Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24

Nuno Martins
Daniel Brandão
Francisco Paiva Editors

Perspectives
on Design
and Digital
Communication
III
Research, Innovations and Best Practices
Springer Series in Design and Innovation

Volume 24

Editor-in-Chief
Francesca Tosi, University of Florence, Florence, Italy

Series Editors
Claudio Germak, Politecnico di Torino, Turin, Italy
Francesco Zurlo, Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy
Zhi Jinyi, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu, China
Marilaine Pozzatti Amadori, Universidade Federal de Santa Maria,
Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil
Maurizio Caon , University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Fribourg, Switzerland
Springer Series in Design and Innovation (SSDI) publishes books on innovation
and the latest developments in the fields of Product Design, Interior Design and
Communication Design, with particular emphasis on technological and formal
innovation, and on the application of digital technologies and new materials. The
series explores all aspects of design, e.g. Human-Centered Design/User Experience,
Service Design, and Design Thinking, which provide transversal and innovative
approaches oriented on the involvement of people throughout the design
development process. In addition, it covers emerging areas of research that may
represent essential opportunities for economic and social development.
In fields ranging from the humanities to engineering and architecture, design is
increasingly being recognized as a key means of bringing ideas to the market by
transforming them into user-friendly and appealing products or services. Moreover,
it provides a variety of methodologies, tools and techniques that can be used at
different stages of the innovation process to enhance the value of new products and
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The series’ scope includes monographs, professional books, advanced textbooks,
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ing Ph.D. theses.
The volumes of the series are single-blind peer-reviewed.

Keywords: Product and System Innovation; Product design; Interior design;

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Design; Design Thinking; Digital Innovation; Innovation of Materials.

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Proposals must be sent to: series editor Prof. Francesca Tosi ([Link]@[Link])
and/or publishing editor Mr. Pierpaolo Riva ([Link]@[Link]).
Nuno Martins · Daniel Brandão · Francisco Paiva
Editors

Perspectives on Design
and Digital Communication
III
Research, Innovations and Best Practices
Editors
Nuno Martins Daniel Brandão
Research Institute for Design, Media Communication and Society Research
and Culture, School of Design Centre, Institute of Social Sciences
Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave University of Minho
Barcelos, Portugal Braga, Portugal

Francisco Paiva
Labcom, University of Beira Interior
Covilhã, Portugal

ISSN 2661-8184 ISSN 2661-8192 (electronic)

Springer Series in Design and Innovation
ISBN 978-3-031-06808-9 ISBN 978-3-031-06809-6 (eBook)
[Link]

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Scientific Committee

Ana Catarina Silva, Escola Superior de Design IPCA (PT)

Andreia Sousa, Universidade Lusófona do Porto (PT)
Catarina Lelis, University of West London (UK)
Cátia Rijo, Escola Superior de Educação IPL (PT)
Cláudia Lima, Universidade Lusófona do Porto (PT)
Daniel Brandão, Universidade do Minho (PT)
Daniel Raposo, Politécnico Castelo Branco (PT)
Eliana Penedos, Politécnico Leiria (PT)
Fernando Moreira da Silva, Faculdade de Arquitetura da Universidade de Lisboa
(PT)
Fernando Suarez Carballo, Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca (ES)
João Alves de Sousa, Universidade Lusófona do Porto (PT)
Karel van der Waarde, Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne (AU)
Leonardo Pereira, Universidade de Aveiro (PT)
Mario Buono, University of Campania (IT)
Marta Fernandes, Politécnico do Porto (PT)
Nuno Coelho, Universidade de Coimbra (PT)
Nuno Martins, Escola Superior de Design IPCA (PT)
Pedro Amado, Universidade do Porto (PT)
Pedro Cardoso, Universidade de Aveiro (UA)
Ricardo Melo, Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS (PT)
Rui Rodrigues, ESMAD-IPP (PT)
Sérgio Dominique, Escola Superior de Hotelaria e Turismo IPCA (PT)
Vítor Quelhas, ESMAD-IPP (PT)
Cristina Sylla, Universidade do Minho (PT)
Francisco Paiva, Universidade da Beira Interior (PT)

v
Preface

This book responds to the dimension of “anticipation” described as one of the dimen-
sions of Design for Innovation by [1]. It aims at highlighting the social and civi-
lizational responsibility of design and to describe how this is being carried out at
multiple levels and in line with the priority established by the European Union in
2014, in the so-called agenda for Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI). The
agenda gave a great focus to design for all, and to guidelines to achieve this, and
was based on the recommendations by the European Design Leadership Board [2],
in the report “Design for Growth and Prosperity.” The report identified six strategic
areas for design: European Design on a Global Stage; Design in Europe’s Innovation
System; Design in Europe’s Enterprises; Design in Europe’s Public Sector; Design
in Europe’s Research System, and Design in Europe’s Education System.
In line with this paradigm, we also consider the four dimensions of design for
innovation scalped by Stilgoe and Guston (2017): Anticipation, Reflexivity, Inclu-
sion, and Responsiveness. They are expected to converge with the emerging transition
design approach, which is being developed worldwide in multiple contexts, such as
within the Carnegie Mellon [3] and the Great Transition Initiative (Peter 19 Sterling,
February 2016 and [Link] [4].
This book aims at depicting the multifaceted nature of design according to the
paradigms and trends explained above, offering a timely snapshot of the diverse
approaches to design and a picture of the transition that this discipline has been expe-
riencing. It offers extensive information and cutting-edge ideas for understanding the
kind of service that design is currently providing and will be able to provide to the
society, on a broad, transdisciplinary basis. It also features the type of ecosystem
innovation design is fostering, taking into account the four key areas of the transition
design framework: transition vision, theories of change, mindset and posture, and
new ways of designing [3].
In time of crisis, such as the present one, design can offer important answer
to societal challenges imposed by complex and ambiguous phenomena, such as
climate change, resource depletion, instability due to wars and massive migrations,
and pandemics, among others. The ubiquitous presence of digital and multimedia
contents, the sensible role that communication and the creation and dissemination

vii
viii Preface

of narratives has in contemporary societies, the needs of improved and inclusive

interfaces for human–machine interaction, as well as the growing importance of
concepts such as visualization and representation, may benefit both from a stronger
participation of designers, and awareness of design concepts, in different disciplinary
fields (software development, urban development, education, and so on).
The main research directions in design and digital communication are reflected
by the organization of this book into five thematic parts, namely:
1. User-centered digital design;
2. Research methods and strategies;
3. Pedagogy, society, and design practice;
4. Digital design branding; and
5. From design history to its transdisciplinarity.
In all of them, theory and practice are inextricably intertwined.
This book gathers original contributions written by renowned researchers and
professionals. They consist of revised and extended contributions to the 5th Inter-
national Conference on Digital Design and Communication (Digicom 2021), held
in November 4–6, 2021, in Barcelos, Portugal. It also includes additional chapters
by important international researchers who were invited to present the most relevant
outcomes of their current research projects. The chapters were subjected to a rigorous
evaluation by both the editors and the scientific committee of Digicom. They address
and seek to inspire both researchers and practitioners in the broad field of design and
communication, by covering the following main topics:
• Challenges of digital interaction and communication;
• Between the utility and the dilemmas of digital design applications;
• Design for digital literacy and social inclusion;
• Design and digital communication in times of crisis;
• Information design toward design activism;
• Designing visual identities and branding given the vicissitudes of hypermodernity;
• Designing cultural heritage in the face of digital transformations.

Barcelos, Portugal Nuno Martins

Braga, Portugal Daniel Brandão
Covilhã, Portugal Francisco Paiva
Preface ix

References

1. Stilgoe J, Guston DH (2017) Responsible research and innovation. In: Felt U et al (eds)
Handbook of science and technology studies, 4th edn. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, pp 853–
880
2. Koskinen T, Thomson M (eds) (2014) European Commission, Directorate-General for Enter-
prise and Industry, Design for growth & prosperity: report and recommendations of the European
Design Leadership Board, Publications Office. [Link]
3. Irwin T (2015) Transition design: a proposal for a new area of design practice, study, and
research. Des Cult 7(2):229–246. 10.1080/17547075.2015.1051829
4. Sterling P (2016) Why we consume: neural design and sustainability. Great transition initiative.
[Link]
Contents

User-Centered Digital Design

Interfaces, Data and Plural Languages to Develop CoDE:
A Collaborative Platform for Multidisciplinary Teams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Michela Carlomagno
Scratch-Based Game Development Resource Set for a Toolkit
to Game Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Pedro Beça, Sofia Ribeiro, Mónica Aresta, Rita Santos,
and Ana Isabel Veloso
Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian
Participation Mobile App to the Portuguese Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Manuel Gil, Liliana Gonçalves, and Lídia Oliveira
Design and Development of an Online Sales Platform for the Brand:
Engenharia Do Brigadeiro . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Viviana Maia, Leonardo Pereira, and Daniel Brandão
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through
Privacy-Enhancing Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Davide M. Parrilli and Rodrigo Hernández-Ramírez

Research Methods and Strategies

Design Radicalized as Experience: Disentangling and Reassembling
the Dance Floor Experience to Understand the Relationship
Between Design and Clubbing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
César Lugo-Elías and Pedro Cardoso
A Case Study of Remote User Research with Older Adults During
Lockdown: Analysis of Barriers, Strategies and of Communication
Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Ricardo Araújo, Ana Vasconcelos, and Ana Correia de Barros

xi
xii Contents

Digital Security Narratives in the Time of COVID-19: A Case

for Kindness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Lizzie Coles-Kemp and Peter A. Hall
The Professional Practice of Type Designers in the Design
of Variable Fonts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Maíra Woloszyn and Berenice Santos Gonçalves

Pedagogy, Society and Design Practice

Inclusive Design is Much More Than the Opposite of Exclusive
Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Fernando Moreira da Silva
Sci-Stories in Design: Guidelines for Curricular Inscription
and Dissemination Through Visual Narratives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Eliana Penedos-Santiago, Susana Barreto, Cláudia Lima,
Rui Vitorino Santos, Nuno Martins, and Pedro Amado
Designing for People with Dementia in Academic Contexts . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Cláudia Lima
How Design and Technology Can Contribute to Learning: The
Mobeybou in Brazil Educational Game Case Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
Rafael Fernandes, Cristina Sylla, Nuno Martins, and Maitê Gil
Hermeneutic Methodology to Design the Skin of the City . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
Liliana Soares and Ermanno Aparo
Visactivism: A Conceptual Model to Identify Information
Visualization as an Expression of Design Activism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
Pedro Duarte de Almeida

Digital Design Branding

Capitalist Visuality: Branding, Architecture, and Its Visual
Reproduction. A Case Study in the City of Porto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
Ana Miriam Rebelo, Heitor Alvelos, and Álvaro Domingues
A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising: A Case Study on How
Outdoor Advertising Can Support Local Identity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255
Ana Seixosa and Maria Cadarso
Brand Management: From Storytelling to Strategic Narratives . . . . . . . . 275
Sérgio Dominique-Ferreira, Sofia Praça, and Catherine Prentice
Dynamic Visual Identities: Reflection on Interaction
and Playfulness in Visual Identity Design by Porto Design Studios . . . . . 297
Rita Coelho and Suzana Dias
Contents xiii

Developing an Integrated Communication Plan in the Digital Age . . . . . . 313

André Teixeira, Sergio Dominique-Ferreira, Nuno Martins,
and Cristina Sylla

From Design History to Its Transdisciplinarity

Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage and Digital
Transformation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329
Mario Buono, Sonia Capece, Camelia Chivăran, Salvatore Gerbino,
Giovanna Giugliano, Alessandro Greco, Elena Laudante,
Maria Laura Nappi, and Ciro Scognamiglio
Mapping Ecosystems Through Design—Reflections
of the DesignOBS Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
Nina Costa, Rui Costa, Afonso Borges, Vasco Branco,
António Modesto, Raul Cunca, and Ana Catarina Silva
Growing Knowledge Across Boundaries: Lessons
from a Multi-Actor Design Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 375
Alison Burrows, Filipe Lima, Ricardo Pessoa, Rui José,
and Paula Trigueiros
Design in a Post-pandemic Era . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 393
Francisco Paiva
Mediated Authorships: The Designer as the Instructor of Machines . . . . 401
Luis Ortega and Julia Capomaggi
User-Centered Digital Design
Interfaces, Data and Plural Languages
to Develop CoDE: A Collaborative
Platform for Multidisciplinary Teams

Michela Carlomagno

Abstract The essay aims to investigate the contemporary communicative languages

introduced by the design culture for the development of digital platforms and inter-
faces. The research starts by analysing the state of the art regarding the creation of
digital networks and the increasing diffusion of alternative means of communica-
tion, which is facilitated by the use of digital media and online tools able to amplify
the geographical limits of relationships. Nowadays, collaborative digital tools and
platforms are assuming an essential role in the dissemination of knowledge and
information, through the creation of digital archives and databases; as facilitators of
relationships for remote collaboration, through the definition of workspaces, to be
used asynchronously and synchronously, with the consequent reduction of spatial and
temporal boundaries. This diffusion has led visual communication design to explore
and define alternative languages, made up of codes and visual synthesis, to design
complex visualisations and facilitate communication within digital spaces. Starting
from these considerations, the research defines a collaborative platform denominated
CoDE that aims to facilitate interaction within multidisciplinary groups. The final
part of the paper illustrates the GUI and UX elements of the platform and identifies
their potential and future developments.

Keywords Digital platform · User interface · Collaborative design

1 Introduction

In the current digital era, the Internet is not only a space for interaction and sharing
of data, information and documents, but also a “tool for connecting people, thoughts,
contexts and spaces beyond the sense of place” [1]. We are witnessing an extension
where relationships are free from the traditional constraints of time and space and
in which it is not necessary to share the moment of interaction. There is “the union

M. Carlomagno (B)
University of Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli”, 81031 Aversa, CE, Italy
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 3

N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
4 M. Carlomagno

of the social experience of our real-life with cyber-space, thus creating a new hybrid
social space” [2, p. 16].
The World Wide Web and Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)
have contributed to this radical transformation of interpersonal relations and ways
in which people communicate, also accentuated by behavioural changes and new
lifestyles adopted in the Covid-19 pandemic.
The ways of working and studying remotely have changed physical spaces config-
uration but also the work modalities and tools, able to satisfy new needs and specific
purposes compared to the traditional ones. Online activities have grown significantly
with the spread of smart-working and e-learning models used by many companies,
enterprises and institutions. Networked connectivity and workspaces evolution have
also influenced the design and the way designers interact and collaborate with stake-
holders, users and communities. In Design fields, the widespread multidisciplinary,
interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches [3, 4] have involved an increasing
number of disciplines and stakeholders within the project, giving rise to new needs
such as the sharing of languages, the equal collaboration between actors involved,
avoiding role imbalances during the project phases and actively involving all parties
involved. Therefore, traditional tools, used during design activities, such as cards,
toolkits, games and physical objects, are replaced by digital platforms that connect
people at a distance and record information, by offering personalized functionalities
for the design and management of teamwork activities.
Digital spaces become actual places where connect, interact and exchange knowl-
edge but also spaces for accessing data and content, mediated by the spread of digital
interfaces and platforms. In these spaces, collaborative whiteboards and dashboards
are intended as places to work and share tasks and information, organise files and
resources, and design using templates, post-its and mindmaps. On the one hand, this
promotes the possibility to establish global connections between people, stakeholders
and whole communities, by transferring large amounts of data and making network
communication effective. On the other hand, the risk of information overload and
incorrect data manipulation affects the ability to interact within the project team,
generating misunderstandings and gaps between stakeholders involved.
The chapter presents the first results of a doctoral research that starts with the
study of the evolution of interfaces as virtual spaces of interaction and the selection
of digital platforms used both as workspaces and tools to design and share ideas and
as places to collect data and information to be transferred immediately through the
construction of complex narrations and visual synthesis. The analysis of the strengths
and weaknesses of the platforms and the identification of the needs of inter- multi-
transdisciplinary teams at work have led to the definition of the digital tool parameters
and functionalities, described in the last paragraph of the essay.
The digital tool consists of a platform able to support the collaboration of teams
composed of heterogeneous disciplines and skills, by creating a common language,
identifying competence gaps, tracking activities and deadlines, and constantly
visualising information flows and ideas.
Interfaces, Data and Plural Languages to Develop CoDE … 5

2 The Evolution of Interfaces as Virtual Spaces

of Interaction

The evolution of information forms and the necessity to create new relations between
user and computer have allowed Design to experiment with new user experiences and
to define new ways of using contents and interaction spaces through the definition of
interfaces. Currently, fields close to Interaction Design and Human–computer Inter-
action (HCI), such as User Experience Design [5], Service Design and Information
Design, experiment with interfaces and new experiences able to involve and generate
digital networks, that are places of access, exchange and comparison.
In these areas, visual communication tools, such as infographics and graphic
visualisations, take the role of storytellers and make the information explicit in visual
syntheses that facilitate data access and decoding, and support the transfer of content
within digital platforms. As defined by [6, p. 5] “Information Visualization is the use
of computer-supported, interactive, visual representations of abstract data to amplify
cognition”.
The development of interfaces and platforms combine aspects that concern the
user (such as predispositions, expectations, needs, behaviours) with the features of the
designed system (usability, purpose, adaptability, functionality) and the cyberspace
(or environment) in which the interaction takes place to define new interactions with
products and services.
In contemporary society, physical and digital spaces are linked to create “cogni-
tive communities”—that is communities that dialogue and collaborate on a project
through the digital network in which temporary goals and ideas are shared. Indeed,
communication and interaction modalities between people are changed, mediated by
screens and digital devices. Communication becomes electronic and the language
“electrified” [7], capable of transferring information flows and therefore cognitive
content within the new media. In this context of hyper-connection, the use of wear-
able devices such as watches, glasses and clothing, is transforming also the ability
of interfaces to react to external factors and human input through voice, gesture and
haptic controls, creating a link to the physical dimension and sometimes overlapping
it.
The spread of ICT and new media have contributed to shape these changes, leading
to the current software society [8]—driven by technological progress and “connec-
tive thinking”. Digital space is no longer just a space of vision and action, but a space
of interaction with information and remotely connected individuals [7, 9]. Inter-
faces become a medium in which news, stories, knowledge and thus culture can be
transferred [10, 11]. As [12] states, “digital interfaces assume the role of translating
and processing cultural products into bits and then returning them in understand-
able forms to humans, according to shared cognitive schemas” [13]. This has also
influenced the definition of digital networks of experts, where products and services
are defined by the collaboration of different actors who actively participate in the
definition of the project.
6 M. Carlomagno

Consequently, the interface has become a mediator not only between human–
computer and human-platform but also as a process of communication between
people and of monitoring the different activities. This has shifted the design focus
from how users interact with objects, to the use of new visual languages inside the
Web to transfer messages and contents. In this paradigm shift, interface as mediator
become a technique for thought: an “allegorical device” that makes the social world
accessible in an age of information, through levels or layers. As [14] claims “an
interface is not a thing, an interface is always an effect. It is always a process or a
translation” (p. 33).

3 Plural Languages for the Infographic Project

In the contemporary infosphere [15], communication inside media becomes interac-

tive, allowing the transfer of information through interfaces that facilitate cross-media
exchange. We are moving towards a “simulation, or interface, culture” that interacts
with IT tools to explore virtual worlds, through manipulation and rewriting of iconic
text, shaped on the screen according to our mental connections. New media and infor-
mation systems, in general, enable this manipulation and transcoding of information
transforming data into digital open, accessible and modifiable languages [12].
The electronic screen is intended as an extension of the human mind, where the
linguistic and cultural forms of new media become the result of a merging of the
computer logic and the cultural level of media content. In this scenario, commu-
nication design can translate comparisons and dialogues into design opportunities,
make new scenarios visible, help to address common challenges, act sustainably and
identify complex action strategies.
Graphic symbols and visual representations facilitate access to information
through diagrams, maps, pictograms, icons and templates for the development of the
interfaces. The use of grids and layouts allows information to be hierarchized, make
it readable and accessible to others by creating visual, textual and verbal languages.
Visual syntheses within the platforms facilitate the exploration and definition of
new forms of sharing, driven by open processes and the ability and desire to explore
ideas and design proposals, investigate, experiment and consider multiple perspec-
tives and potential solutions to create complex visualisations. Interfaces have become
a means of connecting different actors, mediators with which we can explore alterna-
tive worlds and use information dynamically and interactively using narrations, and
places in which to collect data and decode them openly. Even the design project is
no longer the result of the individual action but that of a group of stakeholders with
different skills, approaches and jargon adopted during the various phases of design
process. The digital space becomes the place where synthesise these differences and
experiment with new ways of collaboration and participation.
The cultural sites where the digital and the physical meet is also the key subject of info-
aesthetics. But rather than think only in terms of convergence, as a cultural historian of
Interfaces, Data and Plural Languages to Develop CoDE … 7

the present I am also thinking about other relationships: those of conflict, contradiction,
borrowing, hybridization, remix. [16, p. 8]

4 New Needs and Narrative Artifacts in the Digital Era

Digital tools and services, which have emerged in the last 10 years, have facilitated
the need to dialogue and share information at a distance, communicate immedi-
ately, collaborate in the creation of project proposals in a visual way and participate
constantly in the creative process through shared spaces, diagrams and maps for the
visualisation of contents and ideas [17].
Digitisation, open access and the consequent possibility of using large quantities
of data have facilitated the dissemination and experimentation of tools for reading
and decoding information. These tools are based on self-organized systems and the
creation and transfer of common knowledge by carrying out co-design, co-creation
and participatory design approaches.
The necessity to transmit and share content and knowledge has produced a series
of communicative artefacts, including virtual ones, static or dynamic/interactive, to
which the use and access to contents are associated, through new forms of narration
and visualization such as digital storytelling, data storytelling or data visualization.
Numerous researchers from Tufte to Cairo have questioned how to shape data,
starting from the stages of collection, analysis and visualisation to the identification
of techniques to communicate in a clear, reliable and understandable way [18–20].
As Giorgia Lupi states: “In its second wave, data visualization will inevitably be
all about personalization. The more ubiquitous data becomes, the more we need to
experiment with how to make it unique, contextual, intimate. The way we visualize
it is crucial because it is the key to translating numbers into what they really stand
for: knowledge, behaviors, people.” [21].
Indeed, new data-driven applications require the interaction of the user/reader,
involving and helping them to understand the content communicated in a personalised
way. Reference [18] in “The Functional Art” focuses not only on the purely aesthetic
aspect of visualisations but also highlights the need to achieve an aesthetic that serves
the purpose. A “functional beauty” that aims to make a visual representation not only
attractive but able to influence the way the user perceives and explores data.
Beauty and functionality are interconnected, or should be. Beautiful and intriguing objects
improve our mood and predispose us to be patient when it comes time to learn how to use
them. [18, p. 92]

Data visualisation design, over time, has inspired new forms of narrations,
changing the storytelling and the reading of contents through participatory and open
methods for collecting and visualising digital information. New spaces of investiga-
tion and access are being experienced, as well as operational tools such as storytelling
and interactive platforms, which support the reading of information, making it acces-
sible to a large number of people. Storytelling [22] is used to give a form and meaning
to intangible elements such as the bits that compose data, transforming them into
8 M. Carlomagno

information and thus into knowledge. In particular, the construction of codes, visual
artefacts and languages, and alternative usability formats, such as graphic visualisa-
tions, which permit the reading of information, help to make the content usable and
readable [23] within the platform.
In the last 10 years, the spread of digital collaboration tools such as Miro,
Milanote,1 Slack,2 and Figma,3 have allowed people to work remotely, share ideas
and project proposals through platforms, facilitation tools and visual synthesis [24].
Other interactive platforms have used digital visualization and storytelling, guided
by codes and pictograms, to display stories and large amounts of data synthetically.
These tools aim to facilitate interaction and information by making it amplifiable
and interactive and to immerse the user in digital experiences.
Platforms such as “The Shape of Dreams”, designed by Federica Fragapane
and “Publishing Penisula Talks” made by Accurat Studio, allow users to explore
stories/information through a multi-level navigation system, guided by graphic
elements and visual codes. “Rebound” by the MIT Senseable City Lab and “Atlas of
Emotion”, on the other hand, make it possible to read databases through the use of
filters, legends and interactive maps that simplify information management.
These examples of platforms have in common the use of multilevel visualisations
and graphical forms of communication such as data visualization and data story-
telling, that allow not only to explore and read information but also to involve and
simplify the processes of data gathering and storage using diagrams, texts, animations
and colours. All these elements contribute to the creation of languages and forms of
visual representation that make the user experience in digital platforms customisable.
Shared modalities of usage are experienced to translate inputs from different contexts
into diagram-based visual models [25] that facilitate the creation of connections
and enable collective planning, through “bridge-artefacts” [23] that help build visual
languages. “Bridge-artefacts” are visual languages useful “to connect different points
of view, local contingencies and multiple interests, structural features of a complex
social system (…) for the representation of smooth and complex spaces, spaces of
knowledge and controversy.” [23, p. 4]. Graphs, or charts, used in visualizations take
on different configurations according to objectives and visual characteristics, such as
bar charts, diagrams, histograms, radar charts or word-clouds useful for comparing
data, visualizing temporal sequences, categorizing and classifying information or
correlating multiple elements by highlighting relationships and hierarchies [26].

1 Miro and Milanote are digital workspaces in which is possible to share the workspace visually
to design asynchronous or real-time and personalize the creative process with templates. For more
information visit the link [Link] and [Link]
2 Slack is a project management tools, in which teams can communicate and collaborate in a virtual

space working remotely, managing and organizing activities by timeline. For more information visit
the link [Link]
3 Figma, is a collaborative whiteboards in which visual collaboration allows teams to design together

by translating the design process into a real project through sketches and animated prototypes. For
more information visit the link [Link]
Interfaces, Data and Plural Languages to Develop CoDE … 9

5 Development of the Collaborative Digital Platform:

Parameters, Functionalities and Languages

The project presented starts from the definition of the background up to field research
composed of one-to-one interviews and online surveys, which allowed to recognise
tools, approaches and behaviours used by actors involved in multidisciplinary teams
and identify common needs and issues such as the necessity to adopt a common
language, to share information constantly and to update and personalize the design
process according to the issue. In particular, the analysis of the weaknesses and oppor-
tunities of the mediation tools has allowed defining parameters and functionalities
to develop a digital tool able to support the collaboration within groups composed
of different stakeholders and from various contexts and to reduce the spatial and
temporal boundaries.
The use of visual communication forms such as storytelling, diagrams and graph-
ical elements contributed to the configuration of the Graphical User Interface (GUI).
The aspects required for the elaboration of the interface are usability, clarity of
information, accessibility, simplicity and user-friendliness. The GUI is developed
by combining visual elements—colours, graphical signs, pictograms and charts—
and textual content lists, thematic clusters of words, keywords—which define the
graphical appearance and functions through buttons, drop-down lists, navigation and
search areas and charts. Diagrams allow the exploration of information interactively
and are part of the design of the graphical interface. The use of simple shapes, outlines
and pictograms allows information to be read and conveyed and enables imme-
diate interaction, harmonising language differences [27] and promoting constant
interaction.
From these premises, the research focused on digital tool development, able to
support collaboration within multidisciplinary groups, facilitating the sharing of
languages, project proposals and ideas and establishing equal interaction. The plat-
form named CoDE (Collaborative Design Ecosystem) is an open digital space that
aims to facilitate interaction and knowledge transfer. It consists of an open and collab-
orative platform that guides multidisciplinary groups in the team-building phases,
the organization of project activities, the construction of a common language, and
the visualization of the archetypes that will guide to the final solutions. It is realized
according to a design process that starts from the definition of functionalities, the
collection of information in a database up to developing diagrammatic systems that
facilitate constant access to the team’s information and simplify the collaboration
between parties. The process is organised and divided into 5 phases:
1. identification of parameters, characteristics and functionalities, starting from
the background analysis and the data collection activity;
2. building of the database carried out through a process of analysis and coding;
3. definition of the Graphical User Interface (GUI), starting from the identification
of visual languages, codes and diagrams able to facilitate interaction;
4. digitisation of the functionalities and definition of the platform prototype;
10 M. Carlomagno

5. testing of the interface effectiveness and criticalities through a pilot study with
the reference target.
The parameters defined for the development of the tool’s functionalities are: visu-
alisation, customisation, sharing and variability, in order to support collaborative,
visual, dynamic and interactive design.
Visualization is the parameter capable of showing inputs of information in graph-
ical diagrams, from the visualization of the team composition to the identification of
the skills involved and gaps useful with the aim to optimize the team. The elements
related to this parameter are determined according to disciplines, project fields and
themes placed in the database.
Customization is the parameter that can configure graphic diagrams, maps and
work timelines on varying inputs, to implement teams with new skills during the
project development. The elements related to this parameter are determined according
to the choices of the team members concerning the contents of the tool.
Variability is the parameter that makes the information editable by the team and
consequently set the graphical visualizations related to the tool functionalities. The
elements related to this parameter are determined according to the codes and data
entered in the database.
Sharing is the parameter that builds a repository of elements on which the team
finds feedback and approves, contents, forms, references, results and timing. The
elements related to this parameter are based on information entered in the platform
that flows into an open and implementable archive.
The four parameters guide the flowchart design, organizing the layout of the
platform and its contents, through the subdivision of layers of information and visu-
alizations that respond to the features and contents organized in the database. The
platform layout is illustrated through the description of the main interface pages (see
Figs. 1 and 2).
The first window of the homepage, is the introductive section of registration
and access to information, with tabs for sign-in and log-in and user/team profile

Fig. 1 User flow and UX elements definition for the platform development
Interfaces, Data and Plural Languages to Develop CoDE … 11

Fig. 2 Platform wireframe with the homepage, the user profile, how-to-navigate section and the
four functionalities layout

management. Moreover, in the first pages is possible to explore the instructions (how
to navigate), understand the purpose of each function and start the collaboration
work (see Fig. 3). The opening windows facilitate the visualization and consultation
of information, in synchronous or asynchronous mode, by all members of the group.
The next sections are related to the navigation of four functionalities: team-building,
timeline, glossary and meta-project, described in detail below. All features are linked
to the home page and to the user profile section where all the information selected
during the navigation are recorded. The four main functionalities are connected to
the categories of elements and information to be selected by all team members.

5.1 Team-Building

The team-building represents the first functionality, able to support the composition
of the multidisciplinary working group by suggesting the skills needed in the design
process, distinguished by areas and themes and to detect any skills gaps related to the
disciplines involved and those to be included in the team. It includes the identification
of the themes, disciplines and skills involved in the team, to visualize the competence
layers and identify a wider reference skill set for the team construction.
It consists of a section in which to build the team, through the choice of themes,
disciplines and skills involved. The layout of the navigation menu, located at the
bottom left, indicates the paths to access the three subcategories—themes, disci-
plines, skills and the next function. The information entered into the platform is
collected in the reference database and is displayed, within the tabs, in synthetic
12 M. Carlomagno

Fig. 3 Platform windows with the homepage, the registration section, the user profile and the four
functionalities: team-building, timeline, glossary and meta-project

diagrams that facilitate the choice and selection by the user. This section enables the
first phase of synergistic and equal collaboration, offering the possibility to visualize
and identify any gaps in disciplines and skills within the multidisciplinary team,
through the use of screens and systems of overlays and interactive visualization
menus (see Fig. 4).
Interfaces, Data and Plural Languages to Develop CoDE … 13

Fig. 4 Teambuilding functionality with the selection of themes, disciplines and skills of the team

5.2 Glossary

The glossary supports the construction of a common vocabulary through a lexical

database implementable with definitions related to words, concepts, and technical
terms most used by the different actors of the team during the project process. It
consists of the construction of a glossary useful for sharing a common language
within teams, through implementable definitions. It represents the space in which to
consult the definitions identified in the reference database and aims to facilitate the
sharing of a common language.
For this function, a second section dedicated to the implementation of the glossary
(add new definition) has been prepared. A space in which to identify new technical
terms and definitions that characterize the different disciplines involved in the team
and that can create misunderstandings in their use, for the divergence of meanings
they assume in different areas and disciplinary contexts (see Fig. 5).

5.3 Timeline

The timeline functionality facilitates the definition of the sequence of process phases,
agreeing on the expected results for each step, roles and deadlines. Moreover, it allows
for the management of objectives, the visualization and planning of activities of all
14 M. Carlomagno

Fig. 5 Glossary functionality with the list of words and the section to add new definitions

team members. It consists of the set-up of a space dedicated to the organization of

work phases, activities and deadlines guided by a code characterized by pictograms
that allow the construction and customization of a chronological sequence related to
the project. The purpose of this functionality is to organize the project process, iden-
tify activities, phases and deadlines, by generating a calendar of meetings and visu-
alize the level of interaction of the actors involved and how the disciplines intervene
in the work phases.
It is composed of a timeline and a series of pictograms differentiated by shape and
colour that lead to the customization of your process by identifying and calendaring—
phases, activities, deadlines or meetings and others—in order to organize and track
the activities of the team and share term and goals for projects realization (see Fig. 6).

5.4 Meta-Project

The meta-project functionality drives to visualize ideas through shapes, modifiable

through algorithms, and lets aggregate elements to synthetically represent ideas
during all the creative process phases. It is a system of shapes, colours and elements
guided by parameters and algorithms that allow the composition of elements, useful
for the visualization of the proposals in the meta-project. An abacus of forms and
codes, accessible to all team members, which allows the construction and sharing of
Interfaces, Data and Plural Languages to Develop CoDE … 15

Fig. 6 Timeline functionality with the timeline to personalize with phases, activities, deadlines and
others

archetypes. This functionality represents a virtual interaction space, useful to stim-

ulate the ideation phase in the teamwork and support the conceptualization of the
project idea to visually synthesize the purposes that emerged in the analytical phase.
This section is composed of the predisposition of basic shapes divided in solid,
outline and intersection and by inputs and parametric variables such as shape, colour,
dimension, surface finish, rotation and position on the plane. The parametric code
is defined in Grasshopper, a language and visual programming environment that
runs within the Rhinoceros 3D CAD software. The algorithm allows the overlapping
and the configuration of the different basic elements between them, translating the
creative process in a shared visualization of geometric shapes, determined by the
interaction between user and digital tool and by the relationship between shapes and
codes that generate a representative archetype of each team member (see Fig. 7).
The interface allows users, members of the team, to interact collaboratively and
immediately, at the same time, collects and classify data in a repository to make
information available to other groups and allowed to explore them on multiple levels.
Following the graphic definition of the platform screens, a first interactive digital
prototype was defined and tested on focus groups with samples similar to the target
audience to verify the clarity of the graphic interface, the functionalities and to
implement the user experience and flow.
16 M. Carlomagno

Fig. 7 Meta-project functionality with the exploration of shapes and the composition of digital
archetypes

6 Conclusions and Future Steps

The aspects investigated in this article are some of the possibilities offered today by
the digital platforms for the management of systems of relationships generated by
the collaboration between different actors and how these systems are influenced by
external factors. The use of communicative codes and graphical synthesis in digital
spaces allows spreading of information and knowledge, adopting interactive, visual
and multilevel languages able to involve people.
The platform intends to experiment with a new model of multidisciplinary collab-
oration able to reduce the disparities that are generated within the teams, through the
use of communication codes, and visual synthesis that allows a constant exchange
and interaction between the actors involved.
The realization of digital space, flexible and open, able to record inputs allowed
to define a model of collaboration and active participation in the project, through
customizable and interactive features and to facilitate the exchange of knowledge
and languages through an implementable repository. CoDE help to track activities,
visualize skills and have constant access to the team information, by facilitating
the management of phases and activities, activating a continuous comparison and
participation of different actors through interaction and experimentation of visual
codes.
Interfaces, Data and Plural Languages to Develop CoDE … 17

The graphical user interface of the platform was tested in several focus group
sessions, each composed of 3–4 participants, to test the user flow, functionalities
and graphical elements of the platform by using the “Think aloud protocol” on the
interactive prototype defined in Adobe Xd software. This led to the collection of
initial feedback and improvement of the graphic interface layout and user flow. In
the near future, further tests with new samples will be carried out to implement
the GUI and to analyze new needs for the definition of new functionalities for the
platform CoDE. The experimentation with multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary and
transdisciplinary groups at work during the creative process will allow the identi-
fication of other factors which hinder remote collaboration, misunderstandings and
conflicts negatively affecting the success of projects. The final step is the creation of
the website to launch the tool online and implement the platform database with new
information and data.

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Scratch-Based Game Development
Resource Set for a Toolkit to Game
Design

Pedro Beça , Sofia Ribeiro , Mónica Aresta , Rita Santos ,

and Ana Isabel Veloso

Abstract Games are engaging activities for students that can be applied in classes
worldwide. Simultaneously, toolkit’s potential has been rising over the years due to
its ability to encompass relevant tools on specific subjects. Moreover, toolkits can be
applied as authoring tools transforming students into game designers, motivating the
creation of digital and/or mobile games, and knowledge acquisition and engagement.
The Gamers4Nature (G4N) project has been researching on environmental-themed
games’ development, involving students in game development sessions. Aiming
to support the whole game design process for upper-secondary and undergraduate
education, the G4N project conceived a Toolkit to Game Design that has been used in
formal and informal contexts of education fostering the creation of digital games on
environmental themes. The G4N Toolkit, addressing both experienced and novice
students, was design in a User-Centered approach with iterative sessions for vali-
dating aesthetics and contents. As it was understood that students sometimes lacked
the skills to develop their games, preventing them to accomplish a finished product,
a complement to the already produced resources (Game Construction cards, Rapid
Game Design Document, environmental-themed cards, and Mobile Game Design
Guidelines), was developed: the Development Cards Set. This chapter introduces
the Development Cards Set creation process, to be validated through expert review
(by experts in the game development field) and by end-users who will test and validate
the development cards along dedicated workshops and game creation sessions.

P. Beça (B) · S. Ribeiro · M. Aresta · R. Santos · A. I. Veloso

Department of Communication and Art, University of Aveiro, Aveiro, Portugal
e-mail: pedrobeca@[Link]
S. Ribeiro
e-mail: saribeiro@[Link]
M. Aresta
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
R. Santos
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
A. I. Veloso
e-mail: aiv@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 19

N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
20 P. Beça et al.

