics, which also considers human behavior and the study of this. I will look into courses that compliment these interests. I need to talk to some people that can guide me in this. Janna studied sociology, perhaps she can help me.
Enriched UX tools by Lutz Gegner
A UX evaluation framework that includes emotional aspects in a measurable construction set up by Hessenzahl. The basic approach is to evaluate the usage "before" and "after" the user has engaged with the product - comparing the users expectations with that of the final performance of the product. This evaluation includes many behavioral aspects that looked a bit similar to the behavioral axes we used at Cambridge. Although the method seemed to articulate and process these in a certain assessment and giving them weights, ultimately to come up with a single digit that expresses the UX quality of the product. Rightfully Kartik comments that the critical aspects of context are not addressed in this model.
Publishing in your second language
In addition to our seminar on language I was wondering: How do the Chinese do it? Since historically they hold a strong tradition in Chinese written scholars and their today's language base is rather large. Even though the Finnish situation is far from similar to the Chinese, taking this idea as an extreme in my search seemed interesting. I did not yet find on how the Chinese do it. However, I did find this article of a small study which offers some ideas for thought when you're considering to write in a second language: http://tesl-ej.org/ej41/a1.html
My take on it is that writing in a second language (L2), is significantly different from writing in a native language (L1). Obvious, you'd say. But this article also breaks it down to several applied writing strategies that appear to differ when writing in L1 or L2 (perhaps you recognize yourself in it). The article expresses the wish for the English dominant to be open minded to a plurality of
knowledge, which it also states that this is difficult to wish for. Further more, recommendations include adjusting your course program to face this difficulty of writing in L2.
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