Dear Terry,
May be I'm missing something in this "Inventing Research Methods"
discussion, but for me, your recent reply [Inventing Research Methods:
2008.12.16] to Chris is confusing.
When Chris says about engaging actors in a kind of indirect
participative design method
" ... It's very much a design/prototyping exercise underpinned by
the actors' ability to work rigorously in interviewing/observing
stakeholders and reproducing their experiences in an accurate and
affective way. ..."
you agree with him, and so do I! Indeed, to me this is quite a novel way
of doing a kind of participative designing, and one that can overcome
certain, often rather difficult to deal with, ethical issues that arise
when working with ill, disabled, or otherwise distressed people.
To me, Chris is here talking about a kind of research method for use in
designing, where "research" means what Ken recently (re-)explained
[Dancing Footnote: 2008.12.13]. So, as I understand him (or perhaps
misunderstand him) Chris is NOT talking about a research method used to
do some sciencing.
But you say of all this that ...
"... they [the actors] are solely a component of the data gathering
experimental process. ..."
From what Chris describes the actors are not data gathering, and they
are not part of a scientific experiment: they act (literally) as proxies
for real people in a research activity of a participative design method.
And you go on to say ...
"... This looks like one of those projects that is primarily a
design exercise trying to fly the flag of research by adding the term
'research' in as many ways as possible to reshape perceptions. ..."
This makes it look like you think research = doing science, which it
certainly does not. And that any use of the term research in talking
about designing is dressing the designing up as some kind of sciencing,
which it does not. Nor, I would add, is Chris describing a mere "design
exercise", as if it's some kind of student teaching exercise. He
describes an interesting and novel research method for doing a kind of
designing, and one used in some professional designing.
Designing and Sciencing are two different ways of getting to know and
understand the world: how it can be made to work; and how it does work.
In doing designing we often use a lot of scientific knowledge and
understanding, and in doing science we often do a lot of designing, and
engineering--of experimental apparatus, for example. However, this close
interaction does not make them the same, nor mean that the research
methods used or develop are the same in both kinds of activity.
Designing is not Sciencing, though a scientific investigation of
designing is possible, I would claim. So is it research methods for a
scientific investigation of designing you want to discuss, or research
methods as part of effective designing?
Best regards,
Tim
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