Keywords Game creation process · Scratch programming · Toolkit to game

design · Gamers4Nature

1 Introduction

Games are an important part of human existence, with the human’s interaction with
games being found in various fields, from leisure activities to education [1]. In the
Education field, games have the potential to be used as a teaching strategy, either
by recurring to game-based learning approaches [2], or by engaging students in
game-creation activities—an approach that also allows them to develop specific
programming knowledge and skills [3, 4]. The creation of games, however, requires a
specific set of competencies and skills that sometimes may not-existe or be underde-
veloped, specially with younger audiences. In this scenario, the non-linearity that—
sometimes—pertains the game design process may push prospective creators away,
forfeiting the chance to nurture from non-experience users’ involvement.
In the field of game design, toolkits, namely authoring toolkits, can support
students to create artifacts by integrating the necessary tool for them to develop
a determine activity [5, 6].
In this scenario, and aiming to engage upper-secondary and undergraduate
students in active participation in game creation activities, the Gamers4Nature (G4N)
project, developed and validated a Toolkit to Game Design [7–10] that aims to
provide, in a single component, the necessary tools to allow any student to create
a full gaming experience: from the game narrative definition to its coding imple-
mentation. The G4N Toolkit addresses the several dimensions of game design: (1)
the game narrative is supported by the game construction cards set—that provide
information about the different elements that compose a game—by the rapid game
design document—that suggests a path to explore and articulate the game construc-
tion cards–, and by sets of thematic cards, that present information about specific
environmental-related themes and thus allows students to grow their knowledge and
awareness on the environmental field whilst creating games [3, 4]; (2) the game
aesthetics, with a set of mobile game design guidelines that provide support in the
design and aesthetics of a game considering literature and industry best practices
[10] and finally, (3) the game implementation/coding, with a set of cards that aids the
implementation process of a game, not only by suggesting an intuitive platform for
(non-)experienced programmers but also by tutoring (i.e. step by step) that platform’s
usage in the context of game development.
In this chapter, we present the game implementation cards development process,
from the theoretical background that supported its creation to its prototyping and vali-
dation process. Furthermore, we introduce the theoretical background that supported
the Development Cards Set creation process as well as the methodological approach
to be taken to validate through expert review (by experts in the game development
field) and by end-users who will test and validate the development cards along
dedicated workshops and game creation sessions is also introduced.
Scratch-Based Game Development Resource Set for a Toolkit … 21

2 Theoretical Background

2.1 Games: How Can We Define Them?

Games and play can be adjacent concepts, and indeed complexly related, they are
distinct: games can be board games, card games, sports, computer games, among
others; play can be either an activity involving games, or subset within the game
design field [11].
Games, as a fundamental part of human existence, are a complete and self-
sufficient “formal system that subjectively represents a subset of reality” [12, p. 8]:
formal since it has rules and a system due its parts that interact between themselves.
They can also be defined, in a more ludic or “ludological” approach, as a goal-directed
and competitive activity conducted within a framework of agreed rules [13].
According to some authors [14], games can create habits, sustain changes, and
indicate civilization’s preferences, weaknesses, and characteristics, hence games
have the potential to—applied in diverse approaches—promote knowledge devel-
opment and/or behavior change. In fact, students can benefit from their involvement
in games’ development process [15]. Despite minor variances in game’s definition,
there is a consensus that games consist of components within a framework of rules
[16].

2.2 Creating Games: Is There a Process?

Artifacts derive as a product of a design methodology that guides the creative process
and ensures the artifact’s quality [17]. Games, as artifacts, are created from scratch
[11], nonetheless, there is no fixed design process (only best practices [18]), in
fact, new approaches may lead to innovative designs. Nevertheless, we should never
overlook some game design basics, such as game mechanics and materials, and a
theme [11].
In a more general approach, a game—to be created—needs to be conceptualized,
written, built, and examined, consisting of the decision on what the game should be
(e.g. design, rules, mechanics, scenarios, setbacks) by defining each of the game’s
elements [18]. Notwithstanding, diverse authors consider different approaches to
this process: while Werbach & Hunter follow the Mechanics, Dynamics, Aesthetics
(MDA) framework [19], Fullerton uses game elements to build a game, and Duke
depicts a process of nine steps [18]. These diverse approaches to game design empha-
size that this process can be rethought according to the applied strategy to foster game
implementation and the target audience that is going to be the game designer.
There are some resemblances between game design process approaches: a concep-
tualization concerning the dimensions of the game narrative (e.g. what is the game
22 P. Beça et al.

about, the theme, what and how to achieve), the game aesthetics (e.g. visual appear-
ance, graphical content), and the implementation as in making the game work
[15, 17, 18].

2.3 Toolkits to Support the Game Creation Process

Purely theoretical education is proven not to be enough to teach in any design educa-
tion field, as learners indeed need to be involved in more practical experiences in
order to achieve and acquire knowledge regarding design processes [11]: in fact, and
when engaged in game design training courses, students must create games.
Having this into consideration, toolkits may have the potential to involve students
in design processes: on the one hand, due to their capacity of facilitating activities
[20], on the other hand because they are suitable for novice and experienced users,
and enhance creativity [5, 9].
Practical teaching in games, without disregard to its contiguity with computer
games, does not necessarily require game programming classes and exercises [11].
Therefore, besides the digital games rising, initiatives to develop games should not
be narrowed to digital approaches. Authoring toolkits have huge potential to users
since they are placed as creators and designers whilst nurturing and grasping the
advantages of having the required tools to execute a process, fulfilling its goals.
Toolkits have the ability to transpose abstract and complex concepts into practical
and clear definitions that may allow students to operationalize those abstractions into
concrete games [21]. Concerning games, there are multiple examples of toolkits or
card approaches to game ideation/brainstorming, narrative, and implementation. As
for game ideation: the Grow-A-Game cards uses conscious design and analysis of
digital games[22]; GameSeekers is played similar to UNO and uses cards in a collab-
orative game to visually build a game idea likewise in a mindmapping process [23].
Regarding game narrative: through a book, (even non-experienced) game designers
are able to access a stepwise game development process [24, 25]. Finally, for game
implementation: digital songlines game engine toolkit supports the development of
Australian Indigenous storytelling in a sensitive manner by creating virtual cultural
landscapes in 3D game environment [26]; practical instruction on creating world-
class games that will be played repeatedly with over 100 lenses of fundamental
principles of game design [27].

3 Supporting the Game Creation Process: The

Gamers4Nature Toolkit to Game Design

The Gamers4Nature (G4N) project aims to promote students’ engagement with envi-
ronmental themes (e.g. microplastics, invasive species), hence fostering knowledge
Scratch-Based Game Development Resource Set for a Toolkit … 23

on climate preservation and the earth’s biodiversity by encouraging their participa-

tion in the development of environmental mobile games [7]. Since 2017, this project
has been working with upper-secondary and undergraduate students through a series
of workshops and game creation events, motivating them to create their own digital
games in game jam sessions and events.
In order to incite students’ participation, whilst nurturing collaboration and
engagement between peers and with the educational subjects, the G4N project has
implemented several strategies to support the game creation process. One of those
strategies consists of a toolkit to support the whole process of game creation, from
game narrative to game implementation, to be used even by novice users—those
with no previous experience in game design or game development. The G4N Toolkit
to Game Design (Fig. 1) comprises several resources: a game construction cards set
with 12 cards approaching an adapted version of Fullerton’s game elements [8, 18];
a rapid game design document presenting a path to explore the game creation cards
and building the game narrative; sets of thematic cards addressing nature and envi-
ronment preservation (e.g. microplastics, stag beetle, dune systems); and a Mobile
Game Design Guidelines cards set [10] that aims to help users when creating the
game interface.
As the G4N Toolkit intends to be used even by novice users—those with no
previous experience in game design or game development–, and as there was a
purpose to create a comprehensive resource that would support users all along the
digital game creation process, from narrative to implementation, a new set of cards—
the Scratch Development cards set was developed. With this new set of cards, the G4N
Toolkit to Game Design emerges as a resource able to support the whole game design

Fig. 1 The Gamers4Nature toolkit to game design: on the left the rapid game design document;
on the right, (in order) the game construction cards set, the thematic cards (the microplastics theme
example), the mobile game design guidelines cards set, and the new cards set: scratch development
cards
24 P. Beça et al.

process (from narrative to implementation), along its main stages: (1) conceptualizing
the game; (2) designing the game interface; and (3) implementing (coding) the game.
Along the game design sessions fostered by the G4N project, whilst students
used the G4N Toolkit to create and design their games, it became visible that some
students struggled when the time to implement the game arrived, stressing the need
to support (also) this stage of the process.
Conceptualizing and Writing the game. Game Design is a relation between
the game design/development output and the players’ experience [11]. Thinking
as a game designer requires a solid process from the game’s initial concept to its
creation to create a playable and satisfying experience [18]. For many people, the
ideation stage—which can be considered the beginning of the game design process—
can be an immediate barrier [18]. Furthermore, this process can be innovated, still
it must concern game design basic principles, such as mechanics, materials, and
themes [11]. The G4N project aims to innovatively answer this context, providing
and motivating students to be designers and creators of their own games, by providing
them with tools to be involved in this process consciously. To support the game’s
narrative construction, the G4N Toolkit encompasses three main elements: the game
construction cards set, the rapid game design document, and the thematic cards.
The game construction cards and the game design document can be used together,
comprising cards clarifying the game’s main elements and the document suggesting
a path to explore and articulate the cards [4, 8]. As the intent is to create games
addressing environmental awareness themes, the G4N Toolkit also provides cards set
addressing several environmental-related themes. By challenging students to create
games on these topics, their engagement and interest is being prompted and motivated
[4]. Sessions held with upper-secondary and undergraduate students emphasize the
G4N Toolkit’s usefulness and value [3, 9], while the plasticity of these resources
was pointed out by game design experts, who mentioned that it transmits different
perspectives on game design, supports ideas’ systematization and exploration, and
guides the game construction [9, 10, 12].
Designing the game interface. Games are nothing more than an idea when they
are limited to a narrative. Therefore, it is essential to design the game within an envi-
ronment where players can experience the game narrative connected with graphics.
Likewise any other field, the graphical appearance of any output constraints the
overall experience with it, hence it is crucial to design a game complying with game
standards, avoiding that the gamers’ experience is affected by a bad design.
Along the game design sessions held with students, some barriers related with
interface design were identified, hence an additional set of cards was added to the
G4N Toolkit: the Mobile Game Design Guidelines Cards set [10]. Validated with
experts in design and in games, the set included 28 cards approaching essential
guidelines for mobile game design, from interface to interaction, performance and
promotion categories. While the previous resources help to define the game narrative,
the MGDG cards filled a gap on the G4N Toolkit by bridging the game narrative with
the interface design implementation.
Scratch-Based Game Development Resource Set for a Toolkit … 25

Implementing (coding) the game. Nevertheless of the Toolkit’s efficiency in

supporting the game design process (see [3, 4, 7–10]), to fulfil the whole game
creation process students still must implement the game themselves.
Following the approach taken for the Toolkit’s development—to create resources
able to guide users with and without experience in game design to create digital
games—a set of cards with examples and instructions on how to implement a game
using programing visual languages was created. Research suggests that, amongst the
several visual programming languages that can be used to create games, Scratch is
one of the most used in schools and is already integrated into computer science formal
and informal education in schools and universities, due to its programming teaching
potential combined with its usability [28–30]. Taking this into consideration, Scratch
was chosen to exemplify the coding process, due to its block-based approach, suitable
for both experienced programmers and non-experienced users.

4 The Development Cards Set for Scratch

Aiming to synthesize in a single tool the ability to support the entire game creation
process—from the idea to its materialization in Scratch–, the G4N research team
created a new set of cards to fulfil the last step in the game creation process:
developing, i.e. coding, the game.
Scratch was the software chosen due to its easy learning curve, hence supporting
non-experienced students in both game design or the software itself. The block-based
approach integrated in Scratch is easy to learn and self-explanatory: e.g. a student
does not need to have previous teaching concerning loop events to understand that
by inserting any block into the “forever” block that that event will occur indefinitely.
Although there are several resources to aid Scratch’s use, this cards set is pertaining
since it completes the G4N Toolkit, allowing it to—in a single resource, aggregating
several components—support the entire game design process.
This new set encompasses 29 cards divided into seven separate categories
approaching different stages of the game development process. Each category groups
multiple cards on similar or related topics: before starting the game; start the game;
move; visual appearance; sprites and backdrops; audio; repetition and decision struc-
tures; variables and messages. The category titles were defined to be explicit and clear
regarding its objectives, and also the cards’ title (see Table 1) were denominated and
written in a way that would be evident for even non-experienced users.
The cards were designed in a way so that they can be used separately or as a group.
For example, one card explains—by itself—how to start the game, while another card
depicting how to move a sprite, mentions the card to start the game, and then answers
its propose. This way, users can form a sequence of cards and thus building the hole
code structure for their game.
In order to be easily distinguished from the G4N Toolkit’s card sets addressing
game narrative, and following the same design approach taken for the development
of the mobile guidelines cards, the development cards set follows a tutorial format
26 P. Beça et al.

Table 1 Development cards

Category Cards title
set: scratch orientations
divided into seven categories Before starting the game Clean game scenario
Start the game Start the game with the scratch
flag
Start the game with broadcast of a
message or word
Start the game with a button click
Sprites and Backdrops Create new sprite
Insert sprite
Create new backdrop
Insert backdrop
Change backdrop
Move Move sprite with keyboard
Move sprite automatically
Collisions between objects
Collision with specific color
Variables and messages Create variable
Show or hide variable panel
Scoring points
Change variable value
Broadcast message to the whole
game
Sound Choose a sound from scratch’s
gallery
Play background music
throughout the whole game
Play sound in backdrop change
Repetition and decision Repeat an event forever
structures Count the game’s time
Create conditions to execute
events
Logic operators: This and that?
Logic operators: This or that?
Visual appearance Buttons
Animate game buttons
Add sequential texts
Scratch-Based Game Development Resource Set for a Toolkit … 27

Fig. 2 “Move sprite with keyboard” card from the move category: a model of the development
cards set

by integrating an image that visual represent the code block (card’s front) and step
by step instructions that can be read and followed to build that block (card’s back). In
fact, the image aids in the block’s replication and the text specifies the groups where
each block can be found (see Fig. 2).
The development cards set is composed by 29 cards divided into 7 categories
approaching different objectives and actions of a game: before starting the game;
start the game; move; visual appearance; sprites and backdrops; audio; repetition
and decision structures; variables and messages.
As for the cards’ layout, the card’s front is composed of the G4N project’s logo-
type, the category’s title, an image with the built Scratch blocks, the card’s title,
and the title of the card set. In what concerns the aesthetics, the card has a border
that reflects the card’s content category—common to all the cards in this set-, each
category having a different color, and the layout is similar to the other card sets in
the G4N Toolkit. The cards’ back comprises topics, each one regarding a specific
step of the Scratch function’s construction. Furthermore, it includes the category’s
title and the G4N project’s logotype as well as, when needed, a reference—marked
by an asterisk—to other related cards in the set.
28 P. Beça et al.

5 Conclusions

The acknowledgment of the games’ potential in formal and informal contexts has
been prompting researchers to develop work in this field. Furthermore, there is
a worldwide recognition concerning the capability of toolkits to aggregate useful
resources, specifically for games, as well as to convey relevant information enhancing
students’ understanding of subjects and their motivation towards them.
In this line of thought, the Gamers4Nature project, allying two slopes—games
and environmental preservation and awareness–, has developed a Toolkit to Game
Design encompassing a full approach to the game design process. Throughout this
development cycles, in a User-Centered approach, the project’s research members
have conducted iterative sessions with experts and end-users in order to evaluate the
resources’ aesthetics as well as the theoretical knowledge provided and the integration
in real-life scenarios of these resources. From the G4N studies’ empirical evidence,
the project has scaffolded the need to provide support for both experienced and
non-experienced students in game design field, aiding them with tools to create
games—from scratch—games concerning a specific theme. Hence, in this context,
by successively producing decks of cards for each step of the game design process,
the project as now achieved a full version of the Toolkit, which contains: Game
Construction cards, a Rapid Game Design Document, environmental thematic cards,
Mobile Game Design Guidelines, and Development Cards to create games resorting
to Scratch.
This project hopes that, by providing a full toolkit addressing the multiple stages
of game design, can assist even non-experienced students to create their own games,
whilst promoting environmental awareness. The conducted sessions, in which more
than 160 students were already involved [3], shown the G4N Toolkit’s potential and
how one tool can support the development and creation of so many diverse results.

5.1 Future Work

Similarly to previously developed components of this Toolkit, the research team

aims to validate these cards with end-users in order to execute possible required
adjustments and improvements, and make available this resource to support game
ideation, creation and implementation. Following the same approach taken for all the
other toolkit’s resources [3], this new set of cards will be validated by experts in the
game development field (expert review) who are familiar with this coding language
and are used to work younger audiences, and by end-users who will test and validate
the development cards along dedicated workshops and game creation sessions.
Future work also includes the development and validation of other sets of Scratch
cards, designed to be used in the specific creation of environmental-related games.
These cards will follow the design aesthetics and approach of the introduced
Development Cards.
Scratch-Based Game Development Resource Set for a Toolkit … 29

Acknowledgements This work is part of the Gamers4Nature project Gamers4Nature (POCI-01-

0145-FEDER-031047) that has the financial support of FCT—Foundation for Science and Tech-
nology (Portugal)/MCTES—Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education and FEDER
under the PT2020 agreement.

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Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones:
A Communitarian Participation Mobile
App to the Portuguese Context

Manuel Gil, Liliana Gonçalves , and Lídia Oliveira

Abstract Forest fires have caused devastating social and economic damage in
the forest-dependent regions of Portugal. This phenomenon can accentuate in the
following years due to many factors that can aggravate conditions like extreme
drought, lousy forest management, or interior depopulation. On digital platforms,
forest fires are a target of investigation and analysis. The results point to a few
varieties of mobile applications, most of them focused on the combat phase. The
ones about prevention are limited and with little interaction. This work summa-
rizes the Portuguese situation respecting forest fires and presents a study of the
country’s existing apps and prevention campaigns. Based on the analysis of inter-
views conducted by the orientation team, a mobile application oriented to the active
participation of the community in the prevention of forest fires was conceptualized,
prototyped, and tested. This app lets users add alert points and/or public actions on
a map and give them space for discussion and helpful information.

Keywords Wildfires prevention · Mobile app design · Interaction design ·

Communication design

1 Introduction

Wildfires are a natural phenomenon that affects the Portuguese forest causing signif-
icant social and economic damage. This is a natural phenomenon exacerbated by
different factors such as (1) the behavior of those who manage the forest and other
factors; (2) climate change and prolonged periods of critical temperatures; (3) the

M. Gil · L. Gonçalves (B) · L. Oliveira

University of Aveiro, Aveiro, Portugal
e-mail: lilianabgoncalves@[Link]
M. Gil
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
L. Oliveira
e-mail: lidia@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 31

N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
32 M. Gil et al.

structural profile of the Portuguese forest, mainly composed of private owners [1];
and (4) substantial depopulation of the interior [2], which is where the largest area
of the national forest is concentrated.
Fire prevention is fundamental to protecting forest, communities, and their social
and economic well-being, so it is essential to consider tools that contribute to knowl-
edge about preventive practices based on the active participation of different actors
in wildfires.
In today’s society, digital platforms are vital communication media to broadcast
relevant information and a tool to help in responding to emergencies, particularly
social networks [3]. Most mobile apps about wildfires are oriented toward the combat
phase, and their features may not always be useful for those mainly affected by
this phenomenon [4]. The intersection of these two domains, forest fires, and their
prevention carried out by digital platforms, is the main motivation of this research,
whose objective is to conceptualize and develop a mobile app for the community
prevention of forest fires in Portugal.

2 Methodology

Portugal is different from other European countries due to the inherent characteris-
tics of its territory and the current management of its forest [5]. To cope with these
attributes, the authors adopted applied exploratory research focused on preventing
fires through digital platforms, aiming to make an innovative and beneficial contri-
bution to the main actors affected by this phenomenon. This research approach aims
to bring together the stakeholders of each region to increase their participation in
forest prevention and conservation actions, thus contributing to the protection and
well-being of the community.
It will be used data from different instruments. In the initial phase, it is carried
out research for the theoretical framework to identify the needs of potential users.
Also, it will be considered the results of interviews carried out with citizens and
stakeholders from São Pedro do Sul and Pedrogão Grande (two municipalities in
the Central Region of Portugal at significant risk of wildfires) and surveys with the
scientific community of the central region of Portugal held by Gonçalves [6]. These
sought to identify stakeholders’ and community members’ infocommunication needs
and assess their propensity to use a digital platform oriented towards fire prevention.
Thus, the data obtained through interviews and surveys of different actors in the
context of wildfires was used to define the functional requirements and design the
application’s prototype. This prototype was later subject to usability tests by users
with profiles similar to those defined in the empirical data collection.
Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 33

3 Theoretical Framework

Research in wildfire prevention linked to digital platforms is still limited. However,

the literature review identified Voluntary Geographic Information (VGI) as a valu-
able tool in disaster prevention. It allows digital platform users to share relevant
data with an associated geographic context [7]. This type of information, associated
with maps, can be presented on any platform and is reachable by most citizens. It
can be essential in decision-making and more effective communication with other
community members. Therefore, the widespread use of mobile devices provides
opportunities for implementing IGV-based systems in communities and enhancing
their characteristics, allowing any user to share information they consider relevant
about a given event.
Haworth et al. [8] state that community participation in local decisions is funda-
mental for each region’s proper functioning and democracy. IGV systems can be a
potential contributor to maintaining this good functioning, including the prevention of
forest areas and community protection. Thus, disseminating information associated
with a location is considered the most appropriate way of transmitting information
concerning the theme of wildfires. Another most frequent characteristic raised from
this bibliographic review, which involves the community’s participation, is the use of
data collected by citizens or volunteers with an associated geographic context, which
specialists then analyze. This kind of approach applied to the wildfire topic promotes
research progress, improves forest management and the active participation of the
surrounding population [9]. Hence, digital platforms can be the tool that speeds up
this entire data collection process and, simultaneously, communication between the
different actors in forest management.
However, some of the participants raised privacy and veracity issues regarding
using the IGV [8] or concerns about collecting wrong or malicious information [9].
The case study by Nayebi et al. [4] about the fire of Fort McMurray studies this
problem by comparing the functionalities of existing fire-oriented apps with the
discussions on social media during the events, concluding that many of the apps did
not contain beneficial functionalities that could be used during a crisis.
On the other hand, it is also essential to clarify to potential users that these systems
work as an auxiliary tool that complements the prevention and management process
[7]. For practical effects, each municipality must implement concrete strategies, as
described in the studies by [10, 11]. Both authors analyze cases of municipalities
that have implemented cross-sectional mitigation measures for the entire community,
positively reducing the spread of occurrences. These, applied to a digital platform,
can further increase its effectiveness and thus enhance the levels of protection of
populations residing in forest areas.
34 M. Gil et al.

4 Wildfires in Portugal

Forest fires are one of the most devastating phenomena in Portugal. The Institute
for the Conservation of Nature and Forests (ICNF) released the structural hazard
letter for the 2020s to 2030s in Portugal, revealing a potentially devastating scenario
(Fig. 1).
It is crucial to know the causes and risk factors contributing to dangerous levels
as high as those represented in the previous image.
The trend toward the worsening of extreme weather conditions is a catalyst for
the occurrence of large fires [13]. The great fires of 2017 in Portugal are an example.

Fig. 1 Structural hazard chart 2020–2030 released by ICNF [12]

Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 35

With high temperatures and extreme drought, trees are more vulnerable to diseases
and pests, leading to more dead trees becoming more susceptible to fire [14].
Other aspects can be factors for a high level of risk. The structural profile of
the Portuguese forest shows that only about 3% of forest land is owned by public
entities, unlike in the European Union, where 40% of forests are in the hands of
public entities [1]. This scenario worsens when there is a high level of property
fragmentation, making efficient and coordinated forest management difficult [5].
On the other hand, another of the leading causes of fires in Portugal today is
arsonism and negligent use of fire, mainly in burnings and fires and the re-ignition of
other occurrences [15]. These data reveal the insufficient awareness of communities
regarding forest protection, risk behaviors, and good practices.
These factors increase structural hazards and the risk of large fires, making
it extremely important to adopt effective prevention measures that engage the
population, authorities, municipalities, and other national territory managers.

4.1 Communication Campaigns to Prevent Wildfires

in Portugal

Concerning prevention actions and fire risk mitigation strategies, which are essential
for protecting communities living in regions with significant forest areas, specific
prevention measures must be adopted in the Portuguese context to reduce the risk of
fire more efficiently and effectively.
The analysis of the Portuguese scenario identified the need for interventions in
4 major areas, such as preventing negligent ignitions, creating networks of fuel
management lanes in critical areas, implementing perimeter control tactics and fire
management strategies, and restructuring the firefighting organization [5].
After these, concrete measures were developed, including communication with
the communities from the outset. In this context, national and municipal awareness-
raising plans included disseminating good practices, reducing risk behaviors, and,
above all, increasing participation and communication between communities most
affected by the fires.
This research analyzed national communication campaigns to prevent wildfires
between 2017 and 2019. The goal was to understand these campaigns’ informa-
tive focus, media, and target audience, focusing mainly on digital media. This data
collection was necessary to recognize the method of action with the communities.
Regarding the communication campaign of 2017, in charge of ICNF, awareness-
raising posters, short messages related to good practices, and guidelines for forest
protection aimed at defined target audiences were identified. However, the bet on
digital products was reduced. Except for advertising spots on national television and
radio, the focus on other digital platforms such as smartphones and social media was
short. Information in this format could be found on multiple institutions’ websites, but
36 M. Gil et al.

with unappealing approaches and without a previously defined campaign. The wild-
fire prevention communication plan for 2018 remained in charge of ICNF and was
quite similar to the previous year. However, content dissemination on web platforms
was increased.
Nevertheless, there were no concrete implementation plans for digital media.
There were only used webs from different institutions to disseminate digital content
without specific wildfire prevention campaigns. In 2019, the national awareness plan
was passed to the Agency for the integrated management of Rural Fires (AGIF) to
promote a coordinated action between forest protection entities such as ICNF, Civil
Protection, and GNR. In this awareness plan, digital platforms were more robustly
adopted to support the campaign “Portugal Chama”,1 mainly on web platforms and
social networks. In physical format, leaflets and posters were reused in the same style
as previous campaigns.
On a digital level, it was possible to collect some of the videos referring to the
advertising spots for television, using the slogan and relevant messages to prevent
fires and protect forests and the communities within them.
Content dissemination on web platforms can be accessed from any online device,
such as the website [Link], or the social media of private entities that
partner with AGIF to disseminate the national campaign. The [Link]
website is still active today and is now one of the top online information spots
regarding the “Portugal Chama” campaign. The website has an appealing visual
appearance using many images and short and easy-to-interpret messages. It also has
useful contacts at various points on each webpage to get more detailed information.

4.2 Mobile Apps About Wildfires

A survey of mobile apps dedicated to wildfires was conducted to understand how

existing apps are used and their most common features. The research was carried out
on Android and IOS operating systems on official app search engines. The keywords
used in the app stores search engine were: Wildfires; Forest Fires; Fogos2 ; Incêndios3 ;
Incêndios Florestais4 ; Forest Management. An international geographic scope was
applied, which means Portuguese or other mobile applications were eligible. Apps in
the beta phase and platforms not directly related to the topic of Forest Fires or Forest
Management, such as Urban Fires or Video Games, were excluded. Only free apps
were downloaded from both stores (Apple Store and Google Play). The inclusion
criteria for the Android operating system were to have at least 10.000 downloads and
a minimum 3.5 score, given by users on a scale from 0 to 5. These criteria did not
apply to the IOS environment due to the limited number of results (Fig. 2).

1 This slogan can be double understood as “Portugal calls” or “Portugal flames” in Portuguese.
2 Portuguese word to “fires”.
3 Portuguese word to “fires”.
4 Portuguese expression to “wildfires”.
Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 37

Fig. 2 Number of apps found for each keyword in different operating systems

Twenty-one apps were analyzed. More results (15) were recorded in the Android
environment than in the IOS environment (11). Five apps appeared in the search
results on both operating systems. Five are national apps, twelve have international
context, and four have regional scope. After analyzing its characteristics and features,
each app was placed in a category representing its primary purpose. The following
table reveals the typology of each app (Table 1).
The results demonstrate more apps in the combat typology (see Fig. 3), with
features such as listing occurrences by georeferencing, information about combat
means, and notifications of specific occurrences in areas defined by the user. Of the
21 apps analyzed, 11 are included in the combat typology. One has a regional scope,

Table 1 Typology of analyzed apps

Combat Prevention Forest Prevention (1) Simulation
management and forest Information/(2)Information
management and prevention
– [Link] – Incêndios – Geo forest – Forest-IN – Forest fires glossary (1) – Wildfire
– Incêndios JCYL – Forest app – Prociv Madeiraa analyst
Direto watcher – Forestry – Prociv Azoresa pocketa
– Fogos em – Forest
Portugala manager
– AB – Die
wildfire Waldapp
– Incêndios
Rurais
– Firemap
a Apps analyzed in both operating systems, Android and IOS
38 M. Gil et al.

10%
Combat
5%
5% Prevention

Forest Management
9%
52% Forest Management and
Prevention
Informative
14%
Simulation

5%

Fig. 3 Percentage of apps in each typology

five have a national context, and the rest are international. All applications analyzed
in the combat typology use georeferencing to record wildfires. Five of them disclosed
the combat means in the wildfires. Notifications are also a standard feature, present
on several platforms and in different formats. They can vary between alerts on the
status of a wildfire or alerts of events in areas selected by the user. The wildfire risk is
also included in several apps in this typology, although this is considered a preventive
measure. In addition to this characteristic, information on behaviors to prevent forest
fires was also observed in one of the combat typology apps.
Five of the 21 apps were categorized in the prevention typology. The most frequent
prevention features are disseminating risk behaviors or good practices in a textual
or audiovisual format with little interactivity and without animations. Added to this
category, the forest management, and information typologies also appear since short
and long-term preventive actions can consider information about prevention and
forest management. Both allow the adoption of strategies from an early stage to
protect the forest and thus reduce the occurrences caused by negligent management.
Three applications were included exclusively in the forest management compo-
nent and two in the aggregate typology of forest management and prevention. The
apps included solely in the forest management typology focus on creating systems
that allow the user to register forest areas that he owns to help the management of
these spaces. The features of the aggregated typology included disseminating good
practices in text or video formats with simple navigation menus. One of the platforms
allows the evaluation of existing videos and the possibility of adding new videos.
This research allows us to conclude that there is a trend toward creating mobile
apps dedicated to the combat phase to inform about wildfires in real-time. About
half of the analyzed apps focus on presenting information related to occurrences in
a specific geographic area. Despite being beneficial for the general population from
an informative point of view, this feature may not be essential for the communities
Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 39

directly affected during the wildfires, as exemplified in the study carried out on the
fires in Fort McMurray [4].
Apps targeting the combat phase are downloaded more often and contain more
reviews in app stores. Its geographic scope and the interest of the general unaffected
population may also contribute to that.
It was also identified a limited number of platforms exclusively to prevent forest
fires. These mainly focus on disseminating good practices and behaviors or even
forest management practices in text, video, and audio formats. The apps included
in the typology of forest management do not have a connection to wildfires. They
were only found in searches in app stores through the keyword ‘Forest Manage-
ment’, which implies the disconnection between these two topics in digital platforms.
Those included only in the forest management category have an international scope.
Thus, sharing content between users is less efficient. On the other hand, apps with a
regional context included in the information and prevention typologies present more
detailed information about their area of reach. These can be more relevant to the
target audience, somehow bringing people closer to local authorities.
Most of the analyzed applications focus on the combat phase with a national
geographic scope in the Portuguese context. No application was found exclusively
designed for community prevention or forest management assistance, which may
demonstrate the little investment in this area. It should also be noted that there
is no direct link between the planned and implemented prevention campaigns and
any Portuguese mobile app, thus losing another media to inform and engage the
population on wildfire prevention.

5 Conceptualization and Development of a Mobile App

to Prevent Wildfires in the Portuguese Context

Based on the previous research, the definition of functional requirements that serve
as a foundation and support for developing the prototype and its implementation are
then carried out. The following sections describe the results obtained in each of the
steps.

5.1 Functional Requirements

The definition of functional requirements is a fundamental step where all the possi-
bilities of a system are described before implementation. It is essential to outline
the system’s features, some of its properties, and some of its restrictions. It is also
necessary to define the usage flow and the data model that will be valuable in the
implementation phase. After defining the functionalities and characteristics designed
for the application, the prototype phase proceeds.
40 M. Gil et al.

The first iteration of the functional requirements is based on the systematic review
of the literature, the survey of mobile apps, and the study of Portuguese preven-
tion campaigns. The results from the interviews and surveys collected by Liliana
Gonçalves [6] on communication and digital needs in the context of rural fires are
also considered to adapt the functional requirements to the needs of potential users.
The priority was to define the target audience and understand their role in forest
protection and fire prevention. Another important aspect was how all these different
participants could communicate with each other and what they wanted to communi-
cate. Creating a regional context makes it possible to delimit the areas of intervention,
facilitating forest management, protection processes, and communication between
the different actors.
Owners are responsible for managing their properties, including preventive
measures and other maintenance actions. However, property abandonment and
progressive depopulation of rural areas increase wildfire risk. Thus, service providers
that facilitate the owners’ management, performing the maintenance and prevention
of the land more efficiently are also necessary. Inhabitants living in rural areas are
also essential for active prevention and the primary beneficiaries of wildfire preven-
tion. Finally, the authorities are also identified as territorial and rural fire management
agents. The following table represents the identified profiles for the app and some of
its possible prevention actions (Table 2).
Based on these data, the first functionalities were listed. To use the app and break
the anonymity barrier, each user must start a profile registration. Considering the
regionality context intended for the app, each user must define their region of interest
in the registration phase. However, the app can also be launched by location. In the

Table 2 Users’ profiles and their prevention actions

Landowners Inhabitants Services Providers Authorities
– Private owners – Residents – Forest associations – Municipalities
non-industrial – Non-residents – Forest sappers – ANEPC (Civil
– Private owners protection)
industrial – Firefighters
corporations
– GNR (Police force)
Prevention measures
– Management of fuel – Surveillance – Surveillance – Surveillance
strips and protection – Safe – Awareness-raising – Creation of access
of buildings on their agro-silvopastoral actions roads
land activities – Identification of – Elaboration and
– Scheduling of areas implementation of
burnings and – Fuel reduction municipal forest
burnings – Places of refuge defense plans
– Scheduling the use identification against fires
of machines – Certified areas (PMDFCI)
– Surveillance management
– Post-fire vegetation
control
Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 41

registration phase, each user must choose their role for their region between the
options Inhabitant, Owner, Service Provider, or Authority. The last two require a
subsequent validation of the profile.
Two main actions were defined in the application to encourage community partic-
ipation: Alerts and Public Actions. The execution process and the basic structure are
similar for both functionalities: the user can see, through a map, alerts, or public
actions created by other users or by himself, georeferenced to locate the place where
these were created. Alerts can have different typologies corresponding to critical
situations, such as poor fuel management or garbage accumulated in a specific area.
When added, the alert is subject to validation by other users to reinforce the need
to respond to it—the more checks by users, the merrier importance of the alert. The
alert can also be certified by authorities responsible for changing the alert status.
Likewise, each user can create a public action georeferenced on the map or add
their participation to one created previously. These arise from the need to create a
platform for the local population to interact and be an active part in protecting their
surrounding areas, protecting their properties, and buildings. They also have different
typologies, such as clearing forests, plantations, or fuel management. In the public
action add process, the user must define a date and the materials needed for the event.
Another feature resulting from interviews with citizens and institutions is a Forum
that allows debate between different users. It comprises different subsections related
to forest prevention and protection to funnel participation and minimize fraudulent
and destabilizing interventions. Each section is also filtered by region to present
posts related to the region of interest, improving the efficiency of the discussion and
reducing the noise of posts or comments. Each user can add a new post associated
with a topic or write comments on other posts.
This forum promotes communication within communities by giving potential
participants a space to share their ideas or concerns. However, moderation is needed
to maintain discussion quality and noise control in each subsection. This was a
concern expressed by citizens and institutions during interviews. The forum section
will integrate conduct rules to each subsection that all users must follow to address
this question. It will have volunteer moderators, previously certified, who can range
from members of the scientific community to community members actives in the
prevention and forest protection.
The remaining features of the app consist of information areas with relevant
data for populations, such as contacts of corporations or associations, spaces to
disseminate good practices, risk behaviors, and services provided by associations
inserted in the user’s area of interest. Finally, each user can create and define areas of
interest (surveillance) to receive notifications of alerts or public actions that intersect
these spaces. The following table represents a general model of the application’s
features (Table 3).
Additionally, a section oriented toward the response to the combat phase was
created. Here, the user can search for places of refuge near their location and mark
these places as safe so that other users have this knowledge and can enjoy the space.
The following table represents the roles of each type of user and their possible actions
and characteristics (Table 4).
42 M. Gil et al.

Table 3 Functional requirements defined for the app

Alerts Public actions Forum Information
– With GPS location – With GPS location – Subsections – Contacts
– Alert description – Public action – Posts and comments – Good habits
– Different typologies description – Filtering by topics – Risk behavior
– Alert status – Different types (help, information, – Service
– Checks (users) – Date of the event research) and regions providers
– Certification – Necessary materials – Self-moderation
(authorities) – Participants
– Alert photos – Public action photos
– Notifications – Notifications

Table 4 Profile types, possible actions, and content on the profile page
Landowners Inhabitants Services providers Authorities
– Add alert – Add alert – List available – Change alert status
– Add public action – Add public action services – Change public
– Add posts – Add posts – Add alert actions status
– Add public action – Create notifications
– Add posts – List contacts
Profile Page
– Alert history – Alert history – Contacts – Contacts
– Public actions – Public actions – Services type list – Intervention area
history history – Intervention area
– Areas of interest – Areas of interest
(surveillance) (surveillance)
– Contacts – Contacts

5.2 Prototype

The prototype design was carried out using the InVision Studio platform and was
designed to be demonstrated on a device with specific dimensions, namely the
Samsung S8 smartphone.
This step aimed to compose a first version of the interface based on the previously
defined functional requirements. Some key aspects were considered: the user profile,
the type of use, and the application’s environment. Graphically, the group of icons
used should be easily perceptible and always supported by text. The color palette
should also converge with the app’s concept, using colors that resemble those of the
forest and its natural environment. A different font group has also been defined for
titles, subtitles, text buttons, and description texts. Screens were also created for each
of the main features listed in the functional requirements step with interactions that
allow the user to navigate through the different screens (see Fig. 4):
• home registration screen, with personal data and regions of interest or based on
location;
Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 43

• home page, with a menu with the different sections on the platform, information
on alerts and public actions in the areas of interest to the user, and a navigation
bar;
• user profile page, with information about their alerts, public actions, and areas of
interest;
• screen for adding a new area of interest (central point and radius) to receive
notifications of alerts and public actions in that area;

Fig. 4 Different screens of the app

44 M. Gil et al.

• alerts screen, with information on typology, status, whether it has already been
certified by the authorities, whether or not it has an associated public action, and
an icon to check the alert;
• public actions screen, with information on existing actions in that area and the
option to create a new one through a map with georeferencing and the possibility
of adding images;
• forum screen, with a list of topics related to forestry prevention, protection, and
well-being of the community, visualization of existing posts and comments filtered
by region of interest, search filter by topic, and button to add a new post;
• information screen, with a carousel of topics and relevant content.

