What's Missing in Design Education Today?
2012; Routledge; Volume: 46; Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2691-5529
AutoresJorge Frascara, Guillermina Noël,
Tópico(s)Technology Use by Older Adults
ResumoABSTRACT This article begins by describing a desirable design approach that is only practiced by a few designers today. This design approach is desirable because it responds to a society that suffers from a number of illnesses due to communications and artifacts that do not satisfy the needs of people. The article then proposes the kind of design education that could lead to forming designers within the outlined approach, and defines necessary terms and conditions. Lastly, it proposes recommendations, and the need for a deep reflection on the nature of design and of design education. THE DESIGN APPROACH WE NEED Before talking about design education, we must envision design as we would like it to be. We propose a design that, responding to real needs of society, could generate visual materials that meet the needs and abilities of their users. Society needs forms that employees in a business could use effectively, that tax payers could fill easily; or that hospital physicians could use without resulting in dangerous medical mistakes. We need signage that people in general and seniors in particular could understand and follow easily; teaching aids that could actually promote learning. We need transparent websites, easy to navigate and confusion-free; interactive programs not oriented to using the latest technological gizmos, but oriented to helping people do what they want to do. We need health education for the general population that could be clear enough and persuasive enough so that people could live healthier lives on the basis of making better-informed decisions. This is the kind of design we need. This is a design that fosters equality of access to the benefits, services and opportunities that society can offer. It is ethical design, one that recognizes the different profiles of users, accepts those differences and responds to them. To perform this function design has to be user-centered, evidence-based and results-oriented. First, what does user-centered mean? It has to be a design built around the user, with the user and for the user. It is not design that seeks originality: originality has to be a consequence of good design work, it cannot be the objective of good design work. Second, why evidence-based? It has to be a design that uses available knowledge as a launching pad. There is a lot of information in social sciences and design journals that is directly relevant to a human-centered design approach, particularly in cognitive and perceptual psychology, but also in educational psychology and anthropology. Design decisions cannot be based on hunches, but on available or new knowledge about human cognition and behavior. The design we need is not about looks, it is about people. Third, why results-oriented? The reason why at a certain point someone decides that design is needed is because a reality has to be changed. If something has to be changed, one cannot design what one believes is a solution and walk away assuming that the solution will actually work. One has to wait, watch and evaluate the results achieved. The building of exquisite instruments is not the aim of the design we need, the aim is the change for the better in the reality we face. If 33,808 people died in motor vehicle traffic crashes in 2009 in the USA, and about 2.2 million were injured, the measure of good design action would be to visibly contribute to the reduction of deaths and injuries. Nothing more, nothing less. Cute slogans and smart images do not matter if the statistics remain stable. Someone might say, Well, this is too high a bill for design, a multi-agency action is needed. Right, but who is going to plan that massive multi-agency action? In final analysis, it is a communication problem, within agencies, between agencies and between the agencies and the public. This involves a multidisciplinary approach to design that includes perception, cognition, persuasion, strategic design and information flow management; all provinces of communication design. …
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