Usability Tests
The test consists of 6 tasks encompassing the main activities and application usage
flows, with an estimated 10 to 15 min duration. Due to restrictions caused by the
InVision Studio platform, which allows the creation of prototypes with screens of
only one dimension, the tests were carried out in person using the Samsung S8
Smartphone. As a support tool, each participant was provided with a document that
described the app concept, the participant profile, and the test tasks, with a space to
assign a level of difficulty in the test execution and add pertinent observations. The
research team had a similar document to record the behaviors and difficulties felt by
the participant during the execution of the tasks.
Ten usability tests were carried out. Despite being a convenience sample, the
profile of the participants was evenly distributed, corresponding to the audience
defined for the mobile app. The participants’ profiles vary between 25 and 63 years
old, from students to civil servants and secondary and tertiary sector workers with
different levels of qualification to owners and inhabitants of regions frequently
affected by wildfires.
The test results showed some app usability aspects that needed reflection and
some navigation problems demonstrated and exposed by participants. Some of the
responses suggest adding a temporary “successfully added” feedback after creating
an alert or public action. Another common suggestion is to give the possibility to see
alerts or public actions in a list, thus providing more reading formats. One participant
considered that the information at the top of the homepage regarding the user’s region
of interest and their current location should be buttons to access the respective sections
and not just textual content. Finally, one participant suggested reflecting on the type
of font chosen for the titles, mentioning that “they may not be easy to read”.
Overall, the high-fidelity prototype received positive reviews from participants,
who were pleased with the simplicity of the screens and ease of use. All these sugges-
tions have been considered and applied in the app implementation phase described
in the next section.
Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 45

5.3 Implementation

The app implementation phase is still in progress. This section will describe what
has been done until now and the future perspectives.
Based on the functional requirements and the designed high-fidelity prototype,
services that best suit the app features and allow the easy integration of all the different
system components were defined. After reading the documentation of different types
of services available and considering the time constraints of the research, the decision
was made to use Amazon Web Services (AWS) services that allow establishing a
more robust connection and more accessible in temporal terms between the different
systems components. Below is the list of services used and the system architecture:
• AWS Amplify (provides tools that streamline the development and implementa-
tion of the backend and frontend of a mobile application)
• DynamoDB (database)
• AWS AppSync (API)
• S3 (image storage)
• Cognito (user authentication) (Fig. 5).
In the figure, it is possible to observe the complete system architecture from
the database (dynamo DB), its integration with the API (AWS AppSync), which
communicates with mobile devices through the AWS Amplify service, which also
adds the authentication service (Cognito) and the image storage service (S3). In the
frontend component, the application is implemented using react-native, a javascript
framework, allowing the development of the mobile application in Android and IOS
environments and the integration with the remaining components of the system.
However, the application is structured to work only on smartphones supported by
the Android operating system in the current development phase.

Fig. 5 App system architecture

46 M. Gil et al.

The development of the system started with the installation of the Amplify CLI
tool, which creates a backend structure for later integration with the mobile appli-
cation. Then the project was initialized in react-native with a base structure of a
mobile application. The next step consisted of integrating Amplify services into the
mobile app structure. Thus, it became possible to integrate the remaining system
components, such as the API, authentication, and image storage services.
For the database implementation, the data model and the necessary access points
were generated by using Amplify CLI tool. Since this is automatic, it was only
necessary to define the attributes of each database type and how they will connect
between the different types.
The Cognito authentication service, which allows the management of users, user
groups, and registration and login methods, was also integrated using the Amplify
CLI tool through the ‘amplify add auth’ command in the terminal.
This integration process defined how users must acquire access to the application.
It was then determined that the registration process would require a username, pass-
word, email, and mobile number for each potential user. Users will only need the
email and password to log in to the app. Finally, the image storage service (S3), also
added through the Amplify CLI tool, allows the creation of access points (URLs) for
images used in alerts and public actions to be accessed whenever requesting them
from the application.
Having configured all the services necessary for the system to function, the previ-
ously conceptualized functionalities started to be implemented. An implementation
priority order was established to obtain a minimum functional product in the shortest
possible time. Features like authentication, alerts, public actions, forum, and the
profile page were prioritized. Below are some features already implemented in the
mobile application (Fig. 6).
The user authentication process is currently carried out using the component
provided by Amplify, which contains a pre-established workflow to log in or register.
In the future, the goal is to customize the interfaces, as outlined in the prototype, and
the process in the registration phase, giving the user the possibility to define their
typology (Inhabitant, Landowner, Service Provider, Authority) and their region of
interest. Those features have not yet been implemented.
The following figures show the app’s initial menu, as the page that allows the user
to navigate to all sections and the user profile page where their alerts, public actions,
and surveillance areas can be seen. Currently, on the homepage, the user can navigate
to the Forum section, Alert Maps, Public Actions, and the profile. The central button
on the lower navigation bar and the upper section is not implemented on this page.
It should contain immediate information about the alerts and public actions near the
user’s current location and region of interest. These two features will end the app
implementation splash screen (Fig. 7).
The following figure represents the Alerts section, where it is possible to observe
the georeferences already added to the map. Each marker on the map contains the
associated alert details. These can be viewed by clicking on one of the available
georeferences, and a pop-up will appear with the most relevant information. Here,
the user can confirm the alert by clicking on the flame icon. The screen shows a
Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 47

Fig. 6 Registration and login interfaces

new alert addition, which includes a georeference and its details, such as the title,
a brief description, typology, and a possible photograph. To validate this form, the
user must add at least the title and typology of the alert. After submitting the alert, it
will appear in the initial map of the section.
For the Alerts section, the following goals depend on implementing the different
user profile typologies, which will allow the alert status management, namely through
a profile with the authority typology. Another aspect to consider is the implementation
of displaying alerts in list format (Fig. 8).
The public actions section is identical to the one described for alerts. Here, the
user also can check the public actions added to the map and their details through the
pop-up that appears when clicking on one of the georeferences. As with the alerts, the
pop-up contains a “see more” button that redirects users to a page with full details of
the selected public action. There is also the functionality to add a new public action
from the lower right button that, when submitted, will be added to the initial map of
this section. The name of the public action, its typology, and a brief description must
be added to it, a date must be defined, and a photograph can be added.
In this section, two steps will be added later: the validation process to add a
public action and the possibility of adding necessary materials and confirmation of
participation (Fig. 9).
48 M. Gil et al.

Fig. 7 Homepage and profile page

Fig. 8 Alert section

Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 49

Fig. 9 Public actions section

The Forum section is represented in the following screens figures. It contains the
initial section screen with the different categories displayed. The user can select the
topic they want and be redirected to the list of publications referring to their chosen
category. Each post contains the title, a quote from the text, the date it was submitted,
and its author. As in the other app sections, the user can add a new post from the
bottom right button. To add a new post, the user must add a title, a topic for later
identification, and its textual content. Photos can also be added and displayed along
with the text. It is possible to add comments to posts, which allow discussion and
knowledge sharing between different users. This section’s development goals are
implementing topic and region of interest filtering functionality (Fig. 10).

6 Conclusions

Considering the current state of the art regarding digital platforms applied to wildfire
prevention, this work, still in the implementation phase, contributed with practical
results to the progress of research in this area. Regarding the current context of the
Portuguese forest and the future levels of danger [12], there is an urgent need to
adopt measures that reduce risk and keep the communities that inhabit the regions
engaged with forest protection actions. Given this scenario, the opportunity arose to
combine the two domains of this research: wildfire prevention and innovation in the
development of mobile applications and, in this way, contribute to wildfire prevention
through the use of digital services and devices.
50 M. Gil et al.

Fig. 10 Forum section

The theoretical framework allowed establishing a vast set of relevant data for
the app conceptualization. The literature review identified the most advantageous
systems for sharing information with an associated geographic context and its poten-
tial. The characterization of existing apps about wildfires enabled the systematiza-
tion of the most used and most efficient functionalities. The study of the prevention
campaigns carried out in Portugal provided a deeper understanding of the need to
raise awareness and engagement among the populations in the digital scope. With
this knowledge, functional requirements were defined to develop the mobile app.
The app’s potential users were identified and divided into different typologies. The
general app features were designed, such as maps of alerts and public actions and
the forum and information section.
The conceptualized mobile application provides communities with a platform
to share information, discuss ideas, identify needs, increase the proximity between
different actors, protect their forests in a regional context, and increase communica-
tion transparency between authorities and communities. On the other hand, the proto-
type developed, complemented with the usability tests for performance, allowed to
put into practice most of the functional requirements previously idealized. In this way,
it was possible to obtain a functional product that allows users to add content that they
consider relevant, such as alerts, share ideas and knowledge, clarify doubts through
the forum and create public actions to establish connections between community
members.
Thus, the result of this research can be seen as a foundation for communicational
proximity within communities living in forest areas—population, landowners, asso-
ciations, and authorities. By using tools to monitor and protect their areas of interest
and sharing information and knowledge with other stakeholders, communities can
protect themselves and the forest from wildfires. Thus, using digital solutions such as
the mobile app presented in this research can stretch the ties between actors, giving
them a sense of belonging and a collective purpose to benefit the community and
the territory itself. On the other hand, the knowledge collected, shared, and acquired
Preventing Wildfires from Our Phones: A Communitarian … 51

through the interaction with the app and users could increase the literacy about
preventing wildfires, leading to the adoption of preventive measures and behaviors
by all actors in each community.
In the future, the purpose is to continue the feature’s implementation, increasing
the robustness and security of the application and simultaneously sweetening the
user experience, which is essential in this type of platform. Also, it will be crucial to
plan the app implementation in Portuguese society through partnerships with local
and national authorities, stakeholders, and awareness communicational campaigns.

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Design and Development of an Online
Sales Platform for the Brand:
Engenharia Do Brigadeiro

Viviana Maia , Leonardo Pereira , and Daniel Brandão

Abstract The research here presented consisted in the Design and development of
an online store proposal for Engenharia do Brigadeiro (EB). This company only had
a Facebook and Instagram page and, with the Covid-19 pandemic, it felt the need to
reinforce its online presence, in order to reach more customers. Thus, we developed
a Design prototype for the mentioned online store that should answer to both the
company’s needs and to its customer’s needs. Methodology wise this research was
divided into three stages: in the first stage we undergone a literature review about the
currently undergoing consumers’ buying habits migration into the digital context, and
about User Experience Design. In the second stage we proceeded into understanding
and modelling our user and its main needs and goals. And in a third stage, from all
the data we collected from the previous research stages, we designed an online store
prototype, which we further submitted to Usability tests. The conclusions drawn
from these tests are presented at the end of this chapter.

Keywords E-commerce · User experience · Mobile website · Online shopping

1 Introduction

This research work focused on the development of a communication and online sales
platform for a brand called “Engenharia do Brigadeiro” (EB), a small Portuguese
company that sells made-to-order brigadeiros1 online, through its Facebook page.

1 Brigadeiros are a traditional Brazilian dessert.

V. Maia
Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave, Barcelos, Portugal
L. Pereira (B)
DigiMedia, Department of Communication and Art, University of Aveiro, Campus Universitário
de Santiago, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal
e-mail: leonardpeartree@[Link]
D. Brandão
Communication and Society Research Centre, Institute of Social Sciences, University of Minho,
Braga, Portugal
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 53
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
54 V. Maia et al.

Created in 2019, the company is in a growth phase, and in recent years it found
that, due to not having any other online sales platform besides Facebook, it was at
risk of losing customers. In addition, EB realized that many of its customers also
wanted information about its products, such as how they were made, what allergens
they might contain, whether they were suitable or not for celiac or vegan consumers,
what the products’ energy value was, among other product information.
Although EB only accepted orders through its Facebook page, it also had an
Instagram page as these were the networks most used by its customers. However,
the company felt that this kind of online presence was no longer enough to increase
its sales and brand visibility. And so, with the development of an online store, they
wanted to expand the way their customers could order and to increase their online
presence. Therefore, the lack of a pro-active online sales and communication platform
was a gap that EB needed to fill and which we proposed, with this research work, to
try to eliminate. So, the challenge was to create a design prototype of an online store
that would answer to these needs and motivations, both of EB and its customers,
being this the main goal of this research work.
The conceived platform derives, therefore, from the combination of several
sources of information and research, namely a survey about EB’s own needs and
requirements; the study and modeling of its most common user’s characteristics (EB’s
customers) identifying, therefore, their main needs; and also a literature review about
the migration of consumption habits from a physical context to the online context.
This was done to fulfill the main goal of this research work, which was to make the
process of buying products through the conceived and designed online platform easy
to use, intuitive, pleasant and useful, for its future users.

2 Research and Project Goals

The current research work consisted in the study and development of a first prototype
for an online communication and sales mobile platform for the company EB, with
the goal of answering to the needs and motivations of both EB and its customers.
More specifically, it was intended, through research in Design, to create a digital
communication solution that, on the one hand, helped EB to increase its online
presence and sales, and on the other hand, helped its customers to more easily and
conveniently access information about its products and, ultimately, to purchase them.
Therefore, by developing digital communication tools, the intention was to bring the
EB brand closer to its current and potential new customers.
Knowing that the fulfilment of the goals identified above is a long process, this
study focused on the conception, design and prototyping of the online platform in
order to ensure, through the adoption of UI and UX Design strategies, and also
through the implementation of Usability tests, an interface solution that is pleasant
and easy to use for EB customers.
Design and Development of an Online Sales Platform … 55

3 State of the Art

Since we set out to conceive and design a digital platform for food sales and ordering,
it becomes imperative to understand what it currently means to buy something and
how these transactions of goods and services operate today, particularly in the food
business. In other words, what new behaviours are experienced by consumers (are
they the same as in the past or not) and in what ways they operate. As will be described
and analysed below, there are several factors that have driven this transition phase in
which we find ourselves, from the typical purchase made in a physical store to the
purchase made, also and in parallel, through digital platforms.

3.1 The Transition of Shopping Behaviours

from the Physical Store to the Online and Mobile Context
and the Factors Driving It

In recent times in Portugal, the ecosystem of transactions of goods and services, as

in the rest of the world, is migrating to the digital environment, although not yet
completely eliminating the purchase in physical stores behavior. As published by
the Portuguese Trends Observatory in a survey developed by Grupo Ageas Portugal
and Eurogroup Consulting Portugal [1, 2], although online commerce is growing,
the majority of consumers say they still prefer to buy in-store [1, 2]. However, there
are indicators that reveal a clear growth trend of shopping in the digital context. For
example, in 2019, according to a study by DPDGroup, an average of 83,000 orders
per day resulting from online purchases were delivered in Portugal, for a total of
20.7 million per year [3]. The same study also mentions that 35% of its respondents
buy online regularly [3]. Already in 2019, according to the CTT e-Commerce Report
2020 study, 51% of Portuguese people with internet access had already made at least
one order on the internet and it was estimated, at the time, that by the end of 2020
this number would reach around 56% [4].
On the other hand, the Covid-19 pandemic, also seems to have leveraged this
growth in digital transactions. With the 2020 confinement and the consequent closure
of physical stores in Portugal, buying online became the only way for some consumers
to shop [1, 2]. In fact, 73% of e-shoppers claimed to have shopped online between
3 and 5 times a month [5]. And after a further confinement in early 2021, these
circumstances only accentuated the growth trend of the e-shopping market, growth
that, according to an ANACOM’s2 report about e-Commerce in Portugal in 2021,
reached about 52%, 7 more points than in 2020 [6], figures and numbers which
converge with the growth forecasts described in the CTT e-Commerce Report 2020
study.

2 ANACOM is Portugal’s Communications national authority and regulator ([Link]).

56 V. Maia et al.

Therefore, as can be easily seen by the data presented above, online shopping is
already a very substantial slice of the overall shopping market in Portugal.
Another factor that is intertwined with this rapid growth of e-commerce in Portugal
is the increase of digital apps’ download. Data from the period after the confinement
caused by the first wave of the pandemic, reveal that during this confinement the
installation of Apps grew 70% compared to the same period of the previous year.
And, regarding food consumption Apps (restaurants, Uber Eats, etc.) these grew
21% [7]. As in Portugal, the only forms of service available in restaurants were
deliveries and Take Away services, this significant growth in the adoption of Apps
for food consumption is understandable and expected. On the other hand, there was
also a huge explosion of new online stores, restaurants started adopting the Take
Away model, making deliveries and accepting orders through social networks [7].
These facts demonstrate how much the restaurant industry had to adjust to this new
paradigm of electronic commercial transactions.
Regarding the use of mobile phones to purchase goods and services, there are also
some indicators presented in market studies that show the growth of this purchasing
behavior. For example, in the Portuguese context, from 2016 to 2018, the number of
Portuguese who used their smartphone to make online purchases increased, according
to the 2018 e-Shopper Barometer, by about 6 percentage points, reaching 54% in
2018 [8]. And in 2019, according to a study by DPDGroup, 72% of its respondents
stated that they made their purchases through their smartphone and that this was the
most used device when making transactions [3].
So, in conclusion, as can be seen from the data presented above and this new
ecosystem of commercial transactions, it can be said that these new behaviours
clearly support the relevance and need for companies or brands to have an online
presence today and, in particular, an online presence adapted to the mobile platform,
as it seems consumers are increasing their purchases through this medium. It is
therefore necessary that they offer their customers and consumers digital tools that
meet their new habits and modes of consumption. And EB is no exception in this
regard.

4 Methodologies

Methodologically, this project was divided into three distinct stages, each with its
own specific methodologies that are detailed below.

4.1 First Research Stage

In a first research stage, an extensive literature review was conducted on topics that
were deemed relevant to this research such as the following:
Design and Development of an Online Sales Platform … 57

1. The growing transition of consumer habits to digital and mobile platforms;

2. Interaction Design and User Experience Design (UX Design).
Regarding point 1 it was intended to understand how consumers buy and consume
today. And, for that, it was necessary to analyze the growing use of mobile, and
consequent download of applications, derived from everyday life and new consumer
habits. Regarding point 2, it was intended to collect what other authors and researchers
say about the Design of the interaction and User Experience, in order to, on the one
hand, guide the design process of the EB online platform, and on the other hand,
extract design requirements for this platform’s design.

4.2 Second Research Stage

In a second research stage, a survey regarding the characteristics and needs of the
user was carried out. It was intended, in a User-Centred Design approach, to mainly
know and understand the characteristics and needs of the EB customers, in order to,
from this knowledge, also extract Design requirements that would allow us to adapt
the solution later designed to EB’s target customers.

4.3 Third Research Stage

In a third and final research stage, from all the data collected in the previous ones,
the design requirements of EB’s mobile sales platform were determined. Next, we
proceeded to the design and development of a non-functional and high fidelity proto-
type, using methodologies and concepts associated with UX Design (User Experience
Design) and UI Design (User Interface Design). To this end, the following steps were
performed: creation of the main persona; information architecture design through a
sitemap; user flows; wireframes; interface design; and, finally, high-fidelity proto-
typing [9]. Finally, Usability tests were applied to the prototype with a sample of
participants that were representative of the target audience, in order to understand if
the solution and platform designed was easy to use or not, and if its interface had a
good level of Usability. Each of these steps is briefly described below.
Primary Persona
Personas are, according to Cooper et al. [10], archetypes based on behavior patterns of
real consumers that are discovered during the research stage (…). These abstractions,
built on the common characteristics and needs of real consumer groups, are usually
materialized as a fictional character representing potential users [10].
In the case of this project, only the Primary Persona was defined, which encapsu-
lates the characteristics and needs of EB’s eventual customers, as this is an academic
project and of limited scope. This Persona was therefore defined on the basis of
58 V. Maia et al.

an interview survey applied to the EB managers and on the basis of questionnaires

applied directly to some of EB’s customers, where data on age group, academic qual-
ifications, technological and digital skills (use of computer equipment, use of social
networks, installation of Apps on a smartphone, use of smartphone to make online
purchases), geographical origin and needs felt by customers when making purchases
with the current EB online presence were collected.
Sitemap—Information Architecture
Before moving on to the platform’s UI Design it was necessary to define an infor-
mation architecture. This refers to the structure and distribution of the content and
functionalities offered by a digital product, describing how to navigate between the
different pages and how they relate to each other. Therefore, it was also necessary, for
the UI Design planning of this platform, to decide how to segment and organize the
different contents and functionalities that would be displayed to the user, in order to
understand how the user would interact with and navigate through it. So, a Sitemap
(Fig. 1) was diagrammed in order to distribute and organize all the contents and
functionalities resulting from the requirements determined for the design of the EB’s
platform.

Fig. 1 Sitemap developed for EB’s digital platform

Design and Development of an Online Sales Platform … 59

Fig. 2 Examples of User Flows designed for one of the platform’s interaction tasks

User Flows
In the UI Design planning of this project User Flows were also created. User Flows
are diagrams that represent, in a schematic way, all the steps and actions that a user
has to sequentially perform (according to a specific order) in order to complete a
given interaction task within a digital product. These help a Designer to define all
the possible paths that an eventual user has in a digital product, to perform a given
interaction task, in the fastest and most effective possible way. In the specific case
of this project, 6 groups of User Flows were created (since some of these tasks had
more than one possible execution path) that described the six interaction tasks that
corresponded to the primary needs of a future user of the platform (Fig. 2). It should
also be noted that the interaction tasks that were diagramed and planned with these
User Flows were precisely the same ones that were then tested and assessed in the
Usability tests that will be described later in this document.
Wireframes and Sketches
Next the wireframes of the platform’s pages were drawn. Wireframes are the first
sketches and visual composition studies of the graphical interface, using drawings
with a low level of visual detail and usually without color. They are essentially
used to help define the visual composition and relative positioning of all the visual
and interactive elements that will be displayed on the different pages of a digital
product’s interface. In the specific case of this project, these were also used to quickly
test several hypotheses of graphic composition and help define a visual and layout
dressing for the platform’s different pages (Fig. 3).
High-fidelity Design and Interface Prototyping
As far as the graphic Design’s development was concerned, this was done in Adobe
XD software and, later, a high-fidelity but non-functional prototype was assembled
in the same digital tool (Fig. 4). The prototype can be viewed at the following link:
[Link]
60 V. Maia et al.

Fig. 3 Homepage’s first

sketch

Fig. 4 Platform’s prototype

displayed in a IPhone X
screen

In terms of display resolution and format, the IPhone X screen resolution was used
(375 × 812 pixels), since its format and size were similar to the device on which the
Usability Tests of the prototype were later done, that is, an Asus Zenphone 5. As for
the typography options, we chose to use two different fonts: Blanch Condensed and
Open Sans. Blanch Condensed was used in the larger titles and in the product prices
that are displayed on the platform’s pages. The choice of this font derives from the
fact that it is the main font used in some of EB’s graphic communication materials,
and especially in its logo. And as such, it is desirable to ensure graphic consistency
among all the company’s communication materials, which the use of this font also
ensures.
Design and Development of an Online Sales Platform … 61

With regard to Open Sans, we chose to use this font in the remaining text elements,
since it is a Sans Serif font optimized for the web and for mobile interfaces. It therefore
offers excellent readability on screen and at smaller sizes, which is mainly suitable
for the smaller typographical elements of the interface such as smaller titles and
paragraph text. On the other hand, it has a neutral and connotation-free appearance,
which is desirable in order not to visually compete with the visual expressiveness of
the primary font.
Regarding the adopted text sizes, size 16 points was used for paragraph text, size
8 points was used for less important text such as breadcrumbs, size 30 points was
used for primary headings, and size 12 points was used for secondary headings.
Regarding the colors adopted for the platform’s layout, in order to give it a cleaner
and minimalist look, white was used as the page’s background which was combined,
to ensure graphic and brand consistency, the color previously adopted in the EB´s
logo. That is, the hexadecimal color #9A3324, which corresponds to Pantone 484.
For the text elements an 80% black was adopted in order to reduce the visual weight
of these elements and make it more pleasant to read. In addition to these colors there
are some shades of gray and red in the color scheme implemented, particularly in
some of the pop-ups.
Iconography wise, icons that used common visual conventions were used, so
that there would already be a familiarity with their meanings that would minimize
possible problems of understanding and interpreting them.

5 Usability Testing

Once the prototype was finished, the last and third stage of this study was dedicated
to the Usability assessment of the prototype and its interface with a sample of EB’s
target customers. With this assessment it was intended to test its ease of use so that,
in the event that Usability problems or issues exist, they can be corrected and thus
raise the degree of Usability of the interface to a level that provides the user with a
pleasant, easy and comfortable experience of use and interaction.

5.1 Usability Assessment and Testing Sessions

A total of 5 Usability assessment sessions were conducted between August 21 and

26, 2021, with a sample of 8 participants. The sessions took place, in some cases, in
the participants’ home kitchen and, in other, cases in the researcher’s kitchen, since
this was the context in which the platform was expected to be mostly used.
Each participant was asked to perform 6 different interaction tasks with the proto-
type. These tasks corresponded to the primary needs of a future user of the platform.
As far as equipment was concerned, the tests were performed on a smartphone
62 V. Maia et al.

with the Android operating system, model Asus Zenphone 5, equipment where
participants were provided with the platform’s prototype.
Before the participants started any interaction task, the researcher who applied
these tests explained to the participants how the tests would work. They were therefore
informed of the following:
1. What the prototype platform consisted of and what it was for;
2. What the purpose of these tests was;
3. That given the non-functional nature of the prototype, the data filling fields would
be filled in automatically with a mouse click;
4. That what was being assessed was the prototype, not the participant;
5. That while running the tests they would think aloud (Think Aloud Protocol);
6. A rough estimate of the duration of the assessment session.
After the completion of the tested interaction tasks, a satisfaction questionnaire
was applied to each participant with questions such as the following:
1. Do you find it easy to get information in this online store proposal?
2. Did the online store proposal arouse your interest in the brand?
3. Do you consider that the interaction with the online store is simple and clear?
4. Do you consider the online store intuitive and accessible?
5. How do you characterize the website proposal? Not very interesting and not very
useful? Interesting and useful? An interesting store that would be very useful to
me?

5.2 Data Collection Instruments

In terms of data collection instruments the following were produced and applied:
1. A general script for the tests’ conduction. This script included all the instructions
and information to be given to each participant, as well as the order in which
the tasks and actions would have to be performed throughout the tests by both
the researcher and the participants. It also included an observations grid (for
observations and task execution times registration). This ensured that the tests
were always applied in the same way with all participants;
2. A satisfaction questionnaire. As it was also intended to measure the degree of
overall satisfaction of the participants in using the prototype’s interface and to
verify whether the participants found the conceived Design proposal interesting
and useful.

5.3 Recruited Participants Sample

For these Usability assessments a sample of the target customers of the EB brand was
recruited. The sample was composed of 8 participants who, it should be noted, were
Design and Development of an Online Sales Platform … 63

actual EB customers. Despite the small scale of the sample this does not invalidate
the validity of the data collected since, according to Nielsen [11], testing with only
5 participants allows us to find almost as many Usability problems as if we tested
with many more [11]. As for the sample’s participants gender, 3 were male and 5
were female. Although the sample had male elements, we tried to make sure that
most of them were female, since, according to EB, their clients are mostly female.
In terms of age, the participants were between 18 and 60 years old. Regarding the
digital skills of the sample most of the participants had enough digital skills to shop
online and with a smartphone, as 5 declared they accessed the internet through their
smartphone while 3 declared they did it through their PC. They are also all users
of social networks. Regarding their vision capabilities, 5 of the participants stated
that they already felt some difficulties and problems such as Myopia, Strabismus and
Astigmatism, even using glasses. It should also be noted that one of the Participants
had severe vision impairment and was included in the tests in order to understand if
it would be possible for a user with special needs to use the online store, or not.

6 General Results and Discussion

6.1 First Major Conclusion

Regarding the results obtained, the first major conclusion drawn from the performed
Usability assessments is that, at least in what concerns the interaction tasks tested
with the designed prototype, they endow the interface with a quite reasonable degree
of Usability, since the effectiveness levels are high and the global efficiency levels
are medium. This belief of ours is based on the following data. Of the 6 tasks tested:
1. All were performed effectively. Only one task (namely, task ner 1) was not
performed until the end by one of the participants (namely, participant ner 5). All
the remaining ones were able to execute both that and the other tasks successfully;
2. Only in tasks 1, 4 and 5 there were some problems of efficiency in their execution.
In the remaining tasks there were neither critical errors (errors that prevented the
progression of the task execution from a particular step forward) nor non-critical
errors (errors from which participants would recover). However, in those in which
some errors were observed, with the exception of task 1, the quantity and type of
errors observed was not enough to state that they were of completely inefficient
execution, since, when participants made errors, they were always non-critical
errors.
On the other hand, the results of the Satisfaction survey seem to reinforce and
converge with our conviction that the designed interface enjoys a quite reasonable
degree of Usability, since:
1. All participants mentioned that they had no major difficulties in performing the
tasks tested;
64 V. Maia et al.

2. With the exception of participant ner 5, whose vision difficulties did not allow
him to read some font sizes, namely 12 pt and 8 pt, or to interpret the icons
on the prototype, all considered it easy to obtain information on the developed
prototype;
3. Most participants found the online store prototype simple and accessible, with
the exception of 2 participants whose visual limitations did not allow them to
understand the prototype in its entirety. These participants stated that they could
not see some icons of the interface correctly, namely participants ner 5 and ner 7;
4. The participants considered the online store prototype accessible and of clear
interaction. With the exception of 2 participants whose visual limitations did not
allow them to understand the prototype, namely participants ner 5 and ner 7;
5. In general, participants rated the developed prototype as “Interesting and Useful”
and as “An online store that would be very useful to me”;
6. The participants considered that the prototype is functional and corresponds to
their needs.

6.2 Second Major Conclusion

The second major conclusion to be drawn from the results of these tests is that, despite
the fact that the interface of the prototype already enjoys a very reasonable degree of
Usability, the errors made and the participants’ suggestions, show that there is still
some room for improvement. Therefore, in a future design iteration, the following
adjustments or reformulations should be implemented:
1. It should be possible to enter the purchase process through the product
comparison feature page (add button for this purpose);
2. It should only be presented one date suggestion for the order’s pick-up.

6.3 Third Major Conclusion

While testing, we found that the interface of the prototype may offer some challenges
and difficulties to some of EB’s older customers. This conclusion stems from the
fact that 2 of our participants suffer from some major vision problems (namely
participant ner 5–53 years old) and are not familiar with visual conventions typically
used in the digital world (namely participant ner 7–60 years old), such as specific
icons widely used in the digital world. These participants, given their characteristics
(age, visual difficulties, low digital literacy), were confronted with some difficulties
in the Usability Tests carried out, which tell us that the Design of our interface should
suffer some changes in order to accommodate their limitations since the EB’s target
customers also include people in older age groups. Thus, in a future iteration of our
prototype design the following adjustments should be accommodated:
Design and Development of an Online Sales Platform … 65

1. Increase the font size (ideally at least 16 points), or at least provide some sort of
functionality that allows the user to increase the font size if they need to;
2. Review the design of some icons, such as the trash can, which was not recognized
as such by one of the participants;
3. Design larger icons and add to them a written label with their name/meaning, in
order to make their interpretation more effective;
4. Use higher typography weights than Regular;
5. And include the possibility for the user to use the platform with a black
background or make use of a contrast adjustment feature.
Finally, given the results presented and discussed above, it can be said that these
were quite positive, given that the participants successfully performed most of the
interaction tasks requested, and it was shown that the methodological strategies and
research path adopted, focused on a User-Centred Design approach, produced the
desired results.

7 Final Conclusions

This research project presents as final output a proposal for the design of an online
mobile sales platform for the company EB, with the goal of helping this company
to expand its sales and to provide its customers with a more convenient, fast and
efficient way, both to find information about its products and to actually buy them.
Through a methodological approach in which: (a) the current ecosystem of
behaviours and online consumption habits was studied and analysed; (b) in a
User-Centred Design approach, the needs, characteristics and difficulties of EB’s
customers in their relationship with the brand and its products were studied, as well
as the needs of EB itself; (c) design processes inherent to the practice of UI and UX
design were applied; a proposal for the interface design of an online sales platform
was conceived, designed, prototyped and tested in terms of its Usability. The goal
was to ensure the design of a platform and its respective interface that is easy to use
by its eventual users and that they consider useful in meeting their expectations and
needs.
During the development of the project, to the better understanding of who is the
typical customer and user of the platform, it was essential both the contributions
with data about their customers by the EB managers, as well as the data that was
collected in questionnaire surveys directly applied to a sample of customers. These
contributions made it possible to map both the characteristics of users and to identify
their needs and, thus, to conceive and design the platform with all the necessary data,
content and operational functionalities according to the aforementioned mapping and
user modelling.
With regard to the results obtained with the Usability tests, these indicate that
the research methodologies used helped to create a prototype with a user experience
that, although still needs some revisions and improvements to its design, was globally
66 V. Maia et al.

pleasant and reasonable in terms of the degree of Usability experienced by users. Only
in one of the 6 tasks tested and only one of the 8 participants of the sample (the other
7 successfully completed the task) did not complete the execution of that task, which
demonstrates the high rate of effectiveness of user interaction with the interface. In
terms of task execution efficiency, some interaction errors were observed in 3 of the
6 tested tasks. However, with the exception of one of the three where errors were
observed, the quantity and type of errors observed was not enough to state that they
were of completely inefficient execution, since, when participants made errors, they
were able to recover from them (non-critical errors) by themselves and carry out the
task until the end. Therefore, these errors demonstrate that the interface of the so
far developed prototype, despite already presenting a reasonable degree of usability,
should still be subject to another Design iteration to try to minimize the observed
errors.
Given these results, it is believed that, after a new Design iteration to eliminate the
interaction errors observed with the prototype interface, the future implementation
of the studied, designed, prototyped and tested Design proposal can successfully
meet the needs of both EB and its customers. It may, on the one hand, increase the
sales of EB products, thus bringing the brand closer to its customers. And it can,
on the other hand, make it easier for customers to access information and purchase
products, processes that with this digital tool will be accessible from the palm of
their hands. Which of course is more comfortable and convenient, since it doesn’t
force them to physically go to the store.

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Protecting Users’ Information
and Dignity Through Privacy-Enhancing
Design

Davide M. Parrilli and Rodrigo Hernández-Ramírez

Abstract The research presented in this paper discusses the risks that users of
messaging services may face due to other user’s misuse of the formers’ personal
information. While existing literature about privacy often focuses on the misbehavior
of “Big-Tech” and governments, careless users can be as (or even more) dangerous to
privacy as these institutions. Through a couple of examples where personal informa-
tion is compromised in user-to-user conversations on two major messaging services
(i.e., WhatsApp and Telegram) this paper analyses the phenomenon and how each
platform’s design matches against it. The research here presented shows that both
services have in place features that allow users to protect themselves from other
users’ carelessness. However, it also shows there are existing loopholes that prevent
a satisfactory level of protection and, through an exercise based on speculative design,
suggests an alternative scenario were users have total control of their information as
well as capacity to protect it against careless and malicious use from other users.

Keywords Interactions · Privacy · Service design · Speculative design

1 Introduction

Design is fundamentally a humanistic activity as it involves humans making things

for humans. From a broad ontological standpoint, humans are “composed” of phys-
ical particles such as atoms and their components whose complex interactions allow
us to process nutrients, experience the world, and think. Depending on ones’ beliefs
it may be argued that humans are also made of intangible, “spiritual” components.
Recently, some philosophers have argued that human ontology can also be under-
stood from a third dimension: as information. Oversimplifying, the idea is that every

D. M. Parrilli (B) · R. Hernández-Ramírez

UNIDCOM/IADE, Faculdade de Design, Tecnologia E Comunicação, Universidade Europeia,
Lisbon, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
R. Hernández-Ramírez
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 69

N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
70 D. M. Parrilli and R. Hernández-Ramírez

person is constituted by their physical embodiment, their psychological states, and

their information [1]. Hence it follows that threatening somebody’s informational
privacy—i.e., misusing their personal data, such as name, contact information, and
images—is tantamount to threatening their identity.
Just like body and “soul” may be inextricably connected, information cannot be
understood in isolation from the bodily and cognitive dimensions of a person. When
someone receives a punch, they experience not only physical but likely emotional
distress as well. Likewise, pronounced cognitive stress may have bodily manifesta-
tions (e.g., physical pain or discomfort of all sorts). Forms of violence that initially
involve personal information such as “revenge porn”—that is, the unauthorized publi-
cation of intimate images of ex-partners, which is overwhelmingly carried out by men
as retaliation—can have severe psychological consequences for the victim.
Much has been said about the dangers of misuse of personal information by
governments and corporations. In the last decade, the expression “surveillance capi-
talism” [2, 3]—a business model based on the massive accumulation and trading
of people’s personal data, with potentially severe political, economic, and ethical
consequences—became widely used. Arguably, surveillance capitalism is a specific
aspect of the broader “surveillance society” [4], already characterized by Michel
Foucault in 1975 as a (physical and virtual) Panopticon [5] (Fig. 1).
According to the proponents of surveillance capitalism, governments and corpo-
rations can predict and ultimately control our choices and behaviors by collecting and
processing our everyday information. The paradigmatic example is the Facebook-
Cambridge Analytica Data Scandal, in which the social platform allegedly influenced
the results of elections by (mis)using data and manipulating people through the infor-
mation they consumed [6]. However, except for despotic governments, it is not likely

Fig. 1 The Panopticon,

originally described by
Jeremy Bentham in 1791,
was conceived to allow a
prison guard to constantly
monitor all inmates from a
central tower without being
seen. Source [Link]
[Link]/2013/07/21/books/
review/the-panopticon-by-
[Link]
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through … 71

that companies intentionally mishandle personal information to cause distress to the

people using their services. Data leaks that expose people’s personal information,
causing them various types of harm, happen too often. But logically, and legally,
actively disseminating personal data to cause a damage is different from recklessly
leaking personal information. Appropriate and strong security policies and IT solu-
tions tend to prevent data leaks but are ineffective against voluntary disclosures of
personal data.
This paper shows how design can contribute to prevent mishandling of personal
information by other users, typically the recipients of the sensitive data. Interpersonal
relationships cannot be regulated by policies, and IT solutions may also have a limited
impact. For example, private images may be safely exchanged over a system that uses
end-to-end encryption, nevertheless the data may still be mishandled by the legitimate
recipient without the sender’s knowledge and consent. In this example, elementary
civility could prevent the recipient from sharing the images received without the
sender’s authorization. However, ethics cannot be preventively imposed: authorities
can punish wrongdoers for unethical behavior (ex post enforcement, to punish the
offender after committing an infraction) but cannot force people to act ethically1 (ex
ante enforcement, to prevent the potential offender from committing the offence).
Design should also be understood as a way of building ethical interactions between
users. This paper analyses how design can ensure that interactions with and for
privacy effectively take place. This article builds on our previous research about
design ethics and privacy: design should not only be concerned about privacy but
should be a tool for privacy. Design for privacy, based on universally acceptable
ethical principles, empowers users and citizens by respecting their information and
informational privacy and is conceived to be a conceptual tool to implement privacy
in a designerly way [7].

1.1 Methodology

In this paper we present a case study of design for privacy. Specifically, we assess
how two popular messaging services, WhatsApp and Telegram, mitigate the risks
related to the misuse of personal data in peer-to-peer communications.
Having approximately two billion users worldwide, WhatsApp is arguably the
most popular messaging service in the world.2 WhatsApp is part of the Meta group,

1 Ethically/unethically or legally/illegally. For the sake of simplicity and clarity we assume that
legality and ethics tend to correspond—often, what is unethical is also illegal, such as in the case of
defamation as result of the publication of private pictures or videos. However, an unethical behavior
may be legally irrelevant, e.g., when somebody shares to third parties a friend’s trivial information,
despite her request to keep it secret—or ethics and legality may collide. In this paper we focus on
ethics from the perspective of the sender of the information, irrespective of the legal qualification
and consequences.
2 Source: [Link]
apps/ (last accessed: 25 January 2022).
72 D. M. Parrilli and R. Hernández-Ramírez

along with other social media platforms such as Facebook, Facebook Messenger,
and Instagram. According to recent data (October 2021), Facebook Messenger
is the second most used messaging service, followed by two Chinese services
(Weixin/WeChat and QQ), and Telegram comes in the fifth position.3
We decided to compare the privacy features offered by WhatsApp with those
of Telegram for various reasons. Firstly, because Telegram is not owned by Meta.
Secondly, because to use Facebook Messenger, users need an active Facebook
account—our research focuses on messaging services that only require a smart-
phone or computer and a registered phone number to operate.4 Finally, for cultural
reasons: WeChat and QQ are extremely popular in China, but less so in Western
countries, where the authors of this contribution live and work. Moreover, privacy is
understood differently in China than it is in Europe [4, 8–10], therefore, uncritically
using a Western conceptualization of privacy to evaluate services designed for and
within a different cultural context would lead to biased conclusions.
Telegram, a service launched in 2013 by the Russian brothers Nikolai and Pavel
Durov, is interesting for our research also due to the controversies associated with
it. The service has been accused of being the tool of choice for terrorists, far-
right extremists, copyright infringers, and other criminals, including child molesters.
Recently (January 2022) a member of the Brazilian High Electoral Court suggested
that Telegram ought to be banned in the country due to its alleged role in spreading
fake news during the 2022 Presidential elections.5 In the last years, Telegram has
been censored or blocked by authorities in countries such as Iran and Russia [11].
Section 2 presents an introduction to the relationship between design, interactions,
and privacy through the lens of service design and UX design. We point up a gap
in the existing literature and research concerning the interactions between users of a
digital service. We claim that service providers have an ethical duty to offer services
that minimize potential abuses against data privacy by end-users. In Sect. 3 we
present an overview of the features that WhatsApp and Telegram offer to protect the
privacy and confidentiality of senders’ information. We assess how the two services
tackle problems concerning data privacy from a design perspective to guarantee safe
interactions between users. Finally, Sect. 4 offers some concluding remarks and an
introduction to the development of our research.

2 Designing Interactions for and with Privacy

Nowadays, most people are constantly connected with others. While a person may be
physically alone, they are connected to other humans thanks to the digital device(s)

3 Source: see footnote 2.

4 The research has been conducted by the authors in January 2022 on the apps installed on their
phones (iPhone using the operating system iOS v.15.2.1).
5 Source: [Link]
[Link] (last accessed: 25 January 2022).
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through … 73

they carry. As explained by Floridi, we live in an onlife; a circumstance where offline

and online experiences are blended [12]. For example, one may be sitting alone in
one’s house drinking tea (offline) and chatting with a friend from the other side of
the world through a messaging service (online).
Onlife interactions usually take place between: (1) a user and a given service
provider—e.g., a typical banking app allows a client to interact with the institution and
little more; (2) mainly or exclusively between end-users, as in the case of messaging
services, where interactions with the service provider are extremely rare; (3) between
two or more users and between users and the service provider—e.g., hosts and guests
interact with each other through the Airbnb platform. Service providers and users are
asymmetrically related: users create the interactions, but service providers, through
their design choices, shape the ways in which interactions happen. Designers define
the conditions for possible interactions offered by a service: what could happen
during these interactions and how the system behaves towards users [13]. However,
service providers do not have absolute control over the interactions between users.
Customers of a dating app could use it not to flirt, but to share information about
their academic research, although the app was originally designed to share other
types of information. The interactions that take place are always shaped by the users
themselves. Hence, one may argue that contemporary interaction design no longer
designs things, but shapes conditions for something to happen [14]. This is not to say
that designed function is eschewed. The raison d’être of a chair is to allow someone
to sit; that of a phone is to enable two-way communication; and that of a car to allow
people to go from one place to another. The key aspect of twenty-first century design
is that, being increasingly digitally driven, it has to account for interactions and, in
the case of communication products, for interactions between users (Figs. 2 and 3).
Since the 1990s academic design literature has been concerned with the qualifica-
tion of the relation between services and interactions. Elena Pacenti, in her pioneering
1998 PhD work, defined service design as the design of arenas where interactions
between services and users happen [15]. This view is a consequence of the inter-
active nature of services, where design methods and skills are applied to enhance
the user experience, according to a Human-Centered design paradigm [14]. Coop-
eration between service designers and UX designers is thus required to create the

Fig. 2 The PS2 stereo

turntable, designed in 1963
by Dieter Rams for Braun,
allows users to listen to
records, but not to interact
with other users, unless they
are in the same room. Source
[Link]
lection/works/1164
74 D. M. Parrilli and R. Hernández-Ramírez

Fig. 3 Music streaming

services like Spotify allow
users to listen to their
favorite music and to share it
with other people. Photo
credit: the authors

conditions for appropriate interactions. Consequently, while service designers are

typically called upon to model the service, UX designers are tasked with making
the conditions that allow the interaction between clients and service satisfactory—
e.g., through an interface that considers the actual needs of the user. In practice, the
distinction between the two is often murky and, for the matter we are discussing,
unnecessary. Our analysis concerns the quality of the interactions, rather than the job
descriptions of designers.

2.1 Interactions and Privacy

Interactions between users are key for platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and for
every messaging service. The service provider mediates the relations between end-
users. Platforms nurture interactions between consumers in several business domains,
ranging from real estate and tourism (e.g., Airbnb) to fashion (e.g., Vinted). The
service provider takes care of issues such as payments and assistance to both the
seller and buyer, without actively interfering in their interactions.
The role of the service provider is now more silent than it was in the 1990s when
Pacenti published her findings. From the perspective of privacy, platforms collect
data about users surreptitiously, without informing clients. Tracking technologies
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through … 75

allow service providers to gather clients’ personal information. Third party cookies,
web beacons, pixel tracking technologies permit to surveil and accumulate personal
data without the users’ awareness and consent.
The privacy-related problems emerging from the relation between service
providers and users has received considerable attention in the legal and social science
literature, but less so in design theory. This paper builds on our previous research
to understand how service providers should protect users’ data through design [7,
16, 17]. However, we understand that focusing exclusively on the relation between
service and consumers is not sufficiently accurate and comprehensive. Recent views
tend to see users as victims of Big Tech corporations that rely on user surveillance as
their business model [3, 6]. Reality, however, is more complex and thus the assess-
ment should be more nuanced. We contend that one should not overestimate the power
of large technology corporations such as Apple, Google, Facebook, and Microsoft
[18, 19]. IT companies may be very good at marketing technologies that promise an
endless world of possibilities, however, the actual features are often lacking.
The tech landscape is dictated by the technological and design advancements
of the companies populating it, but also by external policy and financial aspects.
For instance, we wonder whether Google and Facebook dominate the online adver-
tisement market because their solutions are the best from a technological stand-
point, or rather because the regulatory framework—including data protection legis-
lation—allowed them to crush the competitors [20]. Excessive red-tapism, which
poses heavy regulations on small and medium size enterprises, combined with a
lack of efforts to limit market concentrations through aggressive acquisitions and
takeovers of competitors by the wealthiest companies [18], hinder innovation [21].
When applied to privacy protection, oligopolies are particularly pernicious. The few
big corporations controlling users’ data tend to increase their control and surveil-
lance, while reducing the quality of their services and the level of the privacy offered
[22]. However, this does not mean that technology as such is bad for privacy: a proper
design of technologies can enhance and preserve privacy [1].
Furthermore, users tend not only to accept, but also indirectly promote surveillance
by service providers and other users. Voluntary surveillance [23] is part of our onlife:
are end-users obliged to share all their daily experiences and thoughts on social
networks? From their perspective, platforms stimulate consumers to share content
with other users, ranging from the birth of a child to what they are having for dinner,
but do not have the power to force them to do so. Service providers, with the help
of media and entertainment companies, actively promote the idea that people need
to be engaged in social media and share as many details as possible about their
everyday lives to be successful and enjoy a full life. However, assuming that people
do not have the autonomy to think and act differently is a reductionist position. The
pleasure and well-being that social media users obtain from these services should
not be underestimated when trying to understand their behavior [24, 25].
76 D. M. Parrilli and R. Hernández-Ramírez

Designing services that make interactions possible is necessarily an ethical activity

[13]: the designed interactions6 should respect and potentially enhance users’ privacy
and protect them from misuses both by the service provider itself and from other
users. Designing services for interactions with privacy in mind is a matter of creating
safe digital products: it represents the logical expansion of the principles defended
over the last decades by designers such as Victor Papanek and Dieter Rams. In the
1970s, Papanek invited designers to decide whether their products would contribute
to social good or not—having himself a clear preference for the former, he thus
challenged designers to be conscious of their social and moral responsibilities [26].
The 6th principle of Good Design proposed by Dieter Rams in 1976 says that design
must be honest: that a product should not be presented as better than it really is
[27]. Honesty—and usefulness, according to the 2nd principle—should help prevent
design from harming users. It is curious that Rams did not explicitly consider in any
of his principles that design should not harm users, most likely because this is such
an obvious idea. However, modern design offers plenty of examples of products that
are addictive, or designed to benefit companies, venture capitalists, and shareholders
but not users [26, 28].
We claim that it is the duty and responsibility of ethical design to create solutions
that allow fair, healthy, and privacy-oriented interactions between users. Communi-
cation platforms have policies that govern users’ behavior and that prohibit discrimi-
natory and offensive content, or infringement of third parties’ rights. However, these
policies tend to be enforced ex post, i.e., once the offending text or material has
been published. Furthermore, those rules apply de facto only within platforms where
content is publicly available or is accessible by more than one user (e.g., Facebook
and Twitter). Consequently, those protection mechanisms are usually ineffective in
user-to-user or user-to-group messaging services. An example will clarify this point.
Let us suppose the authors of this paper were to create a denigratory deepfake video of
a colleague and post it on Facebook and Twitter, other users could notify the service
provider, which in turn would delete the message and penalize us.7 Alternatively, we
could share the deepfake video through a messaging service with all our contacts but
not with the victim. In this case, every recipient could also share the message with
their own contacts; no policy could prevent such cascade effect from happening.
The solution to these complex situations requires a technological approach too—
we envision a future where everybody would be able to delete and limit the sharing of
videos and images, even outside their sphere of control using, for example, Artificial
Intelligence (AI).
Our research is concerned with the current stage of development regarding
personal control of private information. In the next section we will present a case
study where we compare the features related to privacy protection of two popular

6 We use the expression ‘designed interactions’ for the sake of simplicity and clarity. We commented
in Sect. 2 that interactions cannot be designed, but that designers can only create the conditions for
interactions to happen and flourish.
7 However, we should note that the enforcing effect of the policy is limited—we could share the

video on several Facebook groups, to minimize the risk to have it erased by the platform.
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through … 77

messaging services, WhatsApp and Telegram. We will assess what users can do to
prevent and limit abuses regarding private information included in texts, video, and
audio files shared with other users.

3 Preventing Abuse Through Personal Information

Mishandling on WhatsApp and Telegram

In this section we explore how, in terms of their design, WhatsApp and Telegram
protect users’ privacy and information confidentiality. The methodology we adopted
is field research using both apps and exploring their features. For this reason, we did
not consider their privacy policies, nor how the companies collect and process users’
personal data. Privacy in the context of this paper is not understood in legal terms.
Our concern is to understand how these services protect the personal information
of their users against potential misuses by other users. The processing of personal
data by private individuals for personal reasons is not legally relevant, e.g., for the
European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer
Privacy Act (CCPA). However, mishandling of someone else’s personal information
by a private person could be legally relevant and may lead to criminal prosecution
and civil compensation for the victim.
Potentially sensitive information does not necessarily have to be stolen or extorted
to be publicized, in fact, it is mainly disclosed voluntarily by people to other people
or to a restricted group of individuals. Various authors assume that privacy protection
applies only to personal information that is unknown or unknowable [1]. However,
we argue that this approach is insufficient: if we consider that personal data are
part of one’s identity, it deserves protection irrespective of the secret or public
status of such information. The opposite approach would transform privacy into
a powerful tool of oppression and discrimination—it is easy to imagine the conse-
quences if personal data about somebody’s sexual or political orientation could only
be protected, provided that and until it is secret.
Usually, people willingly share personal data with one or more recipients that they
trust. Trust is strictly related to privacy [29], and violations against the latter often
involve infringements against the former. Messaging services effectively function
as closed networks of trusted relations [30] and are widely regarded as trustworthy
tools for intimate communication [31]—trust works in a twofold way: towards other
users, and towards the services that enable communication.
The following examples may help to clarify our assumption and show the
importance of trust when disclosing personal information:
1. A temporary worker is part of a WhatsApp or Telegram group where all
employees can chat and discuss. A few weeks before the expected renovation of
the contract, a worker writes that he is seriously ill and that his health condition
will likely deteriorate in the coming months. A co-worker forwards this message
to the employer.
78 D. M. Parrilli and R. Hernández-Ramírez

2. A college female student sends an intimate video to her boyfriend, who studies at
the same university, for his birthday. However, after some weeks, she decides to
end the relationship. In retaliation, he shares her video with all his male friends
and colleagues.
Both cases have at least two elements in common. First, personal information has
been disclosed voluntarily by the senders. However, it does not take a lot of mental
gymnastics to feel there was an injustice committed. The employer, supposing that
they decide not to renovate the contract, may be sentenced to pay compensation to
the worker, unless they prove the decision was justified by other reasons. Depending
on the country where they live, the ex-boyfriend may be prosecuted and sentenced
to compensate the victim—but what if all the recipients of the video keep the secret
and do not report it to the girl or the college authorities?
We argue that design should bring solutions to the table. In both cases, the sharing
of personal information has been made possible by designed services. Hence, it
is the duty of designers and developers to incorporate features that limit the risks
of misuses of personal data by the recipients. For example, by allowing people to
cancel the information once it has been sent, or to prevent the recipient from sharing
messages with third parties.

3.1 WhatsApp’s Privacy Features

WhatsApp allows users to send end-to-end encrypted messages and to make

encrypted calls through the phone’s Internet connection.8 Users can also share photos,
videos, audios, documents, and create (and become members of) groups with up to
256 people. Encryption is intended to protect the content sent by users from external
tampering but does not prevent abuses by intended recipients of the communication.
The app offers some tools to mitigate such risks. Users can send photos and videos
that disappear from WhatsApp chat after the recipient has opened them once, and
these media will not be saved in the recipient’s photo or gallery folder. However,
this feature does not prevent the receiver from taking a screenshot of the message or
making a screen recording—in this case, the sender will not be notified. Furthermore,
this feature does not work for texts.
After the “view once’ media file has been sent, the sender will not be able to see
it in the chat. The sender and the receiver cannot forward, save, star, or share it. In
our examples above, this feature will not be effective to protect the ill worker, but

8 Our analysis is based on the most recent version of WhatsApp for iOS devices available at the
time of writing (version [Link]).
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through … 79

Fig. 4 WhatsApp users can

send media that disappear
after viewing

it could have prevented the sharing of the female college student’s video,9 had she
used this possibility offered by WhatsApp (Fig. 4).
Group chats include the Disappearing Messages feature: any group participant—
unless the group administrator determined that only admins are permitted to turn it
on or off—can set every message to disappear from the chat for everyone after 24 h,
7 days, or 90 days. Again, disappearing messages can be recorded by group members
and can be forwarded to third parties, limiting the intended privacy protection scope
of the tool (Fig. 5).
Similarly, WhatsApp users can schedule a Default Message Timer of 24 h, 7 days,
or 90 days. When enabled, all messages in new individual chats will disappear after
the selected duration. However, when a user replies to a disappearing message, the
quoted text may remain in the chat after the selected duration. Disappearing messages
can be freely forwarded to third parties and, were they to be forwarded to a chat with
disappearing messages off, they will not disappear in the forwarded chat. What-
sApp suggests using the feature only with trusted individuals, for forwarding and

9Or at least limited its impact in case the boyfriend had recorded a video of the intimate film sent by
his girlfriend using a recording device, with the consequent loss of image quality. However, nothing
could prevent a potential damage to the student’s reputation, were her partner to be a tech-savvy
person familiar with screen recording tools.
80 D. M. Parrilli and R. Hernández-Ramírez

Fig. 5 Users and admins

can make messages in group
chats disappear after a
selected duration

taking screenshot remains possible, as well as copying and saving content before it
disappears, and taking a picture of a disappearing message with a camera (Fig. 6).10
In conclusion, the tools offered by WhatsApp to protect users’ privacy against
information abuses by other users is quite limited in scope and effectiveness. The
Disappearing Messages feature could not efficiently protect the worker’s sensitive
information, for it does not impede forwarding messages. Similarly, the reputation
and psychological integrity of the female college student would be in jeopardy, had
she used WhatsApp to send intimate videos to her partner.

3.2 Telegram: Privacy Design Features

Telegram allows users to send messages, share files, and make end-to-end voice and
video calls through the phone’s Internet connection. Security is based on the MTProto
protocol.11 Private and group chats (of up to 200.000 members) are protected through
server-client encryption. An additional layer of two-way encryption is used for secret

10 Source: [Link] (last

accessed: 2 February 2022).
11 We analyzed the most recent version of Telegram for iOS available at the time of writing (version

8.4.1).
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through … 81

Fig. 6 Disappearing
messages work in individual
and group chats

chats, that are device-specific and are not part of the Telegram cloud, like non-secret
chats.
Telegram offers several tools to protect users’ privacy and content confidentiality.
In this section, we will go through the features that Telegram released since 2013,
starting with non-secret chats. As with WhatsApp, in Telegram users can set messages
to auto-delete for everyone after a period of one day, one week, or one month. This
feature is available in individual chats and in groups and channels12 where the user
is an administrator (Fig. 7).
A more effective feature to protect privacy and confidentiality allows users to
delete messages for everyone after they have been sent, both in individual and group
chats. Users who regret the messages or files they have sent can decide to cancel
them for everyone. Following such action, deleted messages will simply disappear
from the chat (Fig. 8).
This feature, which is unavailable for WhatsApp users, is quite beneficial for users’
privacy. In our examples, it could have avoided harm to both the ill worker and the
female college student, had they deleted the messages for everybody before they were
forwarded to third parties by the recipient. Moreover, Telegram offers an interesting
feature that restricts the ability to forward messages in groups (and channels). The

12Telegram channels allow users to broadcast messages to unlimited audiences. For this research,
we analyzed only the features available for individual and group chats.
82 D. M. Parrilli and R. Hernández-Ramírez

Fig. 7 In group chats only admins can enable the auto-delete messages tools

Fig. 8 If a user decides to delete messages, media, or files for everyone, they will disappear for
everyone
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through … 83

Fig. 9 Group admins can prevent all users from copying, saving, and forwarding messages

admin can turn on the Restrict Saving Content slider to prevent all group members
from copying, saving, and forwarding messages from the group (Fig. 9).
The Restrict Saving Content feature is particularly powerful to prevent users
from taking screenshots. More precisely, users are allowed to take screenshots, but
the images in the chat will not be recorded in the screenshot picture. Surprisingly,
however, texts and videos are fully registered in the screenshot (Fig. 10).
We tested what happens when the recipient of texts and media in a chat with
“Restrict Saving Content” is activated tries to record the screen of their device.13
The results of the test are perplexing.
1. If one tries to start screen recording when the Telegram app and the chat are both
open, it is not possible to record the screen—the app we used simply did not
open.
2. When the Telegram app was open, but the chat to be recorded was not, the screen
recording app turned on and worked correctly, but it did not record the content
of the chat.
3. When the Telegram app was not open, the screen recording app recorded all the
content in the chat, including media (Fig. 11).
It would be interesting to see if this feature is improved in the next versions of the
app. If fully developed, Restrict Saving Content can effectively protect the privacy
and confidentiality of messages and files exchanged in a group chat. If text messages
could not be recorded in screenshots, the ill worker in our example would have been
able to share sensitive information with colleagues with more confidence. Group

13 We used for the test the native screen recording app in iOS.
84 D. M. Parrilli and R. Hernández-Ramírez

Fig. 10 Videos are registered in screenshots (image on the right), unlike pictures (on the left)

Fig. 11 Diagram of actions and outcomes of our test

chats could be used by lovers to share intimate images and pictures—and, more
broadly, by users to send medical information and other sensitive documents.
In case of forwarded messages, Telegram allows users to remove the original
sender’s name before forwarding. However, only the recipient of the message can
decide to protect the identity of the sender. Finally, users have the possibility to
protect the confidentiality of the content included in a text message by using the
||text|| formatting. The message will appear to both the sender and receiver as hidden
text. Tapping the spoiler animation in chat allows reading the content of the message.
The text is hidden also in the chat list and notifications, as well as when it is forwarded
to another user. However, information confidentiality is potentially threatened by the
possibility to take a screenshot of the text, while it is still readable (Fig. 12).
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through … 85

Fig. 12 The privacy of secret messages is jeopardized by the possibility to take screenshots

Secret chats add an extra layer of security and information protection. Users of
secret chats can assign a self-destruction timer to their messages that will delete
them after the selected period (which ranges from one second to one week) once the
message is displayed on the recipient’s screen. Messages from secret chats cannot
be forwarded, and when a message is deleted on one side of the chat, it will be also
deleted in the receiver’s end.
If the receiver takes a screenshot, a notification is sent, and it appears in both
chats. We tested this feature by taking screenshots and recording the screen. All
parties have been always correctly notified, and we noticed that in case of screenshot
pictures sent in the chat are not recorded (like in the left image in Fig. 10), unlike
videos and texts. When we tried to record the screen, we obtained inconsistent results.
In most attempts, we could not record the screen if the secret chat or the app were
not open when the screen recording started. However, on one occasion the screen
recording software used for the test managed to record the video sent on the secret
chat. Furthermore, if the video in the chat was playing when the screen recording
started, we were able to record the first frames of the video in the chat before a fixed
frame was registered instead. Interestingly, Telegram acknowledges on its website
that “there is no bulletproof way of detecting screenshots on certain systems” and
“it may still be possible to bypass such notifications and take screenshots silently”.14

14 Source: [Link]
take-a (last access: 28 January 2022).
86 D. M. Parrilli and R. Hernández-Ramírez

Videos sent in secret chats cannot be forwarded or saved. However, images and texts
can be copied and saved.
The overview of the Telegram features reveals that the Russian-made messaging
app is more apt than WhatsApp to safeguard users’ privacy through confidentiality.
Telegram offers more tools that its rival, and it implemented features to limit the
misuse of sent information by restricting copying, forwarding, and saving content.
However, such features are still embryonal and should be further developed. In partic-
ular, the fact that Restrict Saving Content allows messages, including videos and
pictures, to be registered in screenshots and records of the screen is particularly
worrying. In both examples, users such as the disloyal coworker and the coward
boyfriend could have accomplished their goals due to the app’s existing loopholes.
Secret chat offers more privacy and confidentiality, but the fact that it cannot be
accessed from other devices makes it quite unpractical. However, it is surely a useful
tool for users who give priority to information protection rather than usability. Further,
our test revealed some issues when recording the chat, that led to inconsistent results.
We hope and expect that the next app releases will increase privacy and stability.

4 Conclusions

Privacy infringements by users can have serious consequences. In the previous

sections we showed that people could lose their job, reputation, self-esteem—and, in
extreme cases, their life—when other end-users misuse their personal information.
Legislation can be effective in preventing such abuses through the fear of sanc-
tions for infringers. However, sanctions are imposed only after the malicious abuse
took place. We advocate that design is better positioned to effectively empower
consumers of messaging apps to protect their personal information. Communication
platforms should be designed to allow users to delete their messages for everybody
after they have been sent—Telegram deserves praise in this respect—and to effec-
tively impede recipients from forwarding, screenshotting, or video recording the sent
text and media.
Both WhatsApp and Telegram have many things to improve, both from the design
and technical points of view, to ensure that users have full information control. The
point is that when users disclaim personal information to one or more recipients
through a messaging service, they can trust that neither the service nor the people
receiving their messages will not misuse the information. In other words, the tradi-
tional pattern of interpersonal offline communication has been replicated online, but
with a major difference: the possibility to record, forward, and spread the information
shared. Trust is not enough to protect the confidentiality of online conversations: the
sender must also have adequate mechanisms to control the information once it leaves
their hands.
In the next steps of our research, we will investigate how design can effectively
allow users to control their data. We will propose how existing tools, such as those
described in this paper, can be further developed and improved, including from the
Protecting Users’ Information and Dignity Through … 87

perspective of User Experience and usability. But, more important, we will specu-
late with possible future scenarios where users, through technology, will have the
power to fully control their information. Speculation in design is a powerful tool to
delineate alternative scenarios [32]. Starting from potential imagined solutions, we
will investigate how to make them plausible and, ultimately, possible. Technology
is advanced enough to allow massive facial recognition or to predict users’ behav-
ioral patterns. Our ambition is to show that technologies often used for surveillance
and profit can be used for ethical purposes too. We envision technologies that not
only respect users’ privacy, but that augment it. Design and technology that protect
fundamental values such as dignity, self-esteem, and the right to live a life without
the fear of being judged or abused by somebody known or unknown.
The ultimate scope of our research is to fully realize the potential of human-
centered design, whose real mission is to affirm, support, and strengthen human
dignity [33], not only against governments and big corporations, but also against
threats posed by other users.

Acknowledgements This study was supported by UNIDCOM under a Grant by the Fundação
para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT) no. UIDB/DES/00711/2020 attributed to UNIDCOM/IADE—
Universidade Europeia, Lisbon, Portugal.

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Research Methods and Strategies
Design Radicalized as Experience:
Disentangling and Reassembling
the Dance Floor Experience
to Understand the Relationship Between
Design and Clubbing

César Lugo-Elías and Pedro Cardoso

Abstract Using data gathered by means of participatory observation and in-depth

interviews conducted over two years of fieldwork in a club devoted to after-parties,
the present text examines (a) the elements within a club of house music; (b) the way
these elements interplay among them in the design and creations of the dance floor
experience; and (c) how Design transcends the physical constrain of objects to be
radicalized as experience in this context. The aim of this text is to open a discussion
about the capacities of Design to trigger emotions and organize interpersonal inter-
actions using the dance floor experience as a case study. This study accompanies the
increasing scholar interest in the relation of Design and clubbing, while presenting
data gathered through first-hand experiences, helping to close the gap in Design
literature regarding clubbing, which tend to use data from secondary sources.

Keywords Lottus After-Hours · Dance floor · Design · Experience · Urban

Ethnography

1 Intro: Stories from the Dance Floor

This text uses data from a doctoral research conducted at the Lottus After-Hours
[1], a club devoted to house music in the city of Porto, Portugal. For this research,
data was gathered using participatory observations and in-depth interviews. The
period of data gathering took ca. two years, between 2016 and 2018. The focus of
the observations was on the material and technological elements involved in the
creation of the dance floor’s environment, the interactions among the participants
of the experience; and the DJ performance. The observations aimed to understand
how site-specific the dance floor experience is. In simpler terms, and from a material

C. Lugo-Elías (B)
Unexpected Media Lab, Research Institute for Design, Media, and Culture (ID+), Porto, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
P. Cardoso
DigiMedia, University of Aveiro, Aveiro, Portugal
e-mail: pedroccardoso@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 91

N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
92 C. Lugo-Elías and P. Cardoso

perspective, we wanted to understand: why is this experience happening here and not
somewhere else? As a result of these observations, the focus of the research shifted
towards the DJ performance as a gateway to understand the different elements of
the experience and the way such elements interrelate. The rationale behind this was
our understanding about how music is customized by the DJ to the venue, technical
equipment, time, vibe, and to interpersonal interactions occurring in the dance floor
during the performance. It is important to underline that this is not a study about
DJing, but for this study, the DJ performance became an entry point to disentangle
the complexity of the dance floor experience.
During the participatory observation, the corresponding author played the roles
of doorman, dancer, and DJ, developing expertise and creating rapport with ten DJs
who voluntarily accepted to be interviewed. All interviews were conducted under
the condition of anonymity; therefore, DJs are named using a code and cannot be
identified here nor in the original work. The transcription of the interviews was coded
following the guidelines of [2] to conduct thematic analysis, approaching coding
in an inductive manner, meaning, acknowledging coding as an active process and
fundamentally an act of interpretation, resulting in the constant selecting, naming,
discarding, arranging, and hierarchical grouping of themes and subthemes.
As a result of that analysis, seven themes were created corresponding to seven
basic elements constituting the dance floor experience: music, venue, audience, abil-
ities, enthusiasm, stances, and journey. These themes are explained in Sect. 2 of this
text; followed by Sect. 3, where those elements are presented as part of four assem-
blages, the material, social, performative, and experiential assemblages, creating a
theoretical framework to understand how the dance floor experience can be designed
from the seven initial elements.
A fourth section contrasts this information with the concept of allatonceness [3],
suggesting that the role of Design in the creation of the dance floor experience goes
beyond placing physical objects within the interior space of the club. Through Design,
clubs allow interactions among the material, social and performative aspects, consti-
tuting the dance floor experience. In other words, we suggest that at the dance floor,
the potential of Design transcends the physical constrains of objects and products to
get radicalized as the embodied clubbing experience.

2 Clearing the Mess: Disentangling the Dance Floor

Experience

This section summarizes seven thematic maps, one for each element identified as part
of the dance floor experience: music, venue, audience, enthusiasm, abilities, stances,
and journey (see Fig. 1).
Music. Music can be seen as a mean to trigger emotions and to match scenarios
during the dance floor experience. This became evident when analyzing some of the
labels DJs use to name and organize their extensive digital music collections. DJ3
Design Radicalized as Experience: Disentangling … 93

Fig. 1 General view of the seven thematic maps—music, venue, audience, enthusiasm, abilities,
stances, and journey—with their respective subthemes

reports saving his music folders named for example: zombiness (sic.), continuous
groove, enders, everybody is dead, and strange noises. DJ1 also reports having a
folder of music called “weird beats bar MDMA [weirdbeats_MDMA]” containing
music he uses when people are “completely out-spaced”. The use of these labels
reveals much of the energy contained in music, but also some of the scenarios DJs
will find at the dance floor.
94 C. Lugo-Elías and P. Cardoso

When used as a trigger, music becomes the main input to the dance floor expe-
rience, provoking bodily dance movements, evoking emotions, synchronizing the
general mood, and preventing negative scenarios—i.e., boredom, monotony. Two
good examples of this, is the use of novelty and nostalgia [4]. Novelty is used when
DJs play new tracks, triggering curiosity and enthusiasm in the audience. Nostalgia
is triggered by bringing back memories to the audience by selecting recognizable
themes during the DJ performance, as DJ2 describes: “That happens to me often
when I play Forever More,1 I always feel the reciprocity from the public with those
classics, like I’ve got The Power 2 ”.
Music, and the subjective aesthetic information contained in it, is then used to
create a stream of energy above the dance floor, while offering accents of nostalgia,
joy, novelty, engagement, and the maintenance of emotional mental states. Music, or
the centrality of music, is also in constant flow between the foreground—as a trigger
of experiences, and the background—as the sonic context of those experiences. As
music interplays between the back and foreground, other elements get the chance
to take a central role and protagonism in the dance floor, like the audience or the
material context, showing how crucial is the interplay between different factors in
the creation of the experience.
Venue. Venue focuses on the intersection between two sub-themes, the event’s narra-
tive, and the materiality of the club. The event’s narrative answers three general ques-
tions: When is the event occurring? Who is attending? What kind of music is being
played? On the other side, materiality includes all tangible, visible, audible, and
haptic objects or things found within the dance floor, including light, room temper-
ature, construction materials, decoration, objects such as clothes and fashion acces-
sories. This map suggests that the combination of these two subthemes modulates
the mood of the audience, and the activities carried out on the dance floor.
Having the Lottus as our venue, the narrative is that the doors open at 6:00 am,
holding diurnal afterparties instead of night events. This club receives clients coming
from other clubs and events, not necessarily linked to the scene of house music,
creating a mixed audience—mostly male, though—with different ages, musical
backgrounds, sexual orientation, and sartorial tastes.
To these factors, we must add the material elements present at this venue, like
the entrance of sunlight trough two windows flanking the DJ booth—the central
visual point of the dance floor—provoking gradual changes of light and temperature
following the natural movement of the sun. The conjunction of these elements, the
natural and the architectural element of the windows and the orientation of the venue
towards the river, creates a diurnal narrative of relaxation, facilitating the commu-
nication among DJs and audience, helping to build a more cohesive audience. This
creates a contrast with the narratives of anonymity and indulgence produced by
the darkness of night clubs. Natural light remembers that the time of the night has
passed, placing the audience narratively and physically in the after party. Similarly,

1 A musical theme released in 2003 by Moloko.

2 The correct name of this theme is The Power, and it was released in 1990 by Snap!
Design Radicalized as Experience: Disentangling … 95

the musical selection of the DJs follows a day-night narrative, reserving techno for
the night and house music for the diurnal after hours.
Another way in which the materiality and the venue’s narrative regulate each
other, is through the disposition of the audience at the dance floor, facing the DJ while
being surrounded by the sound system. This facilitates the effect of reverberation,
which is produced when the sound waves coming from the speakers spread in the
physical space of the dance floor, impacting both bodies and objects, especially
walls. Once this occurs, some of the energy contained in the sound waves will be
absorbed by the impacted objects, while other frequencies will bounce back into the
atmosphere of the dance floor creating a series of audible echoes and atmospheric
vibrations [5, pp. 109–110]. Much of this reverberation is registered as vibrations on
the very skin of the audience. Reverberation allows the physical connection between
architecture, music, and audience, and was also observed by [6] as an element capable
of organizing the space by creating walls of sound.
Additionally, the timber structure of the dance floor at the Lottus creates an unex-
pected effect of bouncing as the audience dance to the pace of the house music making
the floor vibrate. This is perceived by the DJs as a form of feedback from the dance
floor—s. next section audience. In this way, the venue facilitates the intense expe-
rience trough visual, haptic, and sonic inputs, regulated by cables, speakers, sound
system, physical distance, the always changing sunlight, and acoustic reverberation.
Audience. The audience has two main forms of influencing the general dance floor
experience, one is by becoming a single collective dancing body, and by giving
feedback to the DJ. Dancing is the main social activity at the dance floor, and DJs
visualize audience not as individuals dancing separately but as a single collective
dancing body, as DJ1 puts it: “I try not to see much after specific persons on the
dance floor, I try to observe the dance floor as a global image … as a blurred image, I
try to see the global view”. Individual key dancers [7] became less relevant, as the goal
of the DJ and audience is to achieve synchronicity and communality under a similar
vibe, using dancing as both communication tool and as a means of embodiment of
the experience. Audience also expresses feedback verbally—by yelling, whistling,
cheering—with hand and facial expressions—smiling, starring, clapping, nodding—
and by social interaction—greeting, inviting/sharing drinks or cigarettes, and by
holding a welcoming stance to each other’s way of dancing and activities, avoiding
judgmental positions.
The complementary roles of the audience as collective dancing body, and as
sending feedback to the DJ—who ideally will interpret it and include it in the musical
decision process—creates a circuit we describe as a feedback machine, capable to
mediate between at least two types of energies present in the dance floor: the sonic
energy contained in the music and the kinetic energy contained in the act of dancing
[8, p. 41]. The theme of the audience then incorporates the sum of the embodied
and objectified movements, gestures, whistles, verbal and facial expressions, floor
vibrations, and triggered emotions accomplishing a mutual aesthetic understanding
[6, p. 19] between the DJ and the dancers.
96 C. Lugo-Elías and P. Cardoso

Abilities. Admitting that the feedback from the audience cannot be fully predicable,
DJs develop abilities of improvisation and to find music during their performance.
This requires the use of their sensorial and cognitive capacities in combination with
the technical features of the DJing equipment. Regarding the sensorial and cognitive
capacities, these come to help when DJs must shift focus during their performance
among four aspects: (1) the music track playing in the moment; (2) the selection of
the upcoming track; (3) the interactions and reactions of the audience; and (4) the
manipulation of the DJ equipment. To manage these tasks, DJs use one headphone to
listen the new track, the bare ear to hear the track currently playing through the sound
system, while watching the reaction of the dance floor without holding any specific
focal point—applying a high degree of spatial memory to manipulate the music
equipment usually without seeing it.3 These capacities are applied in conjunction
with the technical features offered by the DJ equipment, creating strategies to quickly
select and find music during the DJ performance. These strategies include the use
of customized labels for music and the use of the search engine to find those labels
during the performance; the same search engine can also be used to quickly find a
track by typing the first letter of the authors name, album or song title; also, some
equipment like the CDJ and laptops offer the possibility to visualize album covers,
which comes to help when trying to remember a single track’s name among the
extensive DJ’s music collections.
Another possibility offered by the equipment is the use of hot cues. Hot cues are
digital flags or marks a DJ can place strategically in certain moments of the track, for
example to mark the beginning of a specific melody or vocal phrases in the music.
These marks are recorded in the digital track, remembered, and visualized in many
CDJs and DJing software. In this way, the DJ can quickly start a track at a specific
point, saving time to find that spot.4
Combining the technical features offered by the equipment with their cognitive
capacities, DJs can dissect, label, manipulate, and find music. This translates into
musical choices and improvisation strategies that attempt to match the vibe on the
dance floor as well as to trigger reactions and emotions. DJing is then an excellent
example of how the combination of technology and human ingenuity don’t create
automatization but facilitates human improvisation, echoing [9] notion that impro-
visation assisted by technology does not mean the loss of human agency but its
complementation.
Enthusiasm. DJs add value to their performance not only by mastering new DJing
techniques, acquiring DJ devices and software, or by collecting large music collec-
tions; additionally, they bring an attitude of respect and dedication towards their craft.
This enthusiasm reflects their personal history and artistic and creative motivations,
as well as the self-perception as cultural keepers capable of transfer club culture.

3 This can be compared to a person playing video games who is capable to focus on the screen and
not on the controllers or the equipment.
4 Digital hot cues have their analogue precedent in vinyl records, where DJs used wax crayons to

draw a mark on the disc’s surface, recording specific spots where they should place the needle of
the turntable to find musical sections.
Design Radicalized as Experience: Disentangling … 97

As part of their personal history, DJing is seen as second nature, a vocation they
start discovering mainly during their past role as dancers and influenced by peers
and family members:
DJ7: [I had musical influence] from my father… I can remember when I was already 10
years old being in the car with him driving and hearing house music… that was pretty much
my first memory of house music… that [music] informed my background and opened me
the door for this world.
DJ3: because being there [on the dance floor] was like being in my natural habitat, always
… in those [past] years, it was common for me to wake up and go straight to the Lottus.
DJ10: before [becoming DJ], I was always there [on the dance floor] having fun…

These experiences offered the DJs a sort of layout from which they start to develop
their DJ persona. Especially the capacity of the DJ to read the audience seems to
be very much influenced by their past as clubbers, underlining that every DJ may
always have a past as dancer. DJs also made emphasis in their enthusiasm to transmit
joy, love, and their passion for DJing:
DJ2: I do this because I love it, I love the music, the scene, the friends, and if it weren’t
because of my love for it, I would not do it anymore.
DJ4: I want to transmit happiness, joy, happiness … and dance.

Another motif mentioned by DJs is the maintenance and transference of the club
culture: “There is something… how can I explain it, there is some sort of teaching
… of education. I try to pass some musical culture when I am at the Lottus” (DJ2).
This club culture extends to what the dance floor—including the DJ—sees, hear,
feels, experience, and constitutes a sort of memory that cannot be fully recorded by
text or video. By analyzing this theme, is possible to suggest that the best way to
maintain and preserve club culture is by re-enacting the dance floor experience, for
which the DJ performance is a central part of it, and DJs seems to be aware of it.
The enthusiasm from the DJs encircles personality traits and motivations
embedded in the DJs personal biography, informing the way and the why they do
their craft. They integrate their pride, knowledge, and efforts to both maintain and
actualize the club culture by re-enacting the dance floor experience every morning
they play at the Lottus.
Stances. Different from their enthusiasm and abilities, DJs bring certain stances that
help them to negotiate with the dance floor to achieve a collective and communal
experience through the manipulation of sound customized to people’s mood and in
concordance with the venue’s narrative and materiality. These stances are to embrace
the risk of failure and to seek negotiation with the dance floor, rather than imposing
their musical decisions.
The risk of failure during the performance means the risk of misreading the audi-
ence’s wishes; not bringing the right musical style; not playing the music in the right
order or in an inadequate speed; or failing to create seamless musical transitions
when manipulating the equipment. Any of these failures may result in the disrup-
tion of the vibe or energy on the dance floor. Facing all these scenarios, DJs must
embrace “a good portion of uncertainty [while bringing another portion of] ingenuity,
98 C. Lugo-Elías and P. Cardoso

craziness…” (DJ6). When they embrace those risks, they seem to be more open for
improvisation through creative ways of manipulating the equipment, or by bringing
and playing new musical tracks or mixing genres.
On the other hand, DJs seek negotiation by acknowledging the dance floor as a
sort of commanding entity, understanding that “the DJ will never be bigger than the
club … the dance floor commands the DJ, not the other way around” (DJ1). In this
way, DJs embody a role not only as performers, but also as service providers, giving
importance to be perceived as respectful of the audience but also self-assured in their
craft. This helps them to deal with individuals who may bring disruptive energy by
complaining about the music: “They are there expecting me to tear the house down
and pum, pum, pum! [mimicking the sound and pace of the bass in techno and house
music]” (DJ2); or by making musical requests, something that is rarely welcome by
DJs since it tends to ruin the musical narrative they tend to build during the set.
Journey. Journey describes the aesthetic output generated through the DJ perfor-
mance, expressed as a battle of energies, and improvisation. The term battle is used
here to describe the antagonism created by the constant flow of energies during the
performances: between nostalgia and novelty, between music for the body and music
for the mind, between joy and melancholy. This creates a narrative through gradual
juxtaposition of vibes, which can be contradictory:
DJ1: [I try] to create a narrative through the response of the audience, but that is always
difficult, sometimes you don’t get it … but that is the fight … as I told you I try to create
a battle of energies and maybe create some drama and then an explosion of energy … a
contrast … it is a battle of spirits, a battle of moods.
DJ3: A good set for me should have variety, a mix of forces, fragility, joy and even melan-
choly… It should have moments for everything … and it should be natural, organic. Things
should not be forced; they should occur naturally.

Improvisation is understood as the lack of a defined plan for the journey. Every-
thing gets solved in situ and ad momentum, just as the selection of the music occurs
on the fly. Thanks to the array of possibilities offered by technology and the vast sonic
material at their disposal, every DJ is capable to improvise in their own manner, as
DJ3 states: “This is one of the things I think makes DJing harder and beautiful,
there are thousands of ways for you to do things; and everyone, all DJs are doing
the ‘same job’ but in very different ways”. Embracing improvisation and the risk of
failure humanize the performance adding an edge of expectation while maintaining
the audience engaged during the performance.
Seen like a journey, the dance floor experience challenges traditional notions of
displacement as DJ8 puts it: “I used to say that this is an airplane, it takes time
for the airplane to completely take off, then during the flight, the aircraft will face
some turbulence … and eventually [it] will land”. To be in the journey means to be
embarked in a sonic endeavor capable of bringing the audience to different places and
moments by triggering collective emotions and organizing embodied experiences,
all without leaving physically the dance floor.
Design Radicalized as Experience: Disentangling … 99

3 Building a Philosophical Framework: Reassembling

the Dance Floor Experience

After analyzing the different components of the dance floor, it was necessary to
analyze how they interplay, creating the gestalt or their articulation that is more than
the sum of their parts. To achieve this, we organized the themes into four assemblages:
the material, the social, the performative, and the experiential assemblages.
The Material Assemblage. So far, the elements capable to mediate among the
different material elements involved in the creation of the dance floor experience
are sound, reverberation, proximity, emptiness, and light and darkness.
Sound. Sound is encoded as a continuous groove engraved on the surface of the
vinyl records, or coded as zeros and ones recorded in music digital formats. For
the sound to be released, it is necessary the interplay between the technical features
offered by the DJ equipment—which will decode and playback the sound—as well
as the cognitive and sensorial capacities of the DJ—who will release the sound
following the feedback he/she reads from the audience according with the subjective
energy contained in each musical track. Then, the sound will be emitted through
the sound system—cables and speakers—into the physical space of the dance floor
as soundwaves. These waves will be perceived not only as music but as variations
in the atmospheric pressure hitting the skin of the audience, and as reverberation,
impacting both individuals and the architecture of the dance floor.
Reverberation. Reverberation is not only the consequence of the sound waves
hitting the architecture of the dance floor, but a medium for the sonic energy to
circulate between and through the bodies of the audience. As such, sound is finally
translated into body movements. As movement, sound will be re-transmitted back
into the materiality of the dance floor by the effect of bouncing produced by the
dancers when hitting the floor; this bouncing is then perceived again by the DJ,
creating a closed circuit or a feedback machine. Since the sound of house and techno
music follows a 4/4 signature, it helps to synchronize the people’s movements—the
collective dancing body—with the architectonic reverberation. This synchronicity
can be expressed using the onomatopoeic form pum, pum, pum, pum, to describe the
pace in which music, architecture, and people’s movement gets coordinated, creating
a specific synchronicity. By coordinating all these elements, sound is probably the
most notorious mediator in the creation of the dance floor experience.
Physical proximity. The material assemblage is also influenced by other design
elements such as the physical proximity between the DJ booth and the audience. As in
the Lottus—where the DJ booth is situated at the same level as the dance floor while
surrounded by the audience—DJ and audience can share a single common sonic
experience, facilitating the necessary empathy to create the flow of sonic energy
between the DJ booth and the dance floor.
Emptiness. Emptiness is another fundamental design element in the creation of
the dance floor experience. Rather than being seen as a negative aspect or as lack of
design, the emptiness of the dance floor is a conscious design decision which suggests
and allows dancing, transit, interactions, and the propagation of sound. Emptiness
100 C. Lugo-Elías and P. Cardoso

organizes the dance floor experience not by signifying what to do within the space, but
by allowing things to happen while offering the necessary space for the embodiment
of sound. Empty is also an adjective applicable to the walls of the dance floor at the
Lottus, which lack of decorative elements. The walls, ceilings and floors are either
painted in plain dark color or exposing the raw construction materials—rocks on
two walls, and timber in floor and ceiling. These elements, just as emptiness and
darkness, evoke an aesthetic narrative of the provisional, the possible, the emerging
[10, p. 118] in concordance with the egalitarian narratives of the collective dancing
body who moves synchronized by the sound of house music.
Light and Darkness. In a similar way, lighting and, maybe more surprisingly, dark-
ness are key elements in the design of the atmosphere within the dance floor. While
in the nightclub darkness may allow anonymity as well as indulgent sexual, sensual
and drug practices; at the Lottus, darkness is occurring only in the beginning of the
event, as later the place is bathed with sunlight as a new day develops. These change
in light between night and day is essential to the construction of the event’s narra-
tive influencing the way people interact with each other. Once the sun overflows
the dance floor, illuminating and heating the atmosphere, individuals and actions
become visible, people tend to recognize themselves while sharing the same experi-
ence without the need of anonymity. As one attendee at the Lottus once commented:
“every time I see the sun coming into the dance floor, I always think: we made it”.
The Social Assemblage. The social assemblage is mediated by interaction cues and
social energy.
Interaction cues. The most notorious interaction cue is the collective act of
dancing, which encircles all forms of embodiment such as body language, body
movement and facial expressions. Other interaction cues are the feedback used by
the audience to express approval or disapproval, including verbal conversations,
laughter, cheering and even the act of dancing to music with closed eyes as a way of
introspection. These are all forms of feedback influencing the dance floor experience.
Social energy. DJs foster the sonic energy contained in music to be translated not
only into interactions but also into sensations and emotions such as joy, empathy,
euphoria, looseness, nostalgia, and curiosity. This energy is achieved by manipulating
the DJ equipment, capable to playback, label, dissect, loop, equalize or increase
and decrease the speed of music. Through the manipulation of sonic means, sound
translates into mood or vibe, resuming the emotional load and social energy of the
dance floor experience.
The Performative Assemblage. The performative aspect of the dance floor expe-
rience is mediated by sonic cues and the cultural ethos or cultural narrative. While
sonic cues help in the customization of the sonic energy of the experience to the
wishes of the audience, the cultural ethos helps to wrap that experience in a single
subjective cultural narrative.
Sonic Cues. Sonic cues are here all those sound signals, melodies, patterns,
rhythms, and breaks encoded in the musical tracks, which will be released by the DJ
in combination with the technological features of the equipment and following the
Design Radicalized as Experience: Disentangling … 101

feedback of the public, who will again decipher them and translate them into move-
ment, interactions, emotions and finally record them as memories. A good example
of this is the use of the so-called hot cues recorded in digital music. These digital
tags help dissect and mark the beginning or the end of certain music sections. This
makes possible for DJs to navigate through the structure of a musical track. Hot cues
help find the right sonic energy the audience need by marking certain sonic cues like
melodies, vocals or characteristic sound embedded in music.
Cultural Ethos. Cultural ethos is an umbrella concept covering all the different
aspects related to the dance floor culture, being ideas of utopian egalitarianism,
political manifestations, relations of power, as well as empowerment of minorities and
the exploration of the own personality. The cultural ethos of the dance floor experience
contains all these elements rendered as sonic cues, technical equipment, human
interaction, material spaces, DJing techniques and different types of embodiments
and communication—like dancing and cheering. All these manifestations are all
occurring simultaneously within the physical space of the dance floor creating a
cultural narrative.
The Experiential Assemblage. The last assemblage suggests that the dance floor
experience is the gestalt of all the moments, interactions, emotions, materials, equip-
ment, sounds, body movements, and performative and cultural aspects manifested
during the dance floor experience. This assemblage considers all other three assem-
blages as sources of aesthetic knowledge, which will be interconnected trough the
experience itself. Like so, and paraphrasing [11], each element becomes a medium,
influencing and transmitting agency to the other (p. 17) until the whole experi-
ence is assembled. This reinforce the idea of the nightclub as a “ Gesamtkunstwerk
melting interior and furniture design, graphics and art, light andmusic, fashion and
performance into a unique whole” [12, p. 10].
Here, it seems clear that the human body is the only element capable to assemble
the dance floor experience, since the human body is the repository of the experience
[6, p. 4] and not the architecture, technology, nor music. The body will carry then
the sensations and traces produced by the dance floor experience understood as a
sonic-corporeal-architectonic dialogue.

4 Outro: Design Radicalized as Experience

Up until now, we examined the dance floor experience dividing it in 7 themes with
their respective sub-themes, and afterwards we described how these elements inter-
play, forming the material, social, performative, and experiential assemblages that
constituting the dance floor experience. In this final section, we explore the relevance
that the study of the dance floor experience at the Lottus can have to for the discipline
of Design.
To assemble the dance floor experience at the Lottus implies that multiple and
simultaneous narratives coexist within the same space-event. This reminds to Andy
102 C. Lugo-Elías and P. Cardoso

Warhol’s events, the Exploding Plastic Inevitable or EPI, held at the Dom in New
York in the late 1960s, which later became the club called Electric Circus [10, 13, 14].
During every EPI, Warhol activated an arsenal of projection and sound technologies,
concurring simultaneously with music and artistic performances and the use of props
[14, p. 81]. The (ab)use of multiple technologies and performances undertook by
Warhol built a technology-based space [15] without even building or touching a
single wall, but by creating a semi-solid environment while abducting the attendees
into an intense sensory stimulation just as in the contemporary night-club (p. 518).
There are other references about similar multimedia environments from the late
1960s, namely the club Maddox in Platja d’Aro, near Barcelona [16] and the Cere-
brum in New York [17]—the latter made with the intention of recreating a psychedelic
trip through a multisensory environment (p. 150). However, despite these other exam-
ples, the EPI became relevant as it was used as inspiration by McLuhan’s [3] to coin
the term allatoncenes (all-at-once-ness), a concept fitting to describe our contem-
porary electronically-configured world, where, paraphrasing the author, information
pours upon us constantly, continuously and always replaced by newer information,
melting our experiences and our environment in a constant interplay, vanishing time
and ceasing space into a simultaneous happening (p. 63).
Allatonceness can be seen as a strategy in the design of the club experience [18],
where sound, music and media technologies create a hybrid space-event where time
ceases, and space becomes indistinguishable from the events occurred there. As [16]
pointed out, the club is a phenomenological-spatial apparatus, blending space, time,
social and performative components, transforming the club from a container of events
into the event itself (p. 132). This means that at the club, the category of space is no
longer a stable and Cartesian. Space depends on the events occurred there, rendering
technology and material elements into a sensorial experience.
As [13] pointed out, Warhol’s EPI was not conceptualized as an artistic perfor-
mance but as architecture radicalized as medium, where technology was used to
squeeze out the empty space, only to be replaced with a media-based environment
(p. 100). By echoing Lavin’s notions, it is possible to suggest that the experience at
the dance floor at the Lottus can be seen as the radicalization of design as experi-
ence, not by building specific environments trough decoration or by placing specific
objects within the dance floor, but by using intangible design elements such as sound,
reverberation, darkness or emptiness, with the aim of allowing and triggering social
interactions and organizing the sonic, social and kinetic energy, characteristic of the
dance floor experience. Following this line of thought, the relationship of Design
and clubbing is not based exclusively in the physical objects placed within the dance
floor, but in the way Design allows the assemblage of material, social and perfor-
mative elements, providing for the creation of an experience rather than an object or
product.

Acknowledgements This work was financed by national funds through the Portuguese FCT—
Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia. Thanks to all the anonymous DJs who, voluntary and
selflessly, offered their time and knowledge to conclude this work. Thanks to all the staff members
of the Lottus After-hours, for allowing the development of this research.
Design Radicalized as Experience: Disentangling … 103

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Feb 2022
A Case Study of Remote User Research
with Older Adults During Lockdown:
Analysis of Barriers, Strategies
and of Communication Issues

Ricardo Araújo, Ana Vasconcelos, and Ana Correia de Barros

Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdowns have brought to

researchers’ attention the need to adapt user research methods to remote settings.
This paper builds on a video dataset of remote user research with older adults, imple-
mented in the context of a longitudinal study impacted by the lockdown. In the anal-
ysis of the dataset as a case study, we found and categorised general barriers, strategies
and specificities of communication of user research sessions conducted remotely. Our
findings inform researchers planning and implementing similar methods, particularly
in studies involving older user groups.

Keywords Remote user research · Older adults · Video analysis

1 Introduction

Understanding users’ behaviour in time is increasingly important in design research,

especially when studying digital technology which changes at a rapid pace, along
with users’ digital literacy [1]. However, implementing longitudinal studies comes
with its own set of challenges such as recruiting and retaining participants [2] or
analysing longitudinal data [3]. When such studies include or are centred on specific
audiences such as older adults, their specific characteristics need to be considered
since they can affect how the study is prepared, implemented or finished [4]. Despite
how much effort is put into planning a longitudinal study, there are always unforeseen
circumstances that can jeopardize its successful completion.
The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak is particularly hard to over-
come due to the imposed restrictions that included national lockdowns and physical
distancing. The measures required prompt and full re-planning of many research
projects, particularly ongoing longitudinal studies, to guarantee the minimum
possible impact in the collected data [5]. It is also important to consider that the
pandemic has taken a toll on the general population’s mental health and projects

R. Araújo (B) · A. Vasconcelos · A. C. de Barros

Fraunhofer Portugal AICOS, Porto, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 105
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
106 R. Araújo et al.

involving older adults must consider that this audience has been especially at risk,
both from the virus itself and the social restrictions that negatively impact community-
dwelling and institutionalised older adults, exacerbating already prevalent issues,
such as social isolation and cognitive decline [6].
At the same time, while digital technologies have been widely employed in both
professional and personal contexts to communicate with co-workers, friends and
family, older adults account for the lowest portion of users of these technologies. In
Portugal, where our study was conducted, 76.2% of people aged 16–74 were internet
users as of 2019 but, despite the increase in this number over the years, it is still below
the EU-28 average. People aged 65–74 account for only 34.1% of internet users [7]
indicating that navigating a remote, online environment is still not achievable for
most.
We implemented a remote longitudinal study with older adults to assess if a tablet-
based gaming platform could impact participants’ perceived consequences of social
isolation, quality of life, attitudes towards technology and cognitive abilities. The
gaming platform—CogniPlay—includes 15 games developed to stimulate cognitive
domains, such as visual short-term memory, arithmetic, and inferential reasoning,
among others. Participants were recruited for an initial one-year period and were
encouraged to continue using the system after completing this time frame.
In this paper, we share the analysis of a set of videos of remote sessions with
community-dwelling and institutionalised older adults. The analysis focused on the
barriers we encountered, as well on strategies that were adopted during the remote
sessions. We analysed communication issues in particular, which we have found to
be critical. In sharing our findings, we share lessons learned with design researchers
who may find them useful to implement their own remote user research sessions.

2 Related Work

Design research with human participants requires careful consideration to ensure

participants’ rights are respected, their privacy and safety is guaranteed and that their
well-being is promoted. Some aspects can be more easily safeguarded by proce-
dures such as informed consent forms or study approval by institutional review
boards, while others are more nuanced and require researchers to be very attentive
to participants, their context, and to researchers’ own actions during interactions [8].
Such design research sessions can take up different formats such as observations,
interviews, focus groups or usability tests that require different degrees of interaction
with users. While in some methods researchers would ideally be practically invisible
to the participants (e.g., observations) in others, like interviews, the researcher takes
a very active role that requires an active and extensive conversation with the user. In
such cases, sessions must be carefully planned out from an interpersonal interaction
point-of-view.
In this chapter, we focus on face-to-face, one-to-one conversational interactions
which are an important way of gathering attitudinal, qualitative data [9], as well as
A Case Study of Remote User Research with Older Adults During … 107

on the contributions of Psychology to the practice of design research. While listening

to participants’ responses is critical in conversational interactions, the interpretation
of non-verbal cues such as body language, facial expressions and eye contact should
not be disregarded as they can be used to enhance the researchers’ understanding of
what is being said [10]. While this is an advantage of this type of sessions it does
not come without challenges. The researcher should consider the power dynamics
at play since there could be a perceived status difference by the participants where
the researcher is the subject expert potentially leaving the participant self-conscious
about their knowledge [10]. Sessions should be planned to slowly introduce the
participant to the subject, enabling the researcher to build trust, establish rapport
and avoid surprising the participant with unexpected questions. Sensitive or difficult
topics should be left towards the end of the session [11], when the participant is feeling
more relaxed and at ease. Some strategies that would allow participants to achieve
this state include approaching the session with a relaxed, confident and attentive
demeanour, providing a comfortable environment or finding common ground with
the participant in the initial stages of the session, even if resorting to some controlled
off-topic conversation is required [12]. Avoiding lengthy sessions (ideally under
two hours [12]) will also help control tiredness for both participants and researchers.
Facilitators are, e.g., breaking complex questions into multiple simpler ones, resorting
to strategies like prompts to expand on a subject or re-engaging with the session
[11] and posing probing questions to uncover deeper levels or seek clarity on a
subject [10]. This is particularly useful when facing monosyllabic or less engaged
participants. On the contrary, participants should be allowed to talk uninterrupted and
at their own pace; in case the conversation goes off-topic hindering the purpose of the
interview, the researcher should then politely interrupt and guide the conversation
back to the subject matter [13]. Active listening is the key role of the researcher. To
indicate this attitude, the researcher can use verbal cues, by repeating or echoing what
the participant is saying and non-verbal cues such as an open posture, appropriate
facial expression and maintaining a good eye contact [10]. Silence, coupled with eye
contact, can also be used to allow the participant time to pause and reflect [14]. The
researcher conducting the session should also pay close attention to anxiety signs
shown by the participant. This can derive from concerns on how they are perceived by
the researcher itself or on how their responses are being evaluated [10]. It should be
made clear to the participant, both verbally and through a non-judgemental behaviour
of the researcher, that they are not being judged and that their participation is valued
regardless of their performance.
While literature is increasingly richer in reporting the inclusion on older adults in
user research, e.g., [13, 15–19], the same cannot be said when considering remote
methods [20]. Both Hill et al. [21] and Loveys et al. [22] report successfully transi-
tioning projects involving older adults to a remote setting, however neither of them
employed synchronous activities with participants. Harrington et al. [23] conducted
remote interviews with older adults, however their output on the application of this
method is scarce, emphasizing recruitment difficulties and indicating that splitting
the session in two different days allowed them to tackle technical issues more easily
and avoid participants burdening. In the studies conducted by Cerna et al. [5] two
108 R. Araújo et al.

projects were switched to remote, both including older adults and synchronous activ-
ities. Throughout their adaptation, there were difficulties related to the chosen tool
for videocalls, the need to foster older adults’ capabilities in using such tools and
how important verbal instructions and their context were during the sessions.
During our sessions we included cognitive assessment using the Montreal Cogni-
tive Assessment (MoCA) [24] which has been previously applied remotely with
satisfactory results [25–27]. All studies had similar procedures: participants were
given, mailed or emailed the required materials and interacted with a researcher via
teleconference. After performing the visual exercises, participants were asked to hold
the paper sheet up to the camera. Reported complications included minor technolog-
ical difficulties [25–27], lack of adequate lighting [25, 26], participants’ symptoms
(tremors) [25] that interfered with their ability to show the results to the camera, main-
taining eye contact [26] and difficulty in assessing how much help the participants
were receiving from their caregiver [27]. Since all studies recruited participants with
different conditions (movement disorders [25], Dementia [26], Parkinson [27]), the
convenience of this method is highlighted since it does not require traveling, unbur-
dening both patients and their caregivers. The participation of caregivers during the
sessions is also seen as crucial to aid participants with the technological setup and
provide them with the required materials [26].

3 Dataset

3.1 Context of the Study and Setup

Participants for the longitudinal study were recruited with the help of local caregiving
organisations, who would also appoint one caregiver (henceforth called gatekeeper)
to help researchers in doing the setup for the remote sessions. The sessions took
place either at participants’ homes or at institutions. At times, the gatekeeper was
present throughout the session and, at times, absent. All sessions were moderated by
the same researcher (moderator).
The longitudinal study protocol included a baseline assessment and periodic eval-
uations conducted every 3 months. The assessments have a neuropsychological and
a user experience component. Cognitive performance was assessed by the Montreal
Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) [24]. The WAIS-R version of the Corsi block-tapping
test [28] was used to evaluate visuo-spatial memory. As for Psychological Well-
being and loneliness, depressive symptoms were assessed using the Geriatric Depres-
sion Scale 15 [29] and loneliness was measured by Short-Form UCLA Loneliness
Scale (ULS-6) [30]. Quality of Life was assessed by a combination of a subjec-
tive well-being measure—Life Satisfaction Scale [31], and a health-related quality
of life instrument—EQ-5D-5L [32]. Regarding technology acceptance, we devel-
oped a model based on the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology
A Case Study of Remote User Research with Older Adults During … 109

Fig. 1 Setup on the

participant side

by Venkatesh et al. [33], integrating gerontology-specific dimensions, such as tech-

nological self-efficacy and technological anxiety. This was complemented with a
bespoke questionnaire to assess ICT experience, in terms of frequency and type
of use. Lastly, a sociodemographic questionnaire was administered, with additional
questions related to health, daily habits, and lifestyle.
Digital versions of the neuropsychological instruments were considered, but ulti-
mately rejected due to incompatibility with our equipment’s operating system, not
being validated in the current population/language, and/or being too complex to
implement remotely. MoCA was adapted to suit possible constraints in the remote
assessment, specifically the visual exercises. A separate paper sheet with the Naming
Task (naming three animals drawn on the sheet), an alternate version of trail-making
B test, and both drawing tasks (drawing a clock and drawing a cube) was sent previ-
ously to the institution, to be placed next to participants during the session (Fig. 1).
Participants were encouraged to show the sheet to the researcher after each drawing,
and the physical sheets were later retrieved for evaluation. The Corsi block-tapping
test was adapted into a hybrid (digital and physical) format, to maximize fidelity with
the original version. The remaining instruments were administered as usual.
Protocol administration was split into two (sometimes three) sessions, allowing
a conversational approach with participants, thus increasing researcher-participant
rapport, and minimizing fatigue for participants. Each session began with video and
sound testing, followed by an informal talk to make participants at ease and to assess
their alertness and motivation. The administration paused in the event of persistent
technical issues, or when participants showed signs of fatigue/discomfort.

3.2 Dataset Description

For this paper, we created a dataset of video recordings from the remote sessions
of baseline assessment, by selecting the segment of the session assessing Visu-
ospatial/Executive and Naming cognitive domains with MoCA. This segment was
selected because it contained interaction dynamics which are used in user research
and co-design sessions (spontaneous conversation, instructions giving, interactions
with objects, and drawing) and could, therefore, be useful to render knowledge for
110 R. Araújo et al.

Fig. 2 Mosaic of screenshots from database videos

design researchers. It should be noted however that no analysis of the instrument or

their applicability in a remote context was performed.
The dataset (Fig. 2) is composed of sessions with 40 community-dwelling and
institutionalised older adults (Age = 83.7, SD = 8.2). The average duration of the
videos is 10m10s (Max: 26m36s, Min: 1m11s). Thirty-five recordings were made
at an institution and five in participants’ homes. Twenty-seven recordings have the
participation of a gatekeeper. In seven recordings, another researcher is also present
in the call, although she did not intervene.

4 Procedures

The analysis of the videos was made by the three authors individually using mainly
a deductive approach over a shared matrix of barriers and strategies. The authors
registered their codes on the matrix and freely added codes to barrier types and
strategies, when relevant, supported by quotes from the videos. The authors then
engaged in periodical discussions about their data interpretations as the analysis was
ongoing to ascertain whether there was consensus. Also registered, in this case using
an inductive approach, were aspects which authors found noteworthy—these were
not registered on the matrix, but on a separate, shared, note sheet.
Once all videos were analysed by all authors and the matrix filled in, we began a
second phase of analysis to identify categories, which grouped codes. The identifica-
tion of categories was made via two methods by two of the authors separately: using
an affinity diagram and using the constructs of conversation analysis (CA). In so
doing, the authors continued engaging in periodical discussions about their analyses.
The affinity diagram allows to group codes semantically using an inductive
approach—where a set of codes is brought together with significant resemblance
and characteristics that separate them from other sets of codes, a category is formed.
A Case Study of Remote User Research with Older Adults During … 111

Conversation analysis can be understood as the study of interaction through

talk, delves into a conceptual analysis of structures, dynamics, and organization
of dialogue between two or more individuals [34]. Although it has been extensively
researched in face-to-face settings, remote videoconference dynamics bring new
communication challenges related to technology [35], and CA might complement
design research methods by focusing on sociolinguistic analysis and thus enabling
the understanding of the users’ needs and feedback [36]. The exchange between the
researcher-participant-gatekeeper was thus characterized in terms of three dimen-
sions: turn-taking [37], sequence organization [38, 39], and repair organization
[40].
Turn-Taking implies a structured order of exchange between two or more people
in a conversation, one at a time and organized in turns, which are then composed by
one or more turn construction units (TCUs) which are understood as cues (produced
via grammar, prosody, but also via visual or action cues) by both participants and
help the other person identify and predict the end of a speaker’s intervention, thus
maintaining the flow of conversation. When a turn ends, naming of the next speaker,
or turn allocation, can occur via self-selection, other-selection, or not occur at all, in
which the current speaker continues. Depending on where it is inserted, silence might
also organically inform the dynamic of turn-taking and be indicative of issues with
communication [41]. Videoconference turn-taking challenges can be perceived as
procedural problems in the context of turn-taking even if they stem from technological
issues such as latency [42].
Sequence organization revolves around the idea that dialogue occurs in a succes-
sive exchange of turns which are dynamically linked [38]. Those dynamics can take
familiar forms, such as greeting-greeting, question–answer, request-accept/refusal,
etc., but also more generic forms that fulfil specific co-understandings of the circum-
stances and type of conversation behind held. Through the understanding of adja-
cency pairs (AP), or a sequence of two turns (one by each speaker) that directly
related to one another, we can infer the purpose or a certain message or speaker,
while assessing subsequent APs. The impact of technology related issues, such as
delay caused by latency, can turn a delayed preferred response (a sort of “posi-
tive/acceptance” expected response to the stated message) into a interpreted dispre-
ferred response (a response that isn’t necessarily negative or of refusal, but nonethe-
less does not match expectations derived from the previous stated message), simply
because of expectations of timing [35].
Repair organization can be understood as an organized action to correct for issues
that might arise in communication, such as a misunderstanding, issues with hearing
or speaking (either from the speaker and/or the receiver) or for any other reason
that results in the intended message not being passed [43]. We can further divide
repair into two distinct phases [44]: repair initiation, in which the communicational
issue is signalled, and repair proper, in which the issue is then corrected by either
the speaker (in which case we would consider it to be a “self-repair”) or any other
element of the conversation (a “other-repair”). This sequence of both repair initiation
and repair proper can be structured into some or all these elements: the trouble source
(part of conversation that pertains to the repair), the repair initiator (the person who
112 R. Araújo et al.

addresses the trouble sources), the repair (in which the correction/change over the
trouble source is made) and the repair confirmation (signalling the success of the
repair). The organization of these elements may give rise to different types of repairs,
based on the element that is responsible for each of them, the type of trouble source,
or even awareness of it [40].

5 Findings

5.1 General Barriers and Strategies

Barriers
We identified general barriers grouped under Technology, Context and Person. Tech-
nology barriers relate to audio (low voice volume, cuts in the audio, and audio delays),
image (highly pixelated (Fig. 2 E) or freezing) and the Internet connection, which may
fail altogether. Unexpectedly, they did not seem to impact communication greatly,
as they frequently did not impel the parts to act to solve them. There was a mismatch
between researchers’ anticipated barriers and what effectively was the case, which
is similar to the experience reported by Cerna et al. [5].
There are barriers related to the participant’s Context, which include the physical
environment and the actions of the gatekeeper. Not only is it important to have a
physical environment where the setup for a remote session can be done, but also
one where participants will be able to interact with pencil and paper and show their
exercises to the moderator. We found that participants might have poor conditions to
draw, might have low illuminance levels or need assistance with equipment. Whilst
the gatekeeper is often a valuable assistance, they can unintendedly create barriers
as well: in the videos, gatekeepers sometimes interrupted the interaction between
moderator and participant, overhelped participants in exercises or had difficulties in
placing the camera (obstructing view (e.g., Fig. 2 A, B, V) or sound).
Person-related barriers often refer to the participant, but also to codes identified
in relation to the moderator. Concerning participants, barriers are mostly connected
to functioning (in the sense of the ICF [45])—the person shows auditory/visual
difficulties, deficits in attention or difficulties in understanding instructions. However,
we have also found barriers regarding participants’ mindset, which both moderator
and gatekeeper seem to be aware of. As participants are being asked to perform
an activity, they often verbalise how they think they are not up to the challenge and
comment negatively on their performance after executing the activity. The moderator
may find it difficult to have the necessary situational awareness that helps steer in-
person sessions. In one case, the gatekeeper tells the participant she will be doing
a last thing before joining her colleagues for a snack. In prior analysis of strategies
in user research with older adults, we found this situational awareness to be relevant
for moderators [13].
A Case Study of Remote User Research with Older Adults During … 113

Table 1 General strategies:

Participant performance
theme, sub-themes, and
categories Understanding Executing
Clarification Tasks on exercise
Context Physical conditions

Strategies
The participant, the gatekeeper and the moderator engage in strategies to overcome
the barriers. All strategies fall under the theme of Performance, here defined in
relation to the research participants as the process of performing the activities planned
in the protocol. This theme includes two sub-themes: Understanding and Executing
(Table 1). The first refers to aspects of communication and the second to aspects of
executing instructions of the MoCA. We will go into more detail for each sub-theme.
Understanding
As we will see in the next section devoted to communication aspects, all parties in the
videos engaged in strategies to improve mutual understanding through Clarification.
This was shown by providing physical support, using gestures in addition to spoken
words (Fig. 2 D, J, P), repeating instructions, paraphrasing or in breaking informa-
tion. In one instance, the gatekeeper explained to the moderator that the participant
was using a word in a foreign language to name one of the animals. This is one of the
instances where we notice the role of the gatekeeper in preventing misunderstand-
ings. There were often situations in which the parties need to request confirmation
about elements on the sheet to guarantee that there is no misunderstanding, either by
identifying where they are in the sheet or their characteristics, e.g., moderator asking
about the circle in the clock drawing: ‘Did you make it large, like this?’ [gestures a
large circle in the air] (P37). Although these kinds of clarifications probably made
exercises longer than they would have been in person, we also note that they do not
seem to have had an impact on how the exercise was performed.
There were also times when the intervening parties required more Context about
the situation at hand. Here, the role of the gatekeeper is noticeable, when they provide
the moderator with context which is critical to his understanding of the situation.
The gatekeeper informing that the participant has poor eyesight is an example of
conveying important information that aids understanding. When participants are not
sure about their performance, they might also verbalise it. And, at times, providing
context has the double function of supporting participants’ self-confidence, e.g.:
Moderator: ‘We’re making you sweat today’
Gatekeeper: ‘She likes it. She likes challenges’ (P23)

Executing
The strategies under this theme serve to support the participant in having the condi-
tions necessary to perform the exercises which will help make a neuropsychological
114 R. Araújo et al.

assessment. Verbalisations, from gatekeeper and moderator, giving encouragement

to participants are very salient and mostly help address signs of poor self-confidence.
They arise in relation to specific Tasks on the exercise. The gatekeeper uses their
physical presence on site to direct participants’ attention to parts of the sheet or to
course correct participants. Since the sheet is frequently barred from the moderator’s
view, this strategy is supportive of the user research process. Gatekeepers remind
participants that there are parts of the exercise missing, they erase participants’ draw-
ings when they wish to redraw, and they redirect participants’ attention. The physical
presence of the gatekeeper allows them to improve Physical conditions for partici-
pants. Gatekeepers often improvise solutions, such as using a smartphone flashlight
to illuminate the participant’s sheet (Fig. 2 E), placing a harder surface underneath
the paper sheet to help the participant draw (Fig. 2 G), leaving the room momentarily
to fetch participant’s eyeglasses (P27), making adjustments to the camera while the
exercises are ongoing or picking up paper sheet and showing it to the camera (Fig. 2 F,
L). In two occasions where the gatekeeper was absent from the room, the moderator
was forced to phone call them to aid—this happened once because the participant
needed help to place the pencil on his hand orthosis and another time because the
gatekeeper had forgotten to leave a MoCA sheet with the participant. When the gate-
keeper came in, she said ‘Oh, the camel sheet’. Camel was the first animal named by
the participant in the animal naming exercise (P47). In some situations, the presence
of the gatekeeper and the strategies adopted to support execution of the exercises can
ironically become a barrier and compromise the session goal.
Having looked at general aspects of the remote user research sessions, we will now
look in more detail about communication issues, some of which were already alluded
to in this first overall analysis, e.g., verbalisations of encouragement, verbal prompts
for exercise completion or strategies to deal with technology malfunctioning.

5.2 Communication Aspects

Turn-Taking
Turn Taking was characterized by the means of turn allocation, the nature of TCUs,
and the use of silence. Gatekeepers’ interventions occurred by two means: self-
selection and other-selection—in which the participant would allocate the turn to
the gatekeeper. Both turn-allocation types resulted mostly in a positive impact for
the conversation, denoting the support role of the gatekeeper, as it stemmed from
either repeating (or being asked to repeat) instructions to the participant in cases
of mishearing, misunderstanding, or, specific to self-selection were not performing
the exercise as asked (e.g., drawing in a different spot of the page). Self-selection
also occurred to signal audio/latency issues and to encourage and compliment the
participant’s performance.
In some cases, self-selection had a negative impact on the conversation, acting as
a disruptor of dialogue between the research and the participant, or by overhelping
A Case Study of Remote User Research with Older Adults During … 115

during the execution of an exercise. In those cases, the researcher only self-selected
after the exchange between the gatekeeper concludes and the task is resumed, in
which case the participant is other-selected via use of their name.
Silence in turn-taking was used primarily in three moments: a pause was made
whenever naming at the start of a turn occurred, to aid with attention-grabbing
(particularly in cases where the participant would other-select the gatekeeper and
them in the conversation), giving time for the participant to focus on the research
and the assessment could continue. Gaps after a participant’s turn were purpose-
fully extended by the researcher to account to audio delays/latency, and to minimize
the risk of turn overlapping giving the already mentioned factors. Silence was also
observed due the nature of the exercises and the context of remote assessment, since
the researcher could not see the sheet in which the participant was drawing, and thus
would either extend the silence until the participant’s self-selected to communicate
they had finished the exercise or self-select and ask for an update.
Technology did not seem to majorly affect turn-taking, and other-selection via
pragmatic methods and prosodic determined that turn overlap between researcher and
participant was minimal. When it did occur, the researcher would resort to either stop
talking and wait for the participant to finish, or briefly communicate non-verbally.
Sequence Organization
Sequence organization was classified in terms of expansion types and related
adjacency pairs. Pre-expansions were regularly observed in form of summon-
acknowledgement APs and intentionally used to grab participants’ attention as they
were executing a task (e.g., drawing), had engaged in conversation with the gate-
keeper, or were otherwise distracted. This ensured that, given the circumstances of
remote communication, the main message would not be initiated until the researcher
was sure that the participant was alert and focused on him thus minimizing the number
of repetitions throughout the conversation. This measure would also constitute a
proactive way of dealing with eventual audio delays and latency issues.
Pre-expansions in the form of request-accept/refusal were used when introducing
tasks (e.g., drawing) and were followed with external encouragement in case of a
dispreferred second (a scenario where the participant would give a negative response).
When asked to perform a task:
Participant: ‘Oh, I don’t know how to do that.’
Moderator: ‘I’ll help you.’ (P38)

Pre-invitations related to the context of the visual sheet, which the researcher
could not see on camera, leading to feedback regarding performance. Expansions
were observed in instances of repair initiation (whenever the repair initiator was the
participant) and post-expansions were observed after the participant had just been
tasked with an exercise, in the form of a turn with external encouragement. Question–
Answer post-expansions were also used to guarantee that the participant understood
the assignment.
116 R. Araújo et al.

Repair Organization
Repairs were related to issues of mishearing and understanding, the latter frequently
attributing the trouble source to the exercises’ instructions.
Moderator: ‘Let’s place a clock pointer for the hours and another one for the minutes’
Participant: ‘Like a line?’
Moderator: ‘A line, exactly.’ (P43)

Self-initiation of repair also accounted for situations in which the researcher clar-
ified instructions, particularly when related to visual elements on the MoCA sheet.
In one example, the moderator asks if the participant can see the cube, which causes
the participant to look at the Corsi cubes over the table. The moderator corrects: ‘the
cube on the sheet’ (P37).
Technical issues (audio quality dropping, latency, or background noise) were iden-
tified in many occurrences in which mishearing occurred, with the participant acting
as the primary repair initiator and repair confirmation element, with the gatekeeper
acting less as a repair initiator and more often as repair confirmation element.
Image freezes for some seconds, Moderator waits for it to come back.
Moderator: ‘Can you hear me now?’
Participant: ‘Not very well’
Moderator: ‘It will improve in a second’ (P36)

6 Discussion

The goal of our study was to identify communication barriers and strategies when
conducting remote sessions with older adults to inform researchers planning similar
design research sessions.
Our sessions were conducted while participants were in an environment that was
familiar to them: their nursing home, their day care centre or even their own home. As
expected, this context allowed them to feel more comfortable and at ease, providing
the best environment for conversation flow and avoiding some of the discomfort
and anxiety caused by an unfamiliar setting. Since participants were not required to
travel, this also allowed us to split each session into shorter ones, avoiding burdening
the participant, as recommended in literature [12]. From the researcher point-of-
view, this meant several sessions per day which, albeit tiring, was also time saving
allowing a high number of sessions to be conducted in a shorter time frame. Even
though equipment and its setup were previously tested, when the same setup was
replicated in each setting, variables such as room acoustics, available furniture, light
conditions or background noise impacted how sessions were conducted, similarly
to what previous studies reported [25, 26]. Solutions were diverse, and while some
relating to the general environment were more consistent (e.g., connecting speakers
to the tablet) others were contextual and dealt with as required (e.g., directly lighting
the sheet with a flashlight for a participant). This showed us that while remote sessions
A Case Study of Remote User Research with Older Adults During … 117

widen the possibilities, not all places are appropriate and certain conditions will need
to be addressed, previously or even during sessions.
The involvement of caregivers proved to be crucial to mitigate unfavourable phys-
ical conditions in participants’ settings showing that in remote sessions their role
clearly extends beyond being an important source of information about participants
[15], as also mentioned by Lindauer et al. [26]. Nevertheless, at times challenges can
also be caused by caregivers’ or participants’ specific actions. During sessions, we
observed caregivers misplacing the equipment or holding it in a way that muffled the
sound.
Participants’ actions such as getting too close to the camera or soft speaking were
also observed obstacles that can denote lack of experience in remote interactions.
Nevertheless, despite this inexperience, our observations do not suggest that partici-
pants felt additional anxiety specifically caused by it nor by the assessment that was
being performed in the analysed videos. There were, however, several verbal expres-
sions of low self-confidence regarding their performance, particularly in drawing
tasks. Both the researcher and caregivers had an important role in these situations,
reassuring the participant, adopting a non-judgemental posture and maintaining a
casual conversational approach. Without physical presence, all parties can struggle
to interpret non-verbal cues, which, as stated in [10] can be used to complement and
add significance to verbal interactions. Consequently, verbal instructions can some-
times lack context and be insufficient for their recipient, as observed by Cerna et al.
[5]. Likewise, our observations showed that the researcher conducting the session
provided additional information when instructing participants (e.g., the exact position
in the sheet, in reference to other elements) or was supported by the onsite caregiver
who intuitively complemented information that would otherwise be clearer if non-
verbal cues were easily perceived (e.g., indicate the exact position in the sheet while
looking at it). This showed us that while analysing remote sessions, it is important
to focus on conversational aspects as they gain a new dimension in this setting.

6.1 Minimizing the Impact

Conversational dynamics are constructed locally, as participants co-actively iden-

tify and recognize signs, actions, and structures of speech that can be understood and
used congruently during a conversation within specific circumstances, and thus mini-
mize the impact of external disruptions to the communication. In our study, letting
the participant know before-hand that the communication might momentarily fail,
or what to do in case of audio delay, was an effective way to manage expectations
when such issues occurred and allowed for an implicit structuring of communication
during those moments (in which one or both participants briefly “wait out” for the
re-establishment of proper audio signal). And although these issues might originally
stem from technology, it’s important to understand how both researcher and partic-
ipant might appropriate them in a communicational matter, such as longer spacing
between turns.
118 R. Araújo et al.

At the same time, analysis of sequence organization showed us that, just like in
presential sessions, remote conversation in this context can be broken down into
segments of exchange that can serve multiple purposes—such as attention-grabbing,
preparation for the message, navigational aids (in case of the drawing exercises), or
simply as means of inserting informal talk, resulting in a more relaxed and pleasant
experience for the participant and help reduce the formal tone commonly associated
with assessment.
Lastly, understanding the importance of self-initiated repairs by the researcher,
particularly in moments where instructing the participant in an exercise, serve added
importance to proactively avoid scenarios of misunderstanding or mishearing of the
instructions that might originate and not be recognized, and thus preclude repair.
Since the researcher in this setup is not able to see the visual sheet unless shown
by either the participant or the researcher, making sure that the instructions are
understood is paramount.

6.2 Assessing the Impact

It is not always possible to identify the origin of miscommunication or understand its

cause. During the identification of barriers and obstacles to communication, it was
not always clear whether such trouble sources stemmed from a technology, or due to
participant-related factors, such as auditory difficulties, comprehension difficulties,
lack of literacy, or difficulties related to the task. In a set of task-related interaction
of this nature, mishearing or misunderstanding of the message can lead to repair
proper, either self or other-initiated, and prevent loss of value during conversation and
guarantee adequate means to perform, but only if repair initiation, or the awareness of
the trouble source, both in nature and content, is identified by one of the conversational
agents. This is where active questioning by the researcher can be crucial to identify
barriers to communication that might otherwise be ignored. Understanding of lapses,
or even dispreferred responses, might indicate the need for clarification, and the
employment of specific strategies that can be employed to immediately address the
issue, such in issues of perceived lack of competence, confidence, or understanding.
The gatekeeper here gains a particularly important role, as a facilitator or both
repair: firstly, acting as a privileged source of repair initiation as their physical
presence can facilitate the identification of nature the trouble source, and secondly,
because in case of such trouble source be of technological nature, execute both repair
proper and repair confirmation.

7 Conclusion

Our analysis indicates that the identified barriers do not invalidate remote sessions
from being applied for design research, and the observed strategies can be employed
A Case Study of Remote User Research with Older Adults During … 119

to minimize possible constraints of this method. It should be noted as a limitation

of our findings that the analysed videos only included a subset of the time spent
in each session, excluding other dynamics such as session progression or initial
rapport. Nevertheless, our discussion takes into consideration self-reflections from
researchers involved in the sessions. While performing the analysis of the videos
it came to our attention that recordings do not entirely reflect the reality of the
session: the video includes both points of view (participant and researcher) equally
divided on the screen but during the session the researcher had a full screen view of
the participant. This prevented us from completely understand what the researcher
could see, for instance, when the participant or caregiver lifted the exercise sheet
to the camera. At the same time, regarding the nature of miscommunication occur-
ring during a session, it was not always possible to determine if such was related
to issue regarding technological aspects or related to the participant itself. Lastly,
it’s important to understand that the time-window analysed specifically pertained a
scenario of psychological assessment which might differ a regular conversation, and
thus, impose different rules and structures in turn-taking, transitions, and sequence
organizations between the researcher and the participant.
During our sessions, we contacted with different seniors and caregivers, in
different settings and with varied profiles in terms of age, education, location (urban
vs suburban) or social-economic status. Albeit not the focus of our investigation, we
observed that these variables seem to influence their relationship dynamics and how
they perceived and interacted with each other and with the researcher and would be
an interesting topic for future research. Future studies should also address conver-
sation analysis in remote settings with older adults, integrating new measures to
analyse technological difficulties, such as real-time latency metrics, and explore
assessment-specific structures and dynamics of conversational organization.

Acknowledgements The authors thank all institutions and participants involved for their invaluable
support. The study was funded by Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, project ELAPSE (238452).

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Digital Security Narratives in the Time
of COVID-19: A Case for Kindness

Lizzie Coles-Kemp and Peter A. Hall

Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic has shined a light on the digital divide and its
implications in a digital-first society. In the UK, where our research is focused, parts
of society still lack the infrastructure and/or basic skills needed to access essen-
tial online services like health, welfare, food, housing and education. During the
pandemic, these services became digital by necessity, forcing many people to seek
help through informal networks such as community hubs. Based on our focus groups
and interviews with voluntary and third sector organisations in the UK, we make a
case in this chapter for a kinder, more holistic approach to the accessibility of essen-
tial online services, based on the hypothesis that such an approach creates the types
of spaces in which the benefits of such services can be more safely realised.

Keywords Care · Digital divide · Digital inclusion · Kindness · Privacy ·

Welfare · Service design · Holistic and usable security

1 Introduction

As essential services moved online by necessity during the COVID-19 pandemic,

access to education, health, welfare, food and housing services became depen-
dent on access to the internet. In the UK, where 1.5 million households have no
internet access, and an estimated 10 million people lack the basic foundational skills
needed to access online services, one common reason cited for low digital engage-
ment is concern about privacy and security [1]. In this chapter we argue that the
design of online systems, the security logics that shape their access and the socio-
material assemblages around them have the effect—intended or not—of excluding
populations.

L. Coles-Kemp
Information Security Group, Royal Holloway University of London, Egham TW20 0EX, UK
P. A. Hall (B)
Graphic Design, University of the Arts London, 45-65 Peckham Rd, London SE5 8UF, UK
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 123
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
124 L. Coles-Kemp and P. A. Hall

Rather than frame this problem with a discussion of assistive technologies and
inclusive design, we start this chapter with a case study drawn from primary research,
which we then consider in terms of alternative security and service design narratives.
This approach, based on the COVID-19 support experiences of a community group in
North East England, is driven by a suspicion that conventional framings of security
and accessibility privilege solutions based on incremental technological improve-
ments rather than a more holistic response. We argue that new driving narratives
are needed that account for the relational ways in which people in their day-to-day
lives conceive of digital security, to supplement the dominant narratives of a negative
security where a “referent object” (property, data, the state) is presented as needing
protection, usually through technological means. An alternative narrative of a posi-
tive, enabling image of security, drawn from the field of International Relations, is
not premised on protecting a referent object but on “making something possible”; in
this position, security has “the property of a relationship” (McSweeney 1999, cited
in [2], p. 778). We identify analogous approaches in sociology and urbanism, where
the security of a city is reimagined less in terms of protective measures and more
in terms of invisible or unnoticed acts of “kindness”—such as repair and care—that
are fundamental to the maintenance of everyday urban life [3]. Our case study is
taken from a focus group and a follow-up interview with Pallion Action Group in
the North-East of England, one of many community organizations that have stepped
up during the pandemic to provide support to those on the wrong side of the digital
divide.

2 Framing: A Case Study

Our work is framed in the COVID-19 pandemic experiences of voluntary and third
sector organisations up and down the UK who found themselves as the first and
last line of support for vulnerable and underserved individuals and groups trying to
adjust to day-to-day existence shaped by physical isolation, extreme uncertainty and
digital-only access to everyday support. As part of a study of assisted digital access
funded by the UK’s Research Institute for Sociotechnical Cyber Security,1 we invited
voluntary and third sector organisations to take part in a series of focus groups held
over Zoom to discuss how such groups were supporting the digital access needs of
their community. Inspired by these focus groups, we took the experiences of Pallion
Action Group, one of the community groups that took part in this study and followed
up by interviewing the manager of that group (Karen Noble) to form a picture of how
they have supported their community members with digital assistance from March
2020 to present day. Direct quotes from the focus group and follow-up interview
are presented in this section. We set out these experiences to frame our subsequent
argument for a kinder, more humanistic, and relational form of digital security.

1 [Link]
Digital Security Narratives in the Time of COVID-19: A Case … 125

Pallion Action Group provides monetary, debt and welfare advice and support to
vulnerable groups. Pallion is one of the most deprived areas of Sunderland and
the community organisation has been providing support in the areas of welfare
access, household finance and employment training since its start. As part of this
programme of work, it has been providing digital skills training and support for
digital access. Pallion is a suburb and electoral ward in West Sunderland in North East
England. Since its founding in 2005 as a residents’ group, Pallion Action Group has
changed its focus from supporting primarily youth services to becoming a commu-
nity hub, initiating activities to build support networks in the Pallion area. During the
pandemic, Pallion Action Group’s assistance with services such as providing activity
packs for families, collecting prescriptions and shopping for self-isolating and house-
bound residents, and supporting people with accessing online services has increased,
prompting the local council to recognise its work and that of other community hubs
with further funding.
Overall, the group has reported a significant increase in the number of people
accessing its services—3000 new signees (individuals and households) since the
start of the pandemic—as well as a broadening in the range of people seeking help
during the pandemic, and in the kinds of services provided. Whereas prior to the
first lockdown and shift to digital-only services, the typical visitor to Pallion Action
Group was an older person needing assistance with online services who was “scared
to touch a button or …who just didn’t do digital things,” [4] the pandemic prompted
younger people to seek help: “kids who were supposed to be [school]working from
home, who didn’t have the digital equipment or they didn’t have Internet access. Then
we had parents who didn’t have the digital skills to help the kids get online…so I think
our first issue was about trying to get people to understand what digital equipment
was and what was best for them. We had to go back to basics for a lot of people.”
[4].
The pandemic saw a shift from digital by default to digital by necessity for
many essential and statutory everyday services in welfare, health, finance, food and
education. Whereas pre-pandemic, those needing to access the services essential to
providing household income (such as housing support and access to benefits) could
make claims in person, digital by necessity meant that community hubs such as
Pallion Action Group were called upon to devise a way to support claimants with no
internet access, such as filling forms over the phone: this sometimes meant an advisor
going through the form fields with the claimant, typing their responses, printing out
the form with an indication of where it needed to be signed, and then posting it to
the claimant or arranging for it to be picked up. Those seeking help with this kind
of support, for example in making Universal Credit claims (monthly Government
payments to help people with living costs), can have a high level of trust with the
assisting organization, a trust built up over time based on reputation and familiarity of
known individuals in the hub: “If you didn’t have your computer access, you couldn’t
warrant Universal Credit claims and that puts you at risk of not being able to get
paid. So there was a lot of confusion around that. And the amount of people who
followed up and said, can I give you my login details?” [4].
126 L. Coles-Kemp and P. A. Hall

Such assistance is not merely helping the individual with managing the bureau-
cracy of the service but also offering emotional support and empathetic support.
This is because the pandemic created a stressful environment in which household
resources were severely constrained, job security was threatened, and household
dynamics were severely disrupted. For the households that Pallion Action Group
support, this took an emotional and mental health toll as well as placing a financial
burden. The complexities of accessing online services and the challenges of coping
with wholesale change to the ways that services essential to wellbeing were provided
were experienced against this backdrop of heightened pressures.
At the same time, the pandemic has put a severe strain on the ways in which
an organisation can offer assistance for each individual and the wider community
because much of the support now has to be provided over the telephone or via the
web. Pallion Action Group therefore had to work out how deliver digital skills and
support as part of a wider set of services intended to work with the whole person,
not just their administrative needs. In the original focus group Noble stated: “So,
we got funding to get tablets for people; and on there we have put quizzes, surveys
about the impact of COVID, and mindfulness and meditation activities, photography
competition with prizes; also we’ve put guides about how to get on Zoom and other
things.”
This whole person approach is one that addresses the human security needs of
the individual, placing support for digital access in the wider context of the safety
and security of the individual and their families. In the focus group, the following
story was related, regarding meeting an older person struggling with shopping during
the pandemic: “I had a gut feeling about [this] one lady who sounded down; all of
the usual things have been taken away by COVID, she had no social circle left,
she was just left to vegetate; and the agencies knew about this, but nothing was
done… Age Concern [were] charging £15 per hour to go shopping; which is why
we got involved.” This was part of a wider pattern, it was said, of increased isolation
and desperation which the organisation was attempting to combat through initiatives
such as the one described above: “A common story is older and more vulnerable
very isolated people, no contact, no devices, this really sticks with me; in the first
instance we are arranging to drop off a prescription; [they say] “you’re the first
person I’ve spoken to in ages”; she wanted to just go next-door and mix with people,
and didn’t care about the consequences—amounted to suicidal feelings; during the
pandemic we’ve noticed a lot more suicidal people, over 70 especially.” Securing
the whole person is underscored by the way that Pallion Action Group places as
much importance on mindfulness and yoga sessions as it does on e-safety training
and skills development. From Pallion Action Group’s point of view, both contribute
to the safety and security of the individual.
Digital Security Narratives in the Time of COVID-19: A Case … 127

3 Security Narratives and the Digital Divide

The Pallion case challenges how we conceptualise digital security and what it means
for an individual to be digitally secure. From the perspective of Pallion Action
Group, digital security is a combination of caring for the wellbeing of people and
ensuring that data and access is technically secured. As the different dimensions
of the digital divide reflect, access to technology is contingent on physical access
to security technology and the availability of the underpinning technical and data
infrastructure. Regardless of whether an individual independently accesses a digital
service or requires help, the technological controls used to regulate access need
to be usable, accessible and inclusive if the digital divide is to be bridged. Such
controls typically include authentication processes that deploy a username and pass-
word, digital identifiers that link data to a specific individual, and permissions to
access particular fields in an online form. However, as the example shows, for many
marginalised and underserved groups it is not enough to develop an individual’s
practical skills in securely accessing digital services and resources. Pallion Action
Group’s pandemic experiences show how alongside the technical security of access
control to secure an individual, the emotional wellbeing of an individual must also be
attended to. Emotional wellbeing is primarily achieved through acts of care that take
place through human relationships creating a relational form of security. Contrary
to popular misconceptions that “acts of care” suggests warm feelings, “do-gooder”
behaviour, and subjective, unquantifiable aspects of security, we venture that it can
be reconceived and recognised as an essential aspect of system maintenance that
should be woven into any framework and policy that sets out principles of digital
security. This argument builds on nascent scholarship in this area [5, 6].
The COVID-19 pandemic foregrounded digital inequalities and the ways in which
those without access to digital devices and services are disbenefited in the most
fundamental of ways when a society shifts from being digital by default to digital
by necessity. Digital exclusion is a multifaceted concept and is typically considered
from three perspectives [7]:
• Physical access to digital devices.
• Skills to navigate the digital world.
• Inequalities of access.
The move to digital by necessity emphasised the importance of technology and
its security being accessible for all. During the pandemic, all age groups have seen
an increase in the need to access essential services online [8], but there are still parts
of society that have remained digitally excluded, resulting in an increased risk of
COVID-19 infection and an increase in social and economic isolation. Accessibility
issues play a role in this picture of digital exclusion: economic cost, lack of digital
skills and fear of online harms are all cited as reasons for digital exclusion during
the COVID-19 lockdowns [1, 9]. Moreover, the availability of digital services has
also been an issue and regional variations in quality of Internet access have been
highlighted during the lockdowns [9]. COVID-19 has also revealed that trust in
128 L. Coles-Kemp and P. A. Hall

technology and institutions plays an important part in questions of accessibility.

Within some sectors of society, there has been a marked degradation of trust between
communities and the state during the pandemic [10]. This, in turn, can result in digital
inclusion itself being regarded as a potential harm.
Traditional security analysis focuses on state-centered concerns [11] as the site
of where security is done. Security logics, or the reasoning that underpins security
strategies, can broadly be divided in to positive and negative forms of security [12]
where positive forms of security enable people to live free from fear of attack and
negative forms of security protect people from threat and harms [2]. Doty [12] argues
that the dominant security logic is a negative security logic that is typically one of
exclusion which depends upon an understanding of self and other that is framed
by a notion of territory. Doty identifies three main security logics: national security
logic, societal security logic and human security logic. National security logic is a
traditional security logic focused on the protection of the state against existential
threats. It is negative in the sense that security is perceived as protection against
external threats to the national/state territory. Societal security logic foregrounds
identity politics and society as a site of security but recognises the dependency of
societal security on the security of the state. Human security logic is a human and
individual-centred conceptualisation of security. It is a positive security logic where
security is perceived as a desired good which enables access to a good life. It is a logic
of inclusion, which transcends state boundaries and supports pluralistic conceptions
of identity.
Much of the focus in the traditional canon of security thinking is on the doing
of security [13] and the doing of security is often performed through security tech-
nologies ranging from military weapons to passwords and file permissions [14].
The dominant narrative and messages around technological security predominantly
reflect negative forms of security [14] where the focus of such technologies is to
protect the technology and the data from adversaries performing attacks via tech-
nical means. However, the picture of digital access that Pallion Action Group provides
us shows how safe and secure access to digital services is not simply about using
tools and technologies for protection. Supporting secure access to essential digital
services requires an attentiveness to the tensions, emotions and cultural understand-
ings that are woven around such access. This is very much a human security logic
where security is a desirable way of being that should be available.
Security scholar Paul Roe has argued that responses to protecting entities such as a
state or society need to be a combination of positive and negative security for individ-
uals and societies to live securely [2]. Whilst the dominant narrative around security
technologies is predominantly one of negative security, digital security technologies
are particularly malleable and are often able to support both positive and negative
security positions. This malleability can be seen in the way that such technologies
can be appropriated and re-configured to respond to different threat models [15].
For example, a technology that monitors location might be used as a stalking device
[16–18] or as a physical security protection mechanism [19]. Privacy and security
technologies can also be configured and practised to protect against adversaries that
were not envisaged at the design stage. For example, [20] describe how throwaway
Digital Security Narratives in the Time of COVID-19: A Case … 129

email addresses and anonymous apps are used to provide protection to abused women
from family members. It could be argued that such re-configuration and diverging
appropriations of security technologies are a form of “design in use” which describes
the re-assembly and re-configuration of technology once it is deployed [21]. It could
therefore be argued that it is in the assembly and re-assembly of security technolo-
gies that the positive or negative security position of the technology is often enacted.
Pallion Action Group’s approach to community support with its focus on human
security reflects this blended positive and negative security position. The support
that Pallion Action Group provides in assisting an individual’s digital access takes
the following forms:
• adapting support to enable the individual to realise the benefits of digital service
access (positive security),
• providing a listening ear, to focus on a person’s overall wellbeing and provide
empathetic support (positive security) and
• supporting the digital set-up of protection controls to protect against digital threats
(negative security).
As such, Pallion Action Group’s approach requires confronting the intersections
between technology and inequality, and is built on an understanding of security roles
and responsibilities that could be interpreted as a form of social contract [22].

4 Limits of Common HCI and Service Design Approaches

The blended logics of positive security provide a perplexing problem for the design of
online services, from the development of their user interfaces to their security design.
Typically, a design approach might map out a typical user journey, identifying points
of friction in, for example, a user’s efforts to claim housing benefits, the contributing
factors to those points of friction, and where improvements to a service design, user
interface or security design might be introduced to address the problems identified.
Yet, conventional design approaches struggle to deal with the multiple disciplinary
perspectives at play in these situations (e.g. see Vines et al. on the “ageing” user
[23]). Novel assistive technologies, for example, can support specific users facing
specific challenges when they have been identified, but not when the users in need
have not been identified or have not come forward seeking help. Sociologists (e.g.
[24]) have used the phrase “care avoidance” to describe the issue of people in need
of support who do not come forward, and “care paralysis”, where service providers
and professionals find reason not to get involved with “disagreeable” clients.
Another common method employed in design approaches is to construct
personas—fictional characters based on target users of the service—and hypothetical
scenarios that capture the design problems identified. Introduced by Alan Cooper in
1999, personas are considered a good way to represent real, relatable user needs, to
measure the effectiveness of a design, to inform better design decisions and for multi-
disciplinary teams to communicate with each other [25]. The limitations and pitfalls
130 L. Coles-Kemp and P. A. Hall

of a personas-based approach, however, include their tendency to overlook people

who do not conform to the picture of the “typical” user such as those with disabilities
and other challenges. At the same time, if a persona is purposely constructed to repre-
sent a particular challenge, it can give designers a false sense of understanding their
users. A more general limitation of the persona method is that it “creates an extra
layer of interpretation between users and developers and thus can create a greater
distance” [26]. While a person’s inability to access online services might not be due
to a limitation in resource or capability, the assumption of particular competencies
or capabilities built into user interfaces and service design is clearly one of the most
pressing design flaws in the current design of online services.
More fundamentally, personas tend toward an individualised conception of a
problem space, whereas online services such as health, welfare, education are funda-
mentally relational. Cipolla and Manzini [27] have argued for a particular kind of
service configuration that is relational. Drawing from philosopher Martin Buber’s
conception of a distinction between “I-Thou” encounters (between two holistic
beings) and “I-It” encounters (between a person and an object or a representation
of a person), they argue that relational services follow a circular interactional model
that where benefits are reciprocally produced:
Relational services are defined here as those deeply based on interpersonal interactions,
particularly favouring “I-Thou” encounters. They are challenging the standard way of
conceiving and offering services. [27, p. 3]

By way of example, Cipolla and Manzini contrast the standard school bus service
with a “Walking Bus” relational service. The standard service is conceived as a
mechanical operation, wherein the driver can perform his function on an anonymous
basis, and can be substituted by another driver with the same technical skills, and
where any interpersonal output (e.g. friendship with users) is not seen as an essen-
tial part of the operation. The relational service, designed to encourage children to
walk to school with a group following predefined routes under supervision of adults
(generally pensioners on a voluntary basis) is strongly based on the relational qual-
ities produced between the participants—such that the participants cannot easily be
replaced [27, p. 3].
In the Pallion examples encountered in our primary research, the trust engendered
in the community by a community hub is not transactional, and does not seem to be
replicable in I-it encounters between human and software; it is rather based on the
relational qualities produced between the participants. The “care avoidance” instance
above, for example, is specifically addressed by the broader relational quality of trust
engendered by a community hub well-established in its geographical area, where a
person in need of help is typically identified by a concerned neighbour. Pallion
Action Group pro-actively encourages this kind of positive security with the use of
the phrase “don’t wait till you’re in crisis” on its Facebook page. “We know our
community inside out and there’s a lot of word of mouth and a lot of people have had
help from here, so I usually get a people who either message me or send us an email
or a Facebook message saying “so and so I’m really worried about them”” [4].
Digital Security Narratives in the Time of COVID-19: A Case … 131

It is clear that the positive security examples provided by our research present
a relational rather than standard model of service design: while specific points of
friction might be identified and addressed with improvements in the user experience
such as verification-by-phone, or even theoretical innovations to authenticate trusted
third parties (for example [28, 29]), the positive security framework facilitates a more
holistic reconceptualization of what we mean by security.

5 A Case for Kindness: Understanding Needs in Context

Analogous approaches to positive security can be found in discourse on cities. The

sociologists Hall and Smith [3] argue that the routine but often invisible ways in which
people are maintaining the city–the “looking after, helping out, cleaning, fixing up”
[3, p. 3]—might be reconceived as a “politics of urban kindness” (p. 5). Extending the
concept of repair and maintenance to the care and welfare of people, Hall and Smith
find analogous examples of the constant upkeep required to maintain the complex
machinic order of the city in “minor acts of social repair” from marriage guidance to
outreach services, youth mentoring and support groups: an “infrastructure of kind-
ness” (p. 11). This position builds on the ideas of Nigel Thrift, who has argued that
cities are responsive to catastrophe in part because they are constantly adding “new
circuits of adaptability” [30, p. 202]. One manifestation of these circuits is the “hum
of continuous repair and maintenance” from the noise of pneumatic drills to the
knock on the door of a repairman to the emergency services cleaning up small but
sustained disasters [30, p. 202]
To align the politics of urban kindness with positive security requires that we
consider the support work of voluntary and third sector organisations as integral
to the design of online services, not an aberration, or workaround. The response
to COVID-19, as with a city’s response to a natural disaster or other catastrophe,
depended not just on digital infrastructures, but the “circuits of adaptability” of
social support networks. This in turn requires that the design process also consider
the integral role of “minor acts of social repair” and urban kindness in the so-called
user journey typically modelled in the design process. To incorporate, for example, a
“user’s” phone call to a community hub that results in a completed form being mailed
back to them for signing and posting suggests a broader, more holistic account of
the user experience than a conventional account.
The post-war design of cities was considerably influenced by Jane Jacobs [31]
book The Death and Life of Great American Cities, which argued in a chapter on
safety and security that the public peace is not primarily kept by the police but by
an “intricate, almost unconscious network of voluntary controls and standards” kept
and enforced by the people who live and work on a street [31, p. 32]. Drawing
from her own observations and city crime statistics, Jacobs posited that safe city
neighbourhoods had three main qualities: (1) a clear demarcation between public
and private, (2) “eyes upon the street,” meaning not surveillance cameras or police
patrols but the watchful eyes of its residents, business owners, regulars; and (3) streets
132 L. Coles-Kemp and P. A. Hall

must be populated fairly continuously, both to increase the number of eyes on the
street to give those street watchers something to look at. The street watchers, Jacobs
argued, were not looking out for crimes to report, but were engaged in a form of
observation that is there to protect the values of the community as decided by the
community. “You can’t make people watch streets they do not want to watch” (p. 36).
“A lively street always has both its users and pure watchers” (p. 37). Jacobs helped
to move city planning away from a separatist approach to city building, and helped
bring about the mixed use, more pedestrian friendly spaces that began softening the
neighbourhoods annexed by highways and high rises in the 1960s and 1970s.
In a similar way to the minor acts of social repair that keep a community in
good order, Jacobs’s “eyes on the street” enact a positive security that enacts a
shared value system and even pre-empts breakage. The “word of mouth” scenario
described above, whereby a visitor to the community hub confides that they are
worried about a neighbour, prevents a potentially greater crisis and enacts a sense of
shared, ontological security. Roe defines ontological security as “the maintenance of
the day-to-day routines that provide us with a sense of who we are and how we relate
to others” [2, p. 778]. This can extend to the ambient sounds that we often associate
with a sense of bustling or shared spaces. Thrift’s “hum of continuous repair and
maintenance” in this sense supports an ontological security that is situated in the
everyday routines of people. An example might be the elderly woman who keeps
the television on low volume all day to imbue her home with a sense of ontological
security.
The aim here is not to varnish, or Romanticise acts of social repair or urban kind-
ness. The “values of a community” are, of course, negotiated by communities, and
will include less-than-law-abiding values as well as frequent contraventions of those
values, as in the numerous examples of pandemic-era scams that emerged in focus
groups with Pallion Action Group. Values and a sense of order are precariously main-
tained, even with unwritten codes such as that which condones fraudulent Universal
Credit claims but not stealing from one’s grandfather, the proverbial “honour amongst
thieves” [4]. Hall and Smith also note that keeping things and people well looked
after is a political activity as much as it is practical, and this is not a simple politics
when “repair” is imposed rather than reciprocal. Rather than present a Romanticised
account of kindness as a form of positive security, we argue that narratives driving the
design of online services need to take into account these essential but often invisible
aspects of system maintenance.
In closing, it is illustrative to identify some of the characteristics of a more domi-
nant narrative of digital security by looking at the current website for the UK Govern-
ment’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), which presents guidelines and prac-
tical steps for individuals and families as part of its broader information section. In
defining cyber security, the NCSC clarifies that its “core function” is to protect devices
(smartphones, laptops, tablets and computers), services and the personal information
stored on them. To improve the cyber security of individuals and families, the NCSC
recommends [32] an array of technological solutions: strong passwords, stored in a
browser, two-factor authentication, updated devices and frequently backed-up data.
Digital Security Narratives in the Time of COVID-19: A Case … 133

While these are familiar and sound guidelines, they fall short of the security guid-
ance needed in the scenarios presented in our research with community hubs and
underserved people. For example, recommending that a family updates its devices
presumes they have the financial resources to purchase new devices, and/or the cogni-
tive capacity and sufficient time to negotiate an upgrade of the operating systems on
their devices. Backing up data and two-factor authentication similarly depend on
sufficient resources to fund cloud storage (or a back-up drive) and the time and
cognitive capacity to undertake what are relatively complex tasks.
To revisit the findings of the social change charity cited in our introduction, an
estimated 10 million people lack the basic foundational skills needed to access online
services [1]. Recognising this, through the Research Institute of Sociotechnical Cyber
Security [33], NCSC has supported and taken part in research programmes related
to digital responsibility and accessible and inclusive forms of security to better
understand the security dimensions of the digital divide.

6 Conclusion: A Case for Kinder Narratives of Digital

Security

In this chapter we have drawn from a case study and a literature review to build a case
for a more holistic understanding of digital security in the wake of the COVID-19
pandemic. Academics, community practitioners and policymakers must now work
together to co-develop the next generation of security guidance that produces safer
forms of digital inclusion for both people and technology.
As part of this co-production effort, our case for kindness is a case for inclusiveness
and more holistic narratives of digital security, as illustrated by the positive security
approaches brought up in our research. To move security forward and better address
the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 across the digital divide, we recommend
that the narratives driving the design of online systems and the security measures
consider the following:
– People who are unable to access online services because they lack appropriate
infrastructure
– People who lack sufficient skills and know-how to manage sequences of online
tasks
– How trust relations are built, sustained and improved to help people seek and
secure support in accessing online services
– The role of voluntary and third sector organizations in building trust and
supporting peoples’ access to online services
– Digital literacy within those voluntary and third sector organizations and more
generally among those providing informal or formal assisted access to online
services.
134 L. Coles-Kemp and P. A. Hall

Such a call to action requires a broader perspective on how access to digital

services takes place. At its core, this call to action is asking for our understanding
of responsibility for secure digital access to be re-examined—and to conceptualise
secure digital access as a form of public good.

Acknowledgements We would like to thank Pallion Action Group and Karen Noble for their
participation and generous contributions to this study. Lizzie Coles-Kemp’s participation in this
study is funded by EPSRC grant EP/N02561X/1 and has been supported by the RISCS Digital
Responsibility Fellowship (2020–2022). We would also like to thank Dr. Nick Robinson for his
work to set-up the original programme of focus groups.

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The Professional Practice of Type
Designers in the Design of Variable Fonts

Maíra Woloszyn and Berenice Santos Gonçalves

Abstract The insertion of technologies in the professional practice of design has

provided new areas of activity. The fields that support the professional design practice
are different, such as typography, responsible for transmitting written messages and
creating typefaces. The typographic scope was also boosted by computerization and
digital tools. As a result, font formats began to be developed to allow greater flexi-
bility and the use of typefaces in digital media, such as variable fonts. This format
consists of a technology where different widths, weights, slopes, and many variations
are incorporated into a single file. There are a lot of ads about variable fonts. However,
studies that point out their development processes are still scarce and fragmented.
In this perspective, this study aimed to identify indicators and components of the
design process of variable fonts. For this purpose, a prospective qualitative inves-
tigation was carried out based on the application of questionnaires and interviews
with type designers and specialists from different locations and experiences. As a
result, it was possible to identify, distinguish and characterize specific components
and procedures of the production process of the variable fonts, such as carrying out
tests and verifications, structuring the design space, the relevance of adopting a flow
for the process, and defining the context of the use of fonts and the contribution of
external agents to the type designer in the production of variable fonts.

Keywords Typography · Type design · Variable fonts

1 Introduction

Recognized during the Industrial Revolution, design is an area of knowledge that

explores human relationships with artifacts and languages to increase the quality of

M. Woloszyn (B) · B. S. Gonçalves

Federal University of Santa Catarina, Santa Catarina, Brazil
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
B. S. Gonçalves
e-mail: berenice@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 137
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
138 M. Woloszyn and B. S. Gonçalves

products undergoing industrialization. With it, it is possible to conceive technologies

and meanings that influence society’s daily life [1]. Much has changed since the
origin of the design. Cardoso [2] understands that the change that most affected the
practice in this area was the insertion of information technologies. Diagramming
tools, rapid prototyping technologies, and the diffusion of the internet brought new
elements, increased the possibilities of manipulating graphic resources, and provided
new areas of activity.
According to Maeda [3], the evolution of design can be explained in three stages:
Classical Design, Design Thinking, and Computational Design. Classic design is
about originality, aesthetics, and function and finding ways to put form and function
together. Design thinking is a creative, human-centered approach to problem-solving,
close to management consulting. Computational design is related to programming
languages and interaction patterns.
Some fields of design are linked to the practice of production and dissemination
of information, such as typography, which for many years has played a fundamental
role in the composition and presentation of texts and written content. For Heller
[4], typography is the most important element of graphic design as it conveys most
messages. For design, technological innovations have provided significant growth in
this field. With computerization, the typographic scope changed and was boosted by
the use of digital tools [5]. In this sense, digital font formats began to be developed
to allow a greater diversity of use and storage capacity [6, 7].
To provide more flexibility to the types and greater use of them in digital media,
variable fonts were launched at the ATypl conference in 2016. They consist of the
implementation of OpenType1 technology in which different widths, weights, skews
and many other variations such as color are incorporated into a single file. Thus,
they present several benefits, since they can be used in different ways with different
shapes and sizes and can automatically adapt to the context in which they are applied
[8, 9].
The introduction of digital technologies has also made the type design process
more accessible. However, even with the facilities provided by software and develop-
ment tools, the process is still complex and demands different steps for a consistent
result. According to Cheng [10], there is no single or correct process to create a
typeface. For the author, the individual methodologies are as unique and varied as
the letter designs themselves. Regardless of the development sequence of types,
Scaglione [11] points out that, defining a flow, a process, or adopting a methodology
for the development of a type design project, makes the work faster, avoids redundant
work, in addition to the systemization of the design decision making. In this sense,
Mena [12] reinforces that following a process with an adequate structure, whose
guidelines lead to the necessary decisions for the project, helps to find an appropriate
form for the characters of a typographic project.

1The current specification consists of the 1.8.4 version, with the 1.9 version being ready since May
2021. Available online at [Link]
onformats.
The Professional Practice of Type Designers … 139

When analyzing methods, processes, and academic reports of the development

of typographic fonts and variable fonts, it is possible to notice that they go through
similar phases and sequences to achieve their creative and strategic purposes [13].
In a broad view, it is possible to identify three major moments in the development of
a digital and variable font. First, there is the elucidation of the problem, the search
for references, materials, their analysis, and the definition of the purpose of the
types. Next, the exploration of the form of the letters begins, with manual and/or
digital drawings, until obtaining the desired result for the main characters of the
font, mainly from those that have stems and distinctive parts and that serve as the
basis for the construction of the other glyphs of the font. In the same way, the font
metric is identified, which will guide the design of the other characters. With this, the
character set is made in its entirety, and spacing, kerning,2 and hinting3 are adjusted
(which can be done automatically with the help of software). Finally, there is the
time to generate the font file, test it in operational systems to prove its effectiveness,
develop a specimen, a document that presents a font summary, to present its potential
to potential users, and publish the font.
It was noticed, during the integrative review of the cited literature [13], that the
identified processes are mainly connected to the construction of the characters and
glyphs of the digital font without approaching context and project requirements with
the same degree of detail. Considering the understanding of Moraes [14] regarding
the need for design processes with a broader view, seeking to address not only
questions about the product itself but also to understand the dynamics that surround
this product, it is intended with this study to identify indicators and components of
the design process of variable fonts based on a prospective qualitative investigation
through the practice of type designers.

2 The Digital Type Design

From the emergence of electronic communication, between the late 1960s and early
1970s, types began to be experimented within the digital environment. In 1967, Wim
Crouwel developed an alphabet with letters built-in straight lines. This allowed a great
display on video screens, where curves and angles are represented by horizontal scan
lines, which the author called “new-alphabet” [15].
Also, with the popularization of low-cost personal computers and printers in the
1980s, typographic tools reached a wider audience. Until the mechanization of the
printer, the shapes of the letters and their arrangement in space were the result of
the adaptation of the technology existing at the time and the technique required,
depending on its intended use [12]. As early as 1981, digital fonts began to be
offered by the company Bitstream and then by Adobe [15, 16]. Later, in the early

2 Kerning is the process of adding or removing spaces between specific letter pairs.
3 Information contained in the fonts that modify the shapes of the characters when presented in low
resolution, adjusting the quality of the typographic design to the rasterization matrix.
140 M. Woloszyn and B. S. Gonçalves

1990s, the design of types by contour began, as it is today, being able to consider
several devices, not only those of low resolution [15].
Advances in digital technologies over time have stimulated the constant growth of
type design [16]. Therefore, changes have emerged to improve and facilitate compo-
sition with digital types. The OpenType format, introduced in 1996, was developed
by the Adobe and Microsoft companies to improve the TrueType4 format, allowing
greater flexibility of use and storage capacity. However, the first families in this format
were only released in 2001. OpenType fonts are cross-platform and can include
more than 65,000 glyphs,5 increasing support for several languages, in addition to
involving alternative characters, tail letters, ligatures, among other variations, which
can be identified and replaced automatically with this file type [6, 18].
In the 1990s, Adobe launched the Type 1 Multiple Master technology [19]. Based
on 4-axis interpolation—height, width, optical size, and style—the Multiple Master
technology intended to allow Adobe software users to generate font variations to use
in their projects [20]. The feature was discontinued, but the technology is still being
used today by type designers to assist in the creation of typefaces since with this
feature it is possible to generate an entire family from just two font designs.
In 2009, web fonts appeared, or woff (web open fonts format) format. This format
was developed by companies like Mozilla, Type Supply, LettError among other
organizations, to allow the user to view the fonts used on a website without having
them installed on their computer. With this, it was possible to resolve the licensing
issues that limited the use of fonts on websites. The woff format made it possible to
compress TrueType or OpenType fonts by up to 40% and is the only one that meets
the W3C recommendations [7].
The evolution of typography and, consequently, of type design, allowed several
changes and innovations for the area, as well as the launch of variable fonts in 2016
from a consortium between Adobe, Google, Microsoft, and Apple. Pamental [21]
explains that variable fonts are a new technology where different widths, weights,
slopes, and many other variations are incorporated into a single file. That is, in a
traditional font family, also called static, each variation corresponds to a different
file. For example, a family with regular, italic, and bold variations needs three files.
In this case, it’s the type designer who determines how heavy the bold type will be
and how much lighter the regular type will be. Still, the variable fonts differ from
traditional typefaces by saving storage space, since several variations are allocated
in a single file [21]. A family of static fonts tends to need more storage space than a
variable font, as shown in Fig. 1. It is noteworthy that variable fonts can be text or
display fonts.

4 TrueType was the first public font file type that provided a scalable font technology, which allowed
for a much better display of on-screen type compared to pre-made bitmaps in fonts before this one
[17].
5 Glyphs are specific designs that each character or sign can assume. In turn, a character is the

smallest semantic unit of the language. In this way, a character can assume several glyphs—such
as more than one variation for a letter—or even a glyph can contain more than one character—for
example the ligature “ffi” [18].
The Professional Practice of Type Designers … 141

Fig. 1 Difference between quantity and weight of files of traditional typefaces and variable fonts

Fig. 2 Masters and

instances in a variable font

Thus, in variable fonts, it is up to the user to choose the weight variation (or
other variation axes available in the file) that he wants. Therefore, the font’s user will
have access to all the intermediate variations between the extremes. For example, in
a typeface, you can have light, regular, bold, and extra-bold weights. In a variable
font, there are all possible weights between two masters, and you will adjust the
weight according to your need. You will not have the fixed possibilities as in the
static families (Fig. 2).
There are many announcements about variable fonts and their potential compared
to other typefaces [19, 21–23]. However, studies that point out the purposes,
development processes, and use of variable fonts are still scarce and fragmented.

3 Methodological Procedures

To understand the practice of type designers in the development of variable fonts,

a questionnaire was initially applied with type designers and specialists in variable
fonts [24]. Subsequently, to broaden the understanding of the design process in
question, interviews were carried out with the same audience.
142 M. Woloszyn and B. S. Gonçalves

Fig. 3 Research procedures

Thus, the present phase of the research was divided into six stages: data collection
preparation, forwarding of ethical issues, participants selection and pilot test, ques-
tionnaires application, conducting interviews, and data organization and processing
(Fig. 3).
The questionnaire and interview script were divided into two main parts. Initially,
we sought to identify the profile of the participant and his experience with type
design. Subsequently, we sought to gather information about the design process of
variable fonts and the context in which the professional works. All questions were
open-ended, where the participants could state what they considered to be the most
appropriate in each question. In addition, the participants were asked about the type
design methods and processes used by them, the decisions made during the variable
font design process, and how some aspects influence this process. To verify the clarity
of the script constructed, a pilot test was carried out with one of the professionals
selected to participate in the research. With that, the script was refined.
The selection of participants was based on their proximity to the practice of type
design, electing, mainly, those who have already published variable fonts, who have
already been awarded for their fonts, or who work in prominent companies in the
scenario of digital font production. Thus, 19 professionals were invited to answer
the questionnaire and another 13 were contacted to participate in the interviews.
For the analysis and synthesis of the data obtained in the interviews and ques-
tionnaire, we used the method of content analysis and the technique of categorical
The Professional Practice of Type Designers … 143

analysis proposed by Bardin [25]. According to the author, this technique makes
use of coding, classification, and categorization processes through the dismember-
ment of the text into units and codes classified and regrouped in categories based on
analogies. Bardin [25] explains that categorization deals with the classification of
the elements of a set and their regrouping according to previously defined criteria,
thus forming the categories. This process explores the domain, in a deductive way,
to determine the most comprehensive classes within a theme.

4 Results and Discussions

Given the research strategy adopted, 9 questionnaire responses were collected from
professionals of different nationalities, namely, 5 type designers working in the
United States, 2 type designers in the Netherlands, 1 working in England, and 1
in India. Subsequently, 10 interviews were carried out with 5 type designers working
in Brazil, 1 working in Germany, 1 in Spain, 1 in Argentina, 1 in Portugal, and 1
working in the United States. Analyzing the participants’ profiles, it is possible to
notice that most of them have some training in the area of design. Among the 19
professionals consulted in both collections, 14 have this relationship with the area.
It is also possible to observe other formations, some close to design, such as art and
architecture and urbanism (Fig. 4).
When comparing the profile of the two groups consulted during data collection,
the interviewees and the participants of the questionnaire, it was possible to perceive
that, in general, the professionals who answered the questionnaire had more time
working with type design than those who were interviewed for this research. By
taking an average of the interviewees’ work time, there is an experience of 7 years,
while the average time of work with type design of the professionals who joined the
questionnaire is 24 years.
To understand the design process of variable fonts, data collection had six main
research themes, namely: methods and process of variable fonts design, the definition
of project requirements, design definitions of variable fonts, variable fonts design,
quality of instances of variable fonts, and project completion. The collected data
related to these themes were coded, classified, and categorized into twelve groups of
codes. Thus, the participants’ responses were coded and these codes were related to

Fig. 4 Profile summary of professionals and experts consulted during the research
144 M. Woloszyn and B. S. Gonçalves

Fig. 5 Example of the coding and categorization process

the research topics. Based on the proximity and similarity between the codes, it was
possible to categorize them into thematic families, as shown in the Fig. 5.
The code groups identified during the aforementioned data collection were:
process steps, research, project types, typography features, the context of use of fonts,
design space, character design guidelines, file preparation, distribution, disclosure,
third parties, and tests. Table 1 presents the groups of codes and the number of times
they were cited in each research topic and throughout.
The process steps reflect stages of the production of variable fonts and reinforce
the need for a flow for the design process of variable fonts. This component was
identified in the participants’ answers when they presented phases and steps adopted
in projects with variable fonts, such as generation and incubation of ideas, sketches
of the letters, choice of the test word, and expansion of the character set.
The research deals with the search for typographic references, market gaps, and
type foundrie and inspirations. With them, it is possible to define the purposes and
objectives of the variable font project. In turn, project types reflect the various
possibilities of a typographic project. Data collection presented two main types,
namely, original projects and typographic rescues.6

6The type revival can be understood as the reuse of a typographic design created and used origi-
nally from old technologies, normally already in disuse, for application in contemporary technolo-
gies. A font designed from a type revival seeks to preserve the essence of the original design to
different degrees, being able to only reproduce the types or reinterpret them maintaining their main
characteristics.
The Professional Practice of Type Designers … 145

Table 1 Interview codes and questionnaires were added considering the main themes of the
interviews and questionnaires concerning the design process of variable fonts
Categories Methods Definition of Design Variable Quality Project Total
(Code and project definitions fonts of completion number of
groups) process requirements of variable design instances occurrences
of fonts of (citations)
variable variable by category
fonts font
design
Tests 10 4 2 0 49 17 82
Design 6 6 23 17 0 0 52
space
Process 36 5 0 1 0 0 42
steps
Context of 1 25 7 0 0 0 33
use of fonts
Third 1 5 0 0 1 14 21
parties
File 8 0 0 0 0 12 20
preparation
Typographic 3 7 5 0 0 0 15
features
Character 0 0 1 10 3 0 14
design
guidelines
Distribution 0 0 0 0 0 14 14
Disclosure 0 0 0 0 0 13 13
Research 1 11 0 0 0 0 12
Project 2 0 0 0 0 0 2
types
Total 320

Typographic features refer to character and glyph7 design properties and

attributes. Therefore, they take into account both the formal characteristics of the
letters, for example, the presence of serif, the proportions between characters’ parts,
the thickness of the stems, among others, as well as the conceptual and expressive
characteristics of the typefaces, such as seriousness, formality, relaxation, etc.
The context of use is related to the type of media and the functions for which the
variable font is designed and assists in defining the masters and axes of the variable
font. In turn, the design space directly refers to the axes of variation and extremes
of the variable font. These are usually visually organized in a structure that allows
understanding the possible instances of design existing between the masters.

7 Glyphs are all graphical representations that configure characters. That is, a character is a semantic
unit, while the glyph has a graphical meaning. A font can have different glyphs to represent the
same character [26].
146 M. Woloszyn and B. S. Gonçalves

The character design guidelines clarify rules that must be followed so that the
connection of the axes is possible. In this sense, defining metrics, verifying the
quantity and placement of the points of the vector drawing of the glyphs will provide
the operation of the variable font as such. Thus, the guidelines act as basic parameters
for the construction and performance of the variable technology.
File preparation deals with manipulating the font file to make it available for use.
Therefore, it involves defining metadata8 and font information, improving drawing
processes for on-screen viewing, and exporting the final file. Disclosure involves
the creation of materials for the presentation of the font to possible users as well as
its attributes and the different possibilities available through the axes of variation.
Regarding distribution, how the variable font will be made available to users is
defined. In this sense, some possibilities are the distribution in large distribution and
sale networks of fonts and the type designer’s and type foundries’ websites. In this
regard, the professionals consulted also highlighted the preparation of licenses for
variable fonts, a document that presents how the fonts can be used.
The presence of third parties, or agents external to the type designers, during
the design process of variable fonts, marks the collaboration of other professionals
during the different stages of the project, as well as potential customers. The project
can be forwarded by third parties and benefit from opinions, vision, and use by third
parties concerning the variable font being developed, being some specialist (such as
post-producers of fonts, other type designers, graphic designers) or not.
Finally, the tests deal with the verifications made during the design process of
variable fonts. Concerning them, several possibilities were highlighted by the profes-
sionals consulted. Print tests, final checks, constant revisions, instance tests, and
specific glyphs were scored and, in addition, there was an emphasis on the verifica-
tion of the font being developed in digital media. Some of the possibilities are tests
on platforms developed for this purpose, simulating the fonts being developed on
websites and in different screen sizes.
By adding the citations (participants’ answers coded), referring to the groups of
codes and the research themes resulting from the interviews and questionnaires, it was
possible to verify the recurrence and, consequently, the influence of each group in the
design process of variable fonts. Given the data presented in Table 1, the importance
of tests, the design space, and the process steps for the design of variable fonts is
verified, since these were the three categories most addressed by the professionals
consulted (Fig. 6) that illustrates the distribution of codes for each category identified
in the data resulting from the interviews and questionnaires.
By relating the generated categories with the main themes addressed in the
research, it was possible to visualize the influence of each category according to
the subject addressed, as shown in Fig. 7.
Analyzing the categories in isolation, it is possible to notice that the tests were
mentioned in more themes addressed in the research, in five of the six themes referring
to the design process of variable fonts (Fig. 8).

8Metadata involves the file name and variable font family, authoring data, font version, and naming
and configuring instances and styles.
The Professional Practice of Type Designers … 147

Fig. 6 Aspects addressed by the professionals consulted considering the main themes of the
interviews and questionnaires concerning the design process of variable fonts

Fig. 7 Relationship between the aspects addressed by the professionals and the main themes of
the research

Fig. 8 Recurrence of tests during the variable fonts design project

148 M. Woloszyn and B. S. Gonçalves

Fig. 9 Recurrence of tests during the variable font design project

Therefore, in addition to being addressed in the theme of methods and process of

variable fonts design, according to the participants, the tests are taken into account
in the definition of project requirements, the questions related to the variable fonts,
and in project completion. The biggest recurrence is in the influence of the tests for
the quality of instances of variable font.
It is also observed that the tests, in addition to being addressed in more themes,
were also addressed in more citations, in contrast to the literature. It should be noted
that among the processes and methods of typefaces and variable fonts design analyzed
in previous research [13], the number of processes that suggest this verification
procedure is insignificant, which highlights the gap between the literature in the area
and the professional practice of type design. Given, it is understood that the tests and
verifications during the design project of variable fonts must be present throughout
its course, these being fundamental to provide a quality result.
Next, the categories that appear in four of the six themes explored during the
research are the design space and the influence of external human agents on type
design (Fig. 9).
In this sense, it is noteworthy that the category of design space was addressed
in the theme of methods and process of variable fonts design, concerning project
requirements, variable fonts design, and, more recurrently, related to design defini-
tions of variable fonts. This issue was the second most discussed during the research
concerning recurrence in the participants’ answers. However, it can be seen that it
was little explored in the bibliographic findings [13], not being highlighted as part
of the process in any of the methods and processes consulted.
In turn, the presence and influence of third parties during the design process of
variable fonts was addressed in the theme that raised methods and process of this
type of project, in project requirements, in quality of the instances of the variable
font as well as in project completion, the latter with greater recurrence. Likewise,
this issue was not found in the consulted literature [13]. Thus, it is concluded that
the influence of human agents external to the type designer is also an aspect that
permeates the entire design process of variable fonts.
The Professional Practice of Type Designers … 149

Fig. 10 Aspects identified in the research that influence the project requirements

With the prospective research, it was also possible to relate the most relevant
aspects in each of the themes that refer to project moments. Therefore, concerning the
definition of project requirements, it is possible to perceive the greatest influence of
the category of the context of use of fonts, research, typographic features, and design
space in descending order (Fig. 10). Regarding the context of use, it is possible to
highlight its influence on the design process of variable fonts, given that it was the
fourth most addressed item in the participants’ answers during the research. However,
the relationship of this definition with the practice of type design is rarely addressed
in the literature.
Regarding the specific issues of variable font projects, there was an emphasis
on the categories of design space, the context of use of the font, mainly concerning
applications in digital interfaces, animations, editorial design and visual identity, and
typographic features, in descending order (Fig. 11).
When the subject was variable fonts design, the research participants mainly
dealt with the categories of design space, in most answers, and the character design
guidelines, which should be considered at this time of the variable font design
(Fig. 12).
Finally, when dealing with project completion, the categories of tests, third-party
participation, distribution, disclosure, and file preparation were scored in similar
recurrences (Fig. 13).
Given the above, it is possible to summarize the main contributions of the
professionals and experts consulted concerning the design process of variable fonts:
• Tests: the verification of the ongoing process proved to be essential to guarantee
the quality of the instances of the variable fonts. Still, it is possible to perceive
that this aspect is present in different project moments, its consideration being
relevant throughout the project.
150 M. Woloszyn and B. S. Gonçalves

Fig. 11 Aspects that influence the design definitions of variable fonts

Fig. 12 Aspects present in the variable font design stage

• Design space: as it involves aspects of variable fonts, the design space had a
notable presence during the research, reinforced mainly at the time of variable
fonts character design.
• Importance of steps to organize and guide the process: all participants
explained the design process of variable fonts in stages, phases, and project
moments, demarcating the relevance of adopting a process, method, or flow for
the production of variable fonts.
• Context de use: the planning of variable font application proved to be relevant for
the entire development of the project, explored mainly as a project requirement
by the professionals consulted.
The Professional Practice of Type Designers … 151

Fig. 13 Aspects considered in project completion

• Third parties: the presence, participation, and collaboration of human agents

external to the type designer stood out during several moments of the project,
their presence being significant during the design process of variable fonts.

5 Final Considerations

The advancement of technology has brought changes to the area of design to provide
new experiences to users. As a result, different fields have undergone developments
resulting from computerization, such as typography, where the processes of creation
and application of typefaces have been adapting to new communication formats.
Given the new typographic formats developed to provide more flexibility and use
of digital fonts, such as variable fonts, it is understood that it is necessary to under-
stand the flows and processes of their production. From this perspective, the present
study aimed to identify indicators and components of the design process of variable
fonts based on a prospective qualitative investigation based on the practice of type
designers.
From the application of a questionnaire and conducting interviews, it was possible
to identify components that are part of the design process of variable fonts. The
research results allowed us to elucidate aspects about this process not found in the
literature. Also, it was possible to distinguish and characterize specific procedures
in the production of variable fonts and mark the relevance of the components of the
design process of variable fonts.
Regarding the data collection methods adopted, it is pointed out that the ques-
tionnaire presented as positive points the ease and practicality of sending. However,
one of the perceived weaknesses was the ease of misinterpretation of the questions
and the impossibility of generating new inquiries for further study. This point was
152 M. Woloszyn and B. S. Gonçalves

repaired by conducting the interviews since it was possible to generate new inquiries
to deepen the questions according to the interviewees’ answers. In addition, it is note-
worthy that the interviews presented as positive points the possibility of accessing
subjective data brought by the participants, their experiences, opinions, and practices
in type design.
Among the limitations of the study, the small sample size is highlighted. Further-
more, it should be noted that the results are conditioned to the particular universe
of this sample, considering the experiences and practices of the experts consulted
concerning the design of variable fonts. As an indication of future research, it is
possible to highlight the expansion of professional participation and the use of focus
groups to discuss the consistency of the data presented in this research.

References

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da prática. In: Anais do 13º Congresso Pesquisa e Desenvolvimento em Design. Blucher, São
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2. Cardoso R (2012) Design para um mundo complexo. Cosac Naify, São Paulo
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4. Heller S (2004) The education of a typographer. Altworth Press, New York
5. Hammerschmidt C, Fontoura AM (2011) Notas para uma metodologia do design de tipos. In:
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fica, Brasília
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10. Cheng K (2020) Designing type. Yale University Press, New Haven
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Como criar tipos: do esboço à tela. Estereográfica, Brasília
12. Mena MP (2015) The ideation process in typographic creation: the conceptualization of the
letter through the stroke. In: Ilustrafic. 2o Congreso Internacional de Ilustración, Arte y Cultura
Visual
13. Woloszyn M, Gonçalves BS (2021) Design de fontes variáveis: um levantamento exploratório
a partir de achados teóricos. In: Anais do 10º CIDI | Congresso Internacional de Design da
Informação, edição 2021. Blucher, São Paulo
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Buenos Aires, TPG 62, 27–33
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21. Pamental J (2018) Fontes variáveis: O futuro da tipografia. In: User experience magazine, vol
18(4)
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Estereográfica, Brasília
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and digital communication II. DIGICOM 2021. Springer Series in Design and Innovation, vol
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Pedagogy, Society and Design Practice
Inclusive Design is Much More Than
the Opposite of Exclusive Design

Fernando Moreira da Silva

Abstract For the last 30 years, designers and researchers have been discussing and
practicing a design with the concern of not excluding anyone, or at least including
the largest possible number of users, always with their participation throughout the
process: it became known as Inclusive Design. All projects that do not meet these
principles are now considered exclusive. However, the vision, culture, strategies,
quality requirements and the inherent needs of a socially responsible design have
been changing in recent years. Developing inclusive design products and services
has become a challenge not only for designers but for all stakeholders involved in
the process, requiring greater knowledge of methodologies to be used, processes,
tools and procedures. The present document intends to be a call for attention to the
issue, based on our personal experience as a designer and researcher, with the main
objective of discussing and reflecting on basic and fundamental concepts inherent to
Inclusive Design.

Keywords Inclusive design · Participatory design · Exclusive design · Empathy

1 Introduction

Inclusion has become a concept used regularly and in the most diverse senses. In line
with this procedure, Inclusive Design has been studied and used with greater acuity
in the last 20 years. Proof of this is the UN’s own Sustainable Development Goals
[1] (2015), in which the concepts inclusiveness and inclusivity are among the most
used throughout the document.
When referring to the concept of Inclusive Design, one automatically thinks of the
opposite, that is, Exclusive Design. However, Inclusive Design has been improving
and introducing changes in its way of acting that goes far beyond being non-exclusive.
By their very nature, designers have a desire and a responsibility to contribute
to the betterment of the world. However, they must be attentive to the paradigmatic

F. Moreira da Silva (B)

CIAUD, Lisbon School of Architecture, Universidade de Lisboa, 1346-063 Lisboa, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 157
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
158 F. Moreira da Silva

changes in Design, to the new societal challenges, which mainly involve a new way
of thinking, acting, involvement, attending to and incorporating disciplinary diversity
and end users, exploring concrete ways of integrating knowledge to obtain solutions
closer to the wishes of these same users. This positioning has led to profound changes
in the approach to Inclusive Design itself.
Since the late 90s of the last century, this theme has been central to our investiga-
tions and ways of designing in design, so we consider it imperative to contribute with
this text to the understanding, reflection and clarification of what Inclusive Design
is or what it’s all about when we act with a focus on inclusion through Design.

2 Inclusion and Participatory Design

One of the most important ways to promote inclusion is Participatory Design. It is

a form of effective participation of non-designers in a design project, with a special
focus on end users. According to Muller and Druin [2], we can say that participatory
design is a design process where the end user contributes to the development and life
cycle of the product or system, through his/her perspectives and needs. It becomes a
higher form of involvement, with the transfer of part of the decision-making power
to the user, especially at the level of exploration of the characteristics and validation
of the product, which can be not only decisive for its success but also very important
for the user self-esteem.
The participatory design approach, where the end user is included in the team,
make it interdisciplinary. Users’ active participation goes far beyond using them as a
data source, submitting them to questionnaires or observing how they use a particular
product or service. It is believed that in a participatory project, one must have a global
notion of the users themselves, contextualizing it through each one own individual,
social, cultural and historical reality.
When designers resort to the practice of Participatory Design, they make possible
the involvement with a context that is sometimes unknown or little explored before,
it shows the importance of immersing in a new environment, it cultivates new bonds
of trust and familiarity, building a new relationship with the chain of value, which
makes it possible to expand action opportunities and optimize resources.
Through external participation, it is possible to design based on the capabilities
and needs of the other and move away from pre-established concepts. When the scope
of social issues in which the project is really inserted is understood, it is possible to
design skillfully for the complexity of the world, relying on a collaborative network
in the projects. Thus, resorting to a way of designing in which future users have
decision-making power represents a movement in which different points of view can
combine with the designer’s gaze to generate an innovative solution.
According to Pilemalm et al. [3], participatory design approaches have their origin
in the 1970s, when they were used as a means to empower workers in the workplace,
allowing them to take part in designing the technology they would use. Carroll and
Rosson [4] state that in the 1980s, the direct participation of the end user was still
Inclusive Design is Much More Than the Opposite … 159

almost absent from conceptions at the level of design centered on the Human Being.
It was not before the 1990s that participatory design practices became more common,
understanding the advantages of designing with and for the users, becoming one of
the pillars of interaction design. In this way, it became easier to understand how
products and systems are used, and the impact they have and the empathy they have
on the end user.
At the end of the last century, Papaneck [5] also advocated the importance of
participatory design: for him, the designer’s job is to provide real and meaningful
choices, so it is necessary to allow people to participate more fully in the decisions
of their own lives, enabling them to collaborate with designers in the search for
solutions to their own problems. There is a paradigm shift from design for people to
design with people.
A key point of the current discussions is the approach to design from the perspec-
tive of the stakeholders involved, in order to create and promote forms of interaction
and innovative partnerships between all, which requires new skills from the designer,
such as operationalizing and facilitating processes of participatory design in which
entrepreneurs, users, institutions, community and others participate, directing this
process towards sustainable and inspiring solutions.
Carroll and Rosson [4] state that participatory design has great relevance, as it
integrates two propositions about the project: moral and pragmatic. The moral propo-
sition concerns the people whose activities and experiences will be most directly
affected by the design solution, who should have the right to be directly included in
the design process. The second, pragmatic proposition, is that the people who will
have to adopt and perhaps adapt to a particular product or service must be included
in the design process so that they can offer more perspectives and preferences to
designers, increasing, thus, the possibilities of a successful project outcome and
greater empathy.
Some people confuse Participatory Design with Collaborative Design. Participa-
tory Design focuses on management philosophy, as it answers the question: Why do
it? Thus, when we think of a people-centered approach, motivation is fundamental to
achieve good results; thus, the answer provides such a purpose. While Collaborative
Design seeks to answer the question: How to do it? A design and/or creative process
generates innovation, so Collaborative Design answers the question of how to do it.
Among the various tools that Participatory Design can use, there are two very
important ones for the development of team building, which are: Brainstorming, a
group dynamic that explores creativity, where people give free ideas about a subject
or a problem previously established; and the Empathy Map, a tool that enables a
deeper understanding of people, their behaviors, their opinions and the systematics
of their lives.
We can say that Inclusive Design distinguishes itself from other ways of devel-
oping products For All, because it acts in an interactive way, always incorporating end
users in its processes, so, given our research and design experience its best strategy
is Participatory Design.
160 F. Moreira da Silva

3 Technology and Exclusion

Over time, technology has allowed extraordinary advances and sometimes at a speed
that is difficult to keep up with. Designers, who most of the times help in its develop-
ment or use it for the development of their products and services, are often unaware
of the difficulties experienced by individuals who have some type of disability or
who belong to more aged sections of the population.
We know that those who do not master new technological tools often lose
autonomy, empathy and even interest in a particular product. In this sense, it is
essential to make efforts on the part of all designers, in order to avoid the exclusion
of a large part of society that is increasingly surrounded by technology. It is, there-
fore, of great importance to carry out studies which allow the identification of the
special characteristics of the entire target of products and services in order to be able
to consider and attend to them in their development.
Another very important aspect that must be addressed in the process of inclusion
of people with disabilities or the elderly is the way they face technology, mainly
identifying episodes in which the feeling of resistance, limitation and incapacity
can lead to loss of self-esteem and refusal to use technological products or products
that use a certain type of technology. According to Litto [6], there is an important
relationship between self-esteem and the use of technology: self-esteem plays a
relevant role in the process of appropriation of new technologies by these target
audiences, in which the ability to master a new skill leads to the growth of self-esteem.
The usability of a given product or system is a measure of the quality of the
interface, in terms of ease of use, interactivity and learning. Usability and user expe-
rience are associated with user characteristics, activities and tasks to be performed,
equipment and physical environments.
The product or interface must, depending on the context, adapt itself to the user
and not the other way around; otherwise, it may cause the exclusion of part of its
users, becoming an exclusive design product. The adaptability of a product or system
concerns its ability to respond to user needs and preferences. For this to happen, as
already mentioned, the involvement of the user throughout the project is essential,
that is, from the phases of analysis or survey, conception, design, development,
implementation and revisions [7].
The use of technology has become one of the great contemporary challenges,
especially for large portions of the adult population. In order for technology not to
be an exclusion factor, an interdisciplinary, ethical approach, focusing on the vast
majority of target users, is necessary so that motivated communities able to face the
challenges of our time are developed.
Inclusive Design is Much More Than the Opposite … 161

4 Empathy and Ethics Are Inclusive Design Needs

Remarkable things can happen when empathy for others plays a key role in problem-
solving.
Design empathy is an approach that draws upon people’s real-world experiences to
address modern challenges. When companies allow a deep emotional understanding
of people’s needs to inspire them—and transform their work, their teams, and even
their organization at large—they unlock the creative capacity for innovation, through
concepts, products, services, strategies, and systems that are both innovative and
responsive. Design empathy benefits can reach more people and have long-term
positive impact on actual user needs and desires.
In the late 90s empathic design was described as a cultural shift. Meanwhile,
various disciplines hailed the importance of considering emotion as not only a valid
subject of study, but as one that was crucial to design products [8]. At that time,
empathic design was presented as a significant discipline and process involving
observation, data collection and analysis, and iterative prototyping, being identified
as a way to bring up people’s unspoken latent needs and then address them through
design, rich of innovation, organizational strategy, and business challenges [9].
Inclusive design is a way to apply empathy in new contexts, from simple prod-
ucts to complex systems, leading to outcomes that are functional and emotionally
meaningful for the target people, thus empathic design requires deliberate practice.
Putting ourselves in someone else’s shoes, empathy causes relevant changes in our
cognitive style, increasing our productive thinking, enhancing our ability to receive
and process information, putting it in context and picking up contextual cues from
the environment.
According to Decety and Ickes [10], we are more helpful and generous after an
empathic encounter, and designers’ empathetic behavior personally motivates them
to solve design challenges.
Focusing on empathy, design teams are more motivated and able to understand
users’ perspective, what they want and really care about, more human-centered,
which can introduce unmeasurable changes in the product or service, even in the busi-
ness itself, by presenting new opportunities, providing energy to overcome possible
obstacles.
Empathic design challenges can be at two levels: product or service level; or at
cultural level. Sometimes designers have to use empathy to introduce changes in
the process to achieve a good and sustainable product that performs the needs and
expectations of the final user. But other times designers have to be the mean to make
significant cultural changes in an organization or community, with the resource to
empathy.
Designers regularly discuss the best tools, methodologies, processes and forget
how the complexity brought by modern times forces them to make decisions that
have profound consequences in people’s lives.
Ethics seeks to understand and assist in the judgment of what distinguishes a good
action from a bad one, what makes an attitude right or wrong, what we must do to act
162 F. Moreira da Silva

better. The ultimate goal of an ethical judgment must be to guide a conscious practice
of moral and human values. In design, it is not enough to understand well the problem
to be solved and find a solution: it is necessary to understand the consequences that
a certain decision will have on the life of the target group. Many of the problems
that we can classify as ethical problems arise from actions taken without a serious
assessment of future impacts.
According to Flusser [11], the ethical role in Design has acquired a new meaning
in the current context, and even a character of urgency.
Design ethics has two dimensions: professional and moral. In the case of the
former one, it is currently understood as the production of a globally satisfactory
solution, accommodating the interests of both the client and the user. As for morale,
it is about meeting all possible perspectives so as not to harm the user throughout
the process, as well as any other stakeholder involved, if possible, even introducing
improvements. Only through the coexistence of both in the exercise of design is it
possible to achieve a truly ethical design.
To achieve a more ethical design, designers have to meet some fundamental prin-
ciples: total transparency and focus on the user; inclusion and accessibility, taking
into account the difficulties that the user may have and looking for solutions to extin-
guish or reduce these difficulties; inclusion of the user in the process, right from
the beginning; concern with usability, creating intuitive and easy-to-use products
that make the experience pleasant for users; privacy, creating a design that avoids
the invasion of privacy; social responsibility, with a design that contributes to the
clarification and correct approach to social causes.

5 Inclusive Design Challenges

By definition, Inclusive Design is the design of core products and/or services that
are accessible and usable by as many people as possible, regardless of age, gender
or ability, and without the need for special adaptation or specialized design.
In an ideal world, inclusive products and services would be the norm rather than the
exception. Collaboration between users, designers and producers from the beginning
of the project to its completion would be the key to success. However, in the real
world this is not so. The main objective of inclusive design is therefore to make life
easier for all people. In this context, the designer can have a critical view of the
world and adopt a holistic and sustainable approach to the product or service being
designed [12].
Human diversity, with its needs and expectations, is a reality that still does not
concern the vast majority of people. In the specific case of design, the concept
of Inclusiveness still remains unattended in the design and development of a vast
majority of solutions and final products.
Dong et al. [13] made an important contribution by organizing the main sources of
basic knowledge to achieve Inclusive Design: theoretical models (processes for the
project and knowledge transfer); information about users (on the diversity of profiles,
Inclusive Design is Much More Than the Opposite … 163

capacities and contexts); examples of good practices (in areas of design, business
and education); methods and tools; regulatory documents, standards and guidelines.
It is urgent to use new strategies that allow the different stakeholders involved in
the design processes to respond to a postulate, cultural and epistemological change,
articulating “knowing how to do” with “knowing how to think”, in order to achieve
solutions and products that serve the vast majority of users.
As Paula Trigueiros states [14], everyone has the right to design. However, the
specificity of the problems that affect the daily lives of sick people, in a situation
of disability and depending on others to perform essential tasks, sometimes leads to
very complex challenges when thinking about promoting inclusion through design.
For these situations, the most comprehensive solutions and products on the market
often do not adequately satisfy their requirements.
The deficit in functional capacity, which makes an individual dependent on others
to perform daily activities, has different degrees. Although independence is usually
used synonymously with autonomy, it is important to mention that some people with
reduced functional and physical capacities have the ability to choose and control
part of their environment [15]. This means that we will only be able to develop an
inclusive design if we attend to the great diversity of the final user for whom we are
designing, using our own methodologies, as well as a necessary paradigm shift in the
way of being and acting in design project, which goes through a vision and critical
behavior, and a holistic and interdisciplinary attitude of the designers themselves.
Inclusive Design is also about finding correct solutions so that people with disabil-
ities or the elderly can use a certain product or service, for which they have evident
difficulties or limitations, without feeling discriminated against with the need to use
a product that segregates them in comparison with other users, instead of including
them. In fact, there are several alternatives in support products, possibly much more
functional but that exclude them from using the same products as the others: inclusive
design must guarantee users’ freedom of choice, allowing them to make the decision
to use the same product as the others, using an adaptation, or a support product.
Martelli et al. [16] evidenced that among the elderly there is enormous resistance to
the use of gadgets that could make their lives easier, even providing greater autonomy,
but which discriminate them against other users. These gadgets, rather than promoting
inclusive design, are products that accentuate exclusion.
It should be clarified that Inclusive Design is not Design for Disability. These
concepts are often mistakenly confused. Design for disability is the specific search
for a solution to solve a concrete problem of a certain type of disability, or even a
specific person with a disability, within the tailor-made concept. Inclusive Design is
designing including end users throughout the entire process, in order to achieve a
solution for everyone, or at least for the vast majority of possible users, whether they
have a disability or not.
But designers also have to carefully study products on the market that, with minor
changes or adaptations, will serve a greater number of users: this is also a form of
inclusive design. As highlighted, nowadays there are several and pertinent challenges
that designers have to attend when developing a socially responsible design.
164 F. Moreira da Silva

6 Conclusions

Inclusive products and services were never designed in a vacuum, but now everything
is more evidently connected as part of a larger ecosystem and interdisciplinarity. We
believe the process will evolve and practice empathy will be key to increasing the
positive impact of inclusive design. However, all of the stakeholders involved need
to be intrinsically motivated if they are going to truly follow through with their
commitment to human-centered design and innovation.
Empathy is not only something we facilitate for others but also for ourselves,
which leads us to rethink design methods and processes, replacing or augmenting
them with empathy-building experiences, which will have an impact on the society,
engaging with an increasingly diverse mix of individuals, groups, and contexts.
We believe that Design can only be Inclusive if it integrates new ways of doing and
thinking, taking into account a cultural change, incorporating an interdisciplinary
strategy, with different types of approach and involving interdisciplinarity people
from different areas, and Participatory Design practices; if the principles of Social
Responsibility, Ethics and Empathy are respected in the conception and development
of products and services, taking into account human diversity and assuming that
Design can set an example of what it means to respond to the needs and expectations
of the greatest number possible end-users in your projects; if the technology is used
without forgetting the universe of those who will use it, so as not to promote exclusive
design; if appropriate processes, methods and tools are used for the development of
inclusive products, such as User-Centered or Human-Centered Design, Co-Design,
among many others; if we bring together the different stakeholders involved in the
process and if we implement a cross-pollination of the different concepts and aspects
involved in the search for more holistic results and inclusive solutions.
If this postulated change of mentality and a conscious change of attitude are
achieved, it will result in a gradual return to balance, where society’s behavior
can contribute to socioeconomic and sustainable development, in a framework of
social responsibility centered on the plural Human Being, with different needs and
expectations, that is, meeting the different dimensions of Inclusiveness.

References

1. United Nations (2015) Sustainable development goals. [Link]

2. Muller M, Druin A (2002) Participatory design: the third space in HCI (2002). [Link]
[Link]/publication/228398475_Participatory_Design_The_Third_Space_in_HCI. Last
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and participatory design for development of socio-technical systems: a user participative
approach. Des Stud 28(3):263–288
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28(3):213–340
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5. Papaneck V (1995) The green imperative - ecology and ethics in design and architecture.
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centered approach in the evolving practice of design. In: Strategy and execution. Harvard
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Review, November–December 1997, pp 102–113
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12. Moreira da Silva F (2013) Colour and inclusivity: a visual communication design project with
older people. Caleidoscópio, Lisboa
13. Dong H, McGinley C, Nickpour F, Cifter AS (2015) Designing for designers: insights into the
knowledge users of inclusive design. Appl Ergon 46(Part B):284–291. [Link]
[Link].2013.03.003. Last accessed 11 Jan 2022
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design #2-from exclusive to inclusive design-workshop. In: Senses and sensibility 2017-design
beyond borders. Madeira University, Funchal
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Sci-Stories in Design: Guidelines
for Curricular Inscription
and Dissemination Through Visual
Narratives

Eliana Penedos-Santiago , Susana Barreto , Cláudia Lima ,

Rui Vitorino Santos , Nuno Martins , and Pedro Amado

Abstract This article aims to present a set of guidelines for the curricular inscription
of invisible stories—empirical knowledge, life experiences, professional and peda-
gogical practice—of Design professionals, lecturers, and researchers, with a role in
the history of Portuguese Design, shortening as much as possible, the scientific find-
ings from the corresponding curricular frameworks. It is intended to revert this matter
into a pedagogical context, permeating several Curricular Units, in coordination with
the faculty thus creating new pedagogical contexts for the students who take part in
these Units. A series of workshops in different Design Faculties were conducted to
understand the engagement of the students and the degree of empathy they were able
to establish with the different topics through visual representation exercises. This
reactivation and inscription of these testimonies, from the voice and experience of
several design professionals and researchers, aims to connect the current generation
of design lecturers, students, and professionals with Portuguese design. To achieve
this, we propose two dissemination approaches: (i) learning methodologies will be
put into practice aimed at exploring new visual repertoires that offer a critical look to
the new generation of design students on the inheritance of knowledge, and intellec-
tual assets, through visual representation; (ii) conceiving a digital archive to increase
outreach and perpetuate knowledge. The guidelines proposed will inform new solu-
tions for the dissemination, inscription, and reactivation of knowledge (shaped by
memories and experiences) as curricular or extracurricular modules, using visual
narratives as a communicational interface.

E. Penedos-Santiago (B) · S. Barreto · R. V. Santos

Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
e-mail: elianapenedossantiago@[Link]
C. Lima
Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, University of Porto & Lusófona University,
Porto, Portugal
N. Martins
Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, School of Design, Polytechnic Institute of
Cávado and Ave, Barcelos, Portugal
P. Amado
Research Institute in Art, Design and Society (I2ADS), University of Porto, Porto, Portugal

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 167
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
168 E. Penedos-Santiago et al.

Keywords Design research · Design education · Curricular inscription

1 Introduction

This study introduces itself as an extension of the outcomes obtained at the conclu-
sion of the Science and Technology Foundation (FCT) funded project, “Wisdom
Transfer (WT): towards the scientific inscription of individual legacies in contexts of
higher education reform and Art and Design research (2018–2021)” [1]. Successfully
completed in January 2021, this project aimed to lay the foundations for a paradigm
shift in the reactivation of knowledge-relevant contributions that academics and prac-
titioners in art and design, can provide on their own behalf. A golden generation that
reflects a “sense of school” that remains alive to this day in the foundations of Art
and Design education in Northern Portugal [2]. As John Berger would say, “a people
or a class which is cut off from its own past is far less free to choose and to act as a
people or class than one that has been able to situate itself in history” [3].
Accordingly, one of the main focuses of the R&D project Wisdom Transfer relied
on the relevance and urgency of integrating these results into the curriculum. To fulfil
this goal, several actions of scientific and institutional dissemination were carried out,
such as journal publications and conference participation (national and international),
exhibitions, lectures and seminars, as well as a set of curricular initiatives, in several
design courses, such as the Faculty of Fine Arts—University of Porto, School of
Design-Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave and Lusófona University, Porto.

1.1 Aims

It is considered of utmost importance to continue this work, replicating the dissem-

ination model to improve the preliminary pedagogical model to, on the one hand,
provide a quicker integration of the project research outcomes into the curricula and,
on the other hand, obtain from these experiences crucial data for research itself.
These are the main purposes of this study:
• Map, inscribe and disseminate the untold stories and local memories from Design
professionals, following on the work carried out in the Wisdom Transfer project
and articulated with ongoing research projects. Part of this generation is ageing,
which increases the urgency of recording all this information, otherwise it will be
irremediably lost if it is not legitimised and activated in the present.
• Integrate the previously selected and organised data, into curricular frameworks of
Design education, promoting in-depth research of case studies, in higher education
institutions.
• Connect the contemporary Design community to its foundations, recovering
history in an era of cancel-culture, simultaneously joining a global debate
Sci-Stories in Design: Guidelines for Curricular Inscription … 169

on the subject. The creation of an online digital archive, integrating scien-

tific/pedagogical/artistic research findings, will enable design students, lecturers,
and practitioners to engage with their predecessors through direct, integrated, free
and global access to information.
It is intended to revert this approach into the pedagogical context, either in curric-
ular or extracurricular environments, promoting the ongoing collaboration between
researchers, and their corresponding research units, faculty and students. The rein-
forcement of these relationships, the creation of new pedagogical contexts and the
consequent creation of an open access digital archive will contribute to the invigo-
ration of the relationship to the community, academic and non-academic, bringing
science closer to the public.
It is important to bear in mind that the foundations of Design education in Portugal
were strongly based on international references. This invisibility of Portuguese
Design could be explained by: (i) the need to acquire international expertise after
four decades of a regime of censorship; (ii) the allure for alternative approaches to
design practice; or (iii) the number of Design lecturers educated abroad.
Different authors and researchers in Design, and related fields, have been reac-
tivating these memories and experiences, whether in (i) the first person: Mendonça
[4], Santos [5], Howard’s Personal Views Series (2003–2013), Bártolo et al. [6] and
Cruz [7]; (ii) industry-related: Cunca [8]; or (iii) within a historical context: Fragoso
[9] and the Errata Design doctoral research project by Isabel Duarte, FBAUP.
However, there is a clear lack of a collective framework that gathers, documents,
and compiles all these memories and testimonies, thus mapping out the practices of
Portuguese Design from its origins, framed in both time and space. As pointed out by
Adamson et al. [10] “knowledge is always fragmentary (…) and only comes into its
own through the unexpected challenges, confirmations, elaborations, and unsettling
that result from encounter”.
Several reference models are currently in place, under international contexts,
such as AIGA Design Archives and The University of Brighton Design Archives,
dedicated to British design, and twentieth century design global organisations such as
the Design Council and ICOGRADA, or RMIT Design Archives (RDA) in Australia,
all of which are committed to the completion of projects, exhibitions, and doctoral
research in design.

2 Methodologies

It is important to begin by introducing the methodologies that precede the ones

conducted specifically for this study, considering the relevance of the previously
collected data within a research project.
In the framework of Wisdom Transfer data was collected mainly through ethno-
graphic interviews [11] carried out by the project researchers under the use of an
interview script with open-ended questions [12]. Foreign experiences, international
170 E. Penedos-Santiago et al.

relations, learning and personal experiences as students and/or lecturers, social and
political awareness, were some of the questions addressed in the interviews.
These testimonies focused on a period of two decades, gathering a selected group
of Art and Design professionals who attended the School of Fine Arts of Porto
(ESBAP) between 1960 and 1980, a period of political turmoil in Portugal, and
were mostly of biographical nature. Most of the selected interviewees represented
an important, and sometimes a leading, role in the history of ESBAP.
Forty-two interview sessions were held during a period of one year (2018–2019),
predominantly at the homes and studios of the interviewees, allowing for a direct
and indirect ethnographic observation of displayed memories, daily habits and work-
places. These sessions were video recorded, single audio recorded and photographed.
Besides the importance of recording data to assist research, it also allowed for the
creation of a fund of resources [13], crucial to dissemination. This fund would feed a
future design archive, enabling the inscription, perpetuating the local history of Art
and Design, and relating data directly to the younger generations of designers and
future designers.
Ethical considerations in this research project guided both research design
and practices. These principles include voluntary participation, informed consent,
anonymity, confidentiality and dissemination of results [14].
Subsequently, the transcriptions of the interviews, the notes from direct and indi-
rect observations and the university records were cross-referenced. The following
analysis conducted by the team researchers allowed for the recovery of a set of
curricular practices in Art and Design under this period [15], analyse the circum-
stances behind the birth of higher education design in Portugal [16] and provided us
crucial information for the workshops conducted within several design courses from
several universities aiming to find the most effective and direct approach to insert
scientific research outcomes into design curricula.

2.1 Outcomes Dissemination Under a Curricular Context

Several dissemination approaches were conducted, simultaneously, during the two-

year period of the Wisdom Transfer Project, with the purpose of studying the most
efficient way of not only presenting and communicating but also inscribing the
research findings. A set of seminars, exhibitions, lectures, and workshops were
conducted with the assistance of both researchers, lecturers, and corresponding
design departments. All these events were filmed and photographed, and all the
outputs documented.
The seminars and the exhibitions were open to the public, evolving not only
researchers, faculty, and students but also the entire community, allowing for a wider
range of communication. The five seminars conducted, gathered a group of three
of the interviewees, moderated by a related theme guest, offering an informal talk
about their life, their pedagogical and artistic experiences, shared between the panel
of interviewees, in time and space.
Sci-Stories in Design: Guidelines for Curricular Inscription … 171

Fig. 1 Preparatory meeting between FBAUP students and Wisdom Transfer research team ID+
@PINC—UPTEC

Although sometimes difficult to guide the group conversation, due to the enthu-
siasm and eloquence of our guests, we found that the collective model of interviewing
triggered a set of memories that complemented data retrieved from the previous and
individual interviews.
The seminars, the exhibitions and the lectures conducted in academic context,
were welcomed and appreciated by the corresponding community and the public,
however, although the impact was intense, it was brief.
Three workshops were conducted, under an extra-curricular model, at the Faculty
of Fine Arts—University of Porto (FBAUP), School of Design—Polytechnic Insti-
tute of Cávado and Ave (IPCA), Barcelos and Lusófona University, Porto (ULP).
All workshops followed a visual representation approach to address exploring new
visual and narrative repertoires. The students were challenged to develop a critical
and personal understanding of what this collected testimonies represent both to the
inherence of knowledge and intellectual asset (see Fig. 1).
All workshops were available for design students at their corresponding university.
Commitment was the main requirement. Inspired by our interviewees’ testimonies,
collaborative work was promoted to create a studio environment thus fostering the
exchange of ideas. The extra-curricular model allowed bringing together a multi-
disciplinary group with different profiles and backgrounds. The fact that this model
was optional and with no curricular evaluation, allowed for a more informal and
motivated atmosphere.
The first one, held at FBAUP, was entitled “The narrative possibilities of illus-
tration in trans-generational dialogue”. This workshop intends, through illustration
practice and the creation of illustrated narratives, the implementation of effective
and affective engagement strategies between students and former Art and Design
lecturers and researchers, already retired, through the creation of illustrated and
visual essays. The proximity between generations finds a territory of dialogue and
empathy through the practice of illustration, since it offers various narrative possi-
bilities of representation of both the real and symbolic world, that when guided by
the partial and particular perspectives of the universe of each of the interviewees and
172 E. Penedos-Santiago et al.

Fig. 2 Illustration by Joana

Coelho for the artist Puri
Fontes. Workshop “The
narrative possibilities of
illustration in
trans-generational dialogue”
FBAUP 2019

students, finds its creative, communicative, and social, differentiating potential. Each
stage of this project included 16 students from FBAUP, attending the degree course
in Communication Design and the specialization course in Illustration.
This workshop was divided in two different moments. The first one was “The
illustrated portrait”. The portrait is chosen for its historical nature in the visual repre-
sentation of a person’s identity. The fact that it is illustrated allows each student
to explore aspects such as honouring, making public or valuing a set of scientific,
pedagogical and artistic experiences of former lecturers and researchers, considering
that the participants are mostly unaware of those portrayed. (see Fig. 2) The retired
lecturers and researchers are assigned to each student and the collected corresponding
information is made available (biography, video interview, images, among others).
After a period of research and individual acknowledgement, by each student, of
the universe and particularities of each interviewee, there is a first gathering of the
physical and non-visible elements considered to be defining of the interviewee. (see
Fig. 3).
The second moment was called “Illustrated visual essays/narratives”. Setting out
from the graphic/artistic, biographical archives or the interviews conducted within the
scope of the project, each student performed several illustrated narrative essays. The
aim was to explore new visual repertoires that provide a younger critical look on the
heritage of knowledge and intellectual value offered by this past generation, through
narratives that essentially rely on visual signs. Each participant developed visual
narratives that result from the individual analysis, translation, and interpretation of
the information provided from each interviewee’s archive. The illustrated artefacts,
produced by each student, are based on the narrative possibilities of this archive,
composed by the interviewee´s knowledge and experience in an academic context, the
work developed outside the academy, and any other stories revealed during research.
(see Fig. 4).
Sci-Stories in Design: Guidelines for Curricular Inscription … 173

Fig. 3 Workshop “The narrative possibilities of illustration in trans-generational dialogue”

conducted by Rui Vitorino Santos at FBAUP 2019

Fig. 4 Workshop “The narrative possibilities of illustration in trans-generational dialogue”

conducted by Rui Vitorino Santos at FBAUP. Risograph printing from the “Illustrated visual
essays/narratives” 2020

The second workshop, held at ULP in 2019, was entitled “Typographical essays
as a contribution to the transfer of transgenerational knowledge”. Conducted by
Cláudia Lima and Eliana Penedos-Santiago (both lecturers and project researchers),
proposes the creation of a visual narrative, with a strong typographic component,
based on the reading and interpretation of the testimonies provided by the project.
The typographic/calligraphic poster was intended to visually represent a specific
quote from one of the interviewed artists as a means of identifying its author, for the
creation of a visual narrative. (see Fig. 4) The reduction of the narrated story to a
quote, or a set of quotes, was a task assigned to the student leading the participants to
a deeper knowledge of these Portuguese artists and designers life and careers (Fig. 5).
The last workshop, held at IPCA and conducted by Nuno Duarte Martins and Pedro
Amado (both lecturers and project researchers), was entitled “Procedural pattern
interpretations of the work of António Quadros Ferreira”.
The workshop was conducted with a sample of voluntary student participants
from the Graphic Design degree at the School of Design of the Polytechnic Institute
of Cávado and Ave (IPCA), in four two-hour weekly sessions by the end of 2019.
174 E. Penedos-Santiago et al.

Fig. 5 Poster by Bruna Pires

on the artist Isabel Cabral.
Workshop “Typographical
essays as a contribution to
the transfer of
transgenerational
knowledge”, ULP 2019

The aims of the workshop were two-fold. On one hand, within the scope of the
research project, it aimed to introduce and discuss the visual heritage of the work
of António Quadros Ferreira (AQF). On the other hand, to introduce students to
the fundamental concepts of functional programming for Graphic Design, with the
Processing language.
During the sessions, the students revealed a total unfamiliarity with the work of
AQF. A workshop that addressed both these issues was designed. The workshop was
organized into four sessions, held during an extra-curricular period, for all interested
students who voluntarily signed up. In the first session, participants were introduced
to a specific set of AQF’s work from the early 1970s. Having presented and discussed
the algorithmic origin and computational process of the creators’ work, participants
were introduced to the programming language in the second session. In the third
session, students started translating a personal interpretation of the AQF’s language
in their visual algorithmic process in Processing to design a book cover of their
choice. The fourth and final session was held to supervise the work in progress and
to help solve the technical issues and debug the code for them to be able to tweak
and fine-tune and submit their designs autonomously in the following two weeks.
(see Fig. 6).
Sci-Stories in Design: Guidelines for Curricular Inscription … 175

Fig. 6 Book cover by Marta Valente. Workshop “Procedural pattern interpretations of the work of
António Quadros Ferreira”

Carrying out these workshops, as a way of creating knowledge and empathy

between generations, within the academic institutions, confirmed the relevance and
urgency of retaining and using, in the universe of higher education, the scientific,
pedagogical, artistic, and human capital of its teaching and research community.
Labelling is only the first action to valorise this heritage [17].
The outputs from these sessions were diverse. This methodological process
allowed for all participants, lecturers, researchers, students, and corresponding insti-
tutions, to gain in-depth knowledge about this particular design research project
findings. Empathy, free-will personal commitment, and engagement between the
players were crucial to the success of this experiment. As a result, we gathered a set
of visual narratives in the form of drawing, visual narratives, typographic essay, and
algorithmic representation.
These initiatives and the corresponding outputs were presented in a final exhibition
entitled “Threads of a Legacy” that took place on May 13th 2021 in the Casa Comum,
University of Porto. The engagement between the students and the project outcomes,
through the workshops, was immediately recognised by researchers and participants
once compared to the other dissemination events, such as seminars, exhibitions, and
lectures. Once this program ended, we started a detailed analysis of the aforemen-
tioned initiatives, namely the workshops. Some informal interviews and subsequent
focus group sessions were held with lecturers, researchers, and students. According
to all participants the workshops were the most efficient model of dissemination and
176 E. Penedos-Santiago et al.

more importantly of curricular integration. The involvement, commitment and moti-

vation implied in this initiative is determinant to achieve effective communication
and perpetuate knowledge once compared to more passive dissemination models
such as seminars, lectures, or exhibitions. This allowed us to outline a preliminary,
integrated, and short-term curricular model, to be future tested and compared to the
extra-curricular one.
An open access digital archive will also be considered as a crucial and expanding
component of this dissemination study and thus enhance the reach and broadcasting
capacity of research, involving students towards the mapping of Portuguese Design:
influences, purposes and inspirations.

3 Integrated Modules Guidelines

One of the most significant factors for the success of these initiatives will imply the
direct and indirect involvement of students and lecturers with active and ongoing
scientific research projects, duly articulated and adapted to the year and curricular
unit concerned, a task for which the contribution of the corresponding lecturers will
be of the utmost importance.
These are some of the procedures that can be considered when translating design
research findings into a curricular model:
– Collecting information from previous projects, unpublished interviews, and
related data yet to be collected, combining ethnographic methods and interviews
carried out in places with which our protagonists can establish ties of familiarity.
This methodology will allow us to study our players based on qualitative methods
(detailed observations, unstructured or semi-structured interviews and document
analysis) [18].
– (i) Analyse content in context, (ii) organise and (iii) catalogue. Combine content
analysis methods by cross-referencing existing records and new material to be
collected with future expansion of research on the topic. Additionally include
affinity diagrams, an inductive method in which qualitative research data is rela-
tionally separated and organised, combining observations and interpretations from
research without ever neglecting data [18].
– Ongoing interviews with archivists and curators from different institutions, with
particular focus on the area of Design, to understand the multiple possibilities of
an online digital catalogue, such as the use of sources, a look at history, design
processes or documentation of one’s practices.
– Conduct a series of usability tests supported by iterative evaluation research
methods [18].
Sci-Stories in Design: Guidelines for Curricular Inscription … 177

3.1 Proposal for a Build-In Module on Design Research

These short built-in modules aim at a continuous input of scientific research results
within the pedagogical structure of an Art and Design course. They have a multi-
disciplinary adaptability nature to the hosting curricular units and aim, beyond the
scientific inscription, within the curricular plan, to collect the educational results,
disseminate them and reintegrate them into scientific research.
Duration. According to the experiences previously conducted, the average time
necessary for its implementation will be 12 h of contact, time that can be adapted
according to the time allocated to each curricular unit. The average time expected
for the autonomous work will be 18 h.
Learning outcomes—knowledge, skills and competences to be acquired by
students. (i) Establish a direct relationship with the Portuguese Design history
concerning its origins, influences, purposes and inspirations, going through not only
the published materials, but also integrating the invisible experiences and stories
through the active participation of design research and researchers in the teaching–
learning process. (ii) Explore new visual repertoires that offer a critical and fresher
look over the inheritance of knowledge that essentially rely on visual representation.
(iii) Explore an imagery discourse adequate to the needs of visual communication.
(iv) Contribute to map the Portuguese Design: influences, purposes and inspirations,
in a time of cancel-culture.
Curricular content. The curricular contents of this integrated curricular module
seek the consolidation of an active historical heritage through its curricular reacti-
vation in Art and Design, by means of an integrated modular learning environment.
This particular module employs an inclusive method intended to relate the current
generation of designers with Portuguese Design, through education.
The proposals will address the main areas covered by the course in Communication
Design, such as: multimedia, new media and digital cultures, editorial design and
typography; illustration; photography and audio-visual studies and practices; history
and critics of design or visual culture studies. The research projects, already finished
and ongoing, within ID+, the Research Institute in Design, Media and Culture, will
contribute as catalysts for these initiatives.
The module will be organised under the form of four fundamental sessions,
organised in accordance with the hourly distribution of each hosting unit:
• Establish access to the collected material from completed and ongoing Design
research projects and the research team involved.
• Explore the scope under the hosting unit’s contents and tools as a visual repre-
sentation of exchange, cross-learning, identity, heritage and intergenerational
dialogue.
• Interpret/translate life stories through visual representation determined by the
curricular nature of the welcoming unit. This session includes the completion of
the final project which may be carried out individually or in groups.
178 E. Penedos-Santiago et al.

• Assert the legacy and knowledge of past generations as an active archive of

utmost importance, to current and future generations, through the production and
subsequent integration of the final projects into the online digital catalogue.
Learning Methodologies. The proposed teaching methodologies aim at the
contextual and transversal analysis of previously collected, and still to be collected,
data under the scope of scientific research projects in Design. Conceptual mapping
offers the necessary support to data compilation and visualisation, establishing
and breaking connections with several milestones in Portuguese Design history,
promoting its expansion beyond the current guidelines, to its dissemination and
inscription. The curricular framework for the integration of scientific research in
Design will allow the pedagogical model to become a part of the scientific model.
Each module combines the following methodologies during the lecture time in
the classroom:
• Historical and conceptual presentation and discussion of relevant references.
• Presentation of the research carried out by the research team: material collected
and findings available. The collected material can be characterised by a set of inter-
views in audio-visual support and transcribed in text documents, audio recordings,
existing records provided by the university, etc.
• Whenever possible the interviewees directly involved in the research project, will
be invited to attend one of the sessions to provide a greater proximity to the sources
of information.
• Resource and coordination of the research topic with the available tools at the
welcoming unit.
• Accompanied elaboration of individual or group practical activities.
• Carry out a final project.
• Presentation and discussion of results.
• Dissemination of the outcomes by means of their publication in the online digital
catalogue, thus effecting the relationship between generations towards fostering
empathy, the sense of belonging and promoting an active dialogue between scien-
tific research and the pedagogical agenda. The relationship with the community,
equally important, can be established through exhibitions and publications.

4 Discussion and Future Research

The results obtained from the workshops conducted during the first stage of the
project revealed that these models of scientific dissemination, through the integration
of the research findings in higher education activities, providing a closer articulation
between scientific research and the pedagogical framework.
Given the significant number of researchers teaching in higher education, these
short-term models with immediate application aim at being replicated in other
research domains of Human and Social Sciences. These models allow for a closer
Sci-Stories in Design: Guidelines for Curricular Inscription … 179

relationship between the teacher/researcher and the students, blending different

knowledge domains within the educational institutions.
On the other hand, they provide a framework for the creation of new solutions
for dissemination, inscription and reactivation of knowledge, often in the form of
personal memories and experiences, within a curricular environment.
And the fact that they are designed with the ability to blend in, in a flexible
and adjustable way to each running curricular unit, enables the preservation of
the curricular structure and avoids bureaucratic constraints that often compromise
the relationship between information and time. These are models of participatory
design that simultaneously disseminate and study, under the form of applied research,
scientific-pedagogical methods and approaches.
The next step will be to put these modules into practice and carry out a set of
surveys addressed to students, lecturers, and researchers. These questionnaires should
inform the researchers about the depth of the relationship established between the
students and the information, apprehension rates and the capacity to represent a
critical look on the research topic through a visual narrative.
It also will be very important to understand the lecturers’ vision on the method once
compared with the ongoing methodologies refined over time for teaching models of
semester and annual nature, feeding into the current debate of “open pedagogy” in
the classroom. Lastly, it is important for researchers to understand how this peda-
gogical input can feed back into scientific research, creating links and establishing
an intellectual proximity that can benefit and enhance scientific dissemination. After
analysing and comparing the results obtained from the extracurricular experiences
previously performed, the focus groups should be repeated in order to improve and
adapt the pedagogical model to the different research streams in Art and Design.

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Designing for People with Dementia
in Academic Contexts

Cláudia Lima

Abstract This article reports a pedagogical project carried out in collaboration with
Memória de Mim Day Care Centre (a service by Alzheimer Portugal) within the
course of Design Lab of the Communication Design BA, at the University Lusó-
fona, Porto. This project aimed to highlight, explore, and articulate methodologies
and tools of Design for social issues, through the development of works oriented
to People with Dementia at an early stage. These works included mainly signage
materials and cognitive stimulation materials. Concurrently, this project contributed
to the professional integration of students by acting as designers in a real context.
This article reviews the methodological approach used, namely a set of adaptations
required due to Covid constraints and their impact on the work process, and the
outcomes are analyzed and discussed foreseeing to improve the project dynamics. It
is expected the continuity of the project in the next academic years and a possible
replication of the model of these pedagogical practices in other university contexts
for an approach to Design more oriented to human needs that may contribute to the
training of Designers aware of the importance of their role as social agents.

Keywords Alzheimer Portugal · Design for People with Dementia · Pedagogical

practices · Social design · Cognitive stimulation materials

1 Introduction

Between 2018 and 2021, design projects for social institutions were developed within
the scope of the Design Lab curricular unit, a subject taught in the first semester of
the 3rd year of the Communication Design BA at University Lusófona, Porto (ULP),
Portugal. These projects aimed to develop students’ skills in Social Design, an area

C. Lima (B)
Lusófona University of Porto, Rua Augusto Rosa nº 24, 4000-098 Porto, Portugal
e-mail: claudiaraquellima@[Link]
Unexpected Media Lab — Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, University of Porto ,
Av. de Rodrigues de Freitas 265, 4049-021 Porto, Portugal

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 181
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
182 C. Lima

distinct from that oriented to the market, to which most of the contents of the Design
courses are devoted. In line with Margolin’s view, the practice of Social Design is
distinct from the concept of Design coming from the product market context by
defining it as “that exercised for the satisfaction of specific human needs” [1]. This
differentiation is based on the assumption that Design was born in a market context
which does not contemplate the whole spectrum of social needs, since many of
these needs are related to groups of individuals who are not part of the consumer
public—such as low-income individuals or individuals with special needs arising
from age, health problems or disability—and therefore do not bring profit to compa-
nies. Furthermore, Margolin underlines the importance of the practice of Social
Design being integrated into curricula, considering that Design educators can assume
a fundamental role as collective agents of change [1].
On the other hand, as Design Lab is a subject of the 3rd year—last year of the
course—these practices also envisaged the integration of students in the workforce
by developing project proposals for real clients. In other words, these are projects
that propose a reflection on the role of Design as a social agent through research,
practice and the production of visual communication materials that aim to respond
to real specific needs in society.
These pedagogical practices were anchored on three axes:
(1) The need to integrate students in the professional activity, through the
development of projects that aim to respond to real societal needs;
(2) The difficulty for social institutions to harness the potential of Design tools
and methodologies to respond to the needs, either of the institution or the
community where they are located, due to the lack of human and financial
resources;
(3) The inexistence of a curricular unit structured in the scope of Social Design
in the Communication Design BA (which, indeed, analyzing the 2020–21
curricular programs, is verified in the several Communication Design courses
proposed by the Portuguese universities).
In this sense, it was structured a program for the curricular unit of Design Lab
based on the following objectives:
• To highlight the importance of social innovation as a fundamental field of
application for the area of design.
• To promote a socially aware design practice, aimed at responding to human needs.
• To identify ways in which Communication Design can contribute to meet specific
human needs through projects for real contexts.
• To educate attentive, participatory, and responsible designers regarding the
planet’s sustainability and human needs.
• To explore and articulate methodologies and tools of Communication Design for
social issues.
The projects were based on partnerships with local social institutions such as
Portuguese Red Cross—through its Delegations in Matosinhos and Vila Nova de
Gaia—or Eu Sou Eu—Associação para a Inclusão Social de Crianças e Jovens
Designing for People with Dementia in Academic Contexts 183

(Association for the Social Inclusion of Children and Young People), and aimed,
through Communication Design, to contribute to solutions for a set of problems and
needs identified by the institutions themselves. Among the main issues reported was
the need for greater visibility of the institutions involved, their mission and actions
in the social fabric; the lack of financial means and human resources to respond to
the social needs that emerge every day; the lack of specialized human resources to
implement effective communication strategies. Hence, the proposals developed by
students were primarily aimed at creating corporate identities, campaigns to raise
awareness of the social role and actions developed by the institutions, promotional
materials for the services and activities provided to the community, and campaigns
focused on possible ways of community support through volunteering, donations,
and membership [2]. At the beginning of each academic year a common proposal
was made for all students to be worked on during the period of one semester and, at
the end, the best proposal was selected to be used by the institution. In these cases,
the number of selected proposals was always limited, since all students worked to a
common and objective brief regarding the intended materials.
In the 2021–2022 academic year, a different approach was taken, seeking to direct
the Communication Design practices towards the needs of a specific community, and
not exclusively towards the institution that serves that community, unlike what had
been done in previous years.1 This change in the approach was due to the nature
of the institution with whom a partnership was established, the Alzheimer Portugal
Association—specifically the Memória de Mim Day Care Centre which is managed
by the North Delegation of this Association—and the brief issued to students. The
approach to the project was also revised (in relation to previous years) following the
constraints resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic.
This paper reviews the methodologies and strategies adopted for this project as
well as the outputs, aiming at possible replication of the model of these pedagogical
practices in other teaching contexts. An approach to Design more oriented towards
social causes and within the principles of sustainability is envisaged, contributing to
the training of Designers aware of the importance of their role as social agents.

2 Alzheimer Portugal

According to data published in the Dementia in Europe Yearbook [3], in 2018,

dementia cases in Portugal exceeded 193,000 (corresponding to 1.88% of the popu-
lation). The prevalence of this disease is a growing social problem. Age is one of
the biggest risk factors for dementia [4]. Given the increasing ageing of the popula-
tion, even though the number of inhabitants in Portugal is decreasing, it is estimated
that, in 2050, the percentage “of People with Dementia will more than double”: the

1 It is considered that the community has always benefited from the projects carried out, but in an
indirect way, since the briefings pointed out the needs of the partner institutions such as Red Cross
or Eu Sou Eu, and not of the community to which they provide services [2].
184 C. Lima

number of individuals with dementia may exceed 340,000, which, in percentage

terms, corresponds to 3.46% of the Portuguese population [3].
Moreover, the study Health at a Glance 2021: OECD Indicators [4], places
Portugal as the 4th OECD country with the highest prevalence of dementia, with
more than 20 cases per 1000 inhabitants. Although there are few Portuguese studies
on dementia in the country [5], it is estimated that, despite the various manifestations
of dementia, the percentage of individuals with Alzheimer’s disease is between 50
and 70% [6].
The most common symptoms experienced by People with Dementia may include
memory loss; difficulty performing familiar tasks; problems with language; disorien-
tation in time and place; poor or decreased judgement; problems with concentration,
planning or organizing; misplacing things; changes in mood or behavior; trouble
with images or spatial relationships; withdrawal from work or social activities [7].
Non-pharmacological treatments have proven to be essential to reduce these symp-
toms, namely Cognitive Stimulation Therapies: studies show that they are effective
in improving cognitive function and quality of life with positive results among people
with mild to moderate dementia [8, 9]. Accordingly, researchers and therapists have
advocated for activities in this area that are focused on people and their individuality,
adapting materials to the culture and family aspects of People with Dementia [10].
Alzheimer Portugal is a Private Institution of Social Solidarity founded in 1988
“which aims to improve the quality of life of People with Dementia and their Care-
givers” [11]. As a non-profit organization, the Association seeks its sustainability
in several ways to meet its objectives, namely through partnerships, volunteering,
donations, among others. It emerged in order to inform and support this public and,
in the words of Maria do Rosário Reis (member of the Alzheimer Portugal Board of
Directors), it has grown “filling gaps that neither the public authorities nor the private
sector knew how to or wanted to fill”. Reis adds that the work of the Association and
what it represents “emerged from the awareness that People with Dementia and their
Caregivers needed specific services and responses, which still do not exist today in
much of the territory in an integrated and accessible way” [11].
Among the various types of support and information that they offer to People with
Dementia and their Caregivers, they provide a network of specialized support offices
and day care centers, one of which is the Memória de Mim Day Care Centre. This
Centre has been operating since 2016, in Matosinhos (a city next to Porto), and is
managed by the North Delegation of the Association. It is a specialized Centre for
people with Alzheimer’s disease and other types of dementias in the early stage, which
provides a set of “therapeutic activities, with the aim of stimulating the remaining
cognitive, psychomotor and sensory skills” [12]. Among the diverse individual and
group activities, the following can be highlighted: Playful and Expressive Activities,
Reality Orientation Therapy, Cognitive Stimulation, and Multisensory Stimulation.
The project developed for Memória de Mim Day Care Centre was based on the
dynamics and issues related to these activities. Although it was grounded on the
same premises of previous projects (carried out for Portuguese Red Cross or Eu Sou
Eu), it was not targeted at the needs of the institution itself (its visibility, mission and
Designing for People with Dementia in Academic Contexts 185

actions, or the need to raise volunteers or fundraising), but at the needs of its users
(People with Dementia at an early stage) in their daily lives at the Centre.

3 Methodological Approach

For the development of the project, a methodology already tested in previous projects
for Portuguese Red Cross and Eu Sou Eu was adopted. Hence, Design Thinking
methods were used [13, 14] “as the basis of a work process divided into three essential
phases: problem definition; project ideation; project implementation” [2]. However,
certain aspects of this methodology had to be reviewed and reformulated following
the constraints resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic, particularly those that required
personal contact with the Day Care Centre users and collaborators.
In September 2021, an online presentation of Alzheimer Portugal and, in partic-
ular, of Memória de Mim Day Care Centre was made by the Technical Director
of this institution. Issues related to the symptoms of dementia, namely those most
prevalent in the Centre’s users, were also addressed. Following this, two proposals
were presented to the students, within which they could define a specific project to
develop:
(1) The study of signage for the Day Care Centre;
(2) The study of cognitive stimulation materials based on Portuguese culture.
In the first case, particularities of dementia were highlighted, such as frequent
memory loss, disorientation in time and space and, in certain cases, vision loss.
Accordingly, several work possibilities were suggested, such as the identification
of the Centre’s spaces; the identification of routes to follow between spaces as a
response to possible disorientation of the user; or the creation of decorative images
as an identity reinforcement of the spaces or as a means to aid temporal orientation.
As for the second proposal, one of the requirements highlighted was that the cogni-
tive stimulus materials should be focused on Portuguese culture since the materials
currently available in this field are scarce, expensive and do not reflect Portuguese
culture or traditions familiar to the Portuguese population. This was, in fact, one of
the main streams since many of the activities they carry out are focused on memory
stimulation exercises, hence, based on experiences and things familiar to the Centre’s
users, which are intrinsically associated with local culture and spaces.
The following sessions were dedicated to the definition of the problem. As the
topic of dementia was very little known by the students, a seminar was organized
with the presence of Rita Maldonado, researcher at ID+ (Research Institute for
Design Media and Culture, University of Aveiro) specialized in design for dementia,
who presented her PhD project Codesingning communication in dementia [15] and
brought several practical examples of design objects developed for this audience
(Fig. 1).
This presentation was followed by a period in which students researched for the
project autonomously, mostly resorting to existing documentation, interviews with
186 C. Lima

Fig. 1 Materials developed with and for People with Dementia by Rita Maldonado during her
Master and PhD project. Materials presented at the seminar held on 27 September 2021 at ULP

professionals working with People with Dementia and visual research of current
materials.
In previous years, at this stage of problem definition we used to organize a study
visit to the partner institution. In the impossibility of such visit, given the restrictions
caused by the pandemic, students were allowed to make occasional visits, in small
groups, at a later stage (between November and December).
After the problem definition, students decided if they wanted to develop the project
individually or in groups and started the ideation phase. Several ideas and approaches
to the project were outlined and discussed, the accessibility and usability of the project
was assessed regarding the particularities of the target audience, as well as its material
and financial viability.
This ideation phase took place between October and December, during which
3 interim presentations of the project were made corresponding to different stages
of development: (1) conclusions of the research work resulting from the problem
definition and possible ways of approaching the project; (2) presentation of design
proposals under development, analysis of its suitability to the target audience and
material and financial viability; (3) presentation of project prototypes for anal-
ysis and discussion of aspects such as functionality, accessibility and usability.
These interim presentations were an opportunity for individual self-reflection on
the projects, analysis, and discussion of results in group, and study of forms of
presentation/communication of the proposals, a relevant point, considering that, in a
final stage, students had to make an oral presentation of their project to the client.
As aforementioned, between November and December, the students made visits to
the Day Care Centre in small groups. These visits allowed them to know the facilities
(until then they only knew them through photographs) and to present prototypes
of the projects under development to the Centre’s Technical Director, providing a
moment of reflection, analysis and discussion about the proposals, identification of
weaknesses and opportunities.
At this stage, a session was also held with the researcher Rita Maldonado, who
made an individualized assessment of the projects, also identifying aspects which
Designing for People with Dementia in Academic Contexts 187

were less well addressed or even unsuitable for the target audience and proposing
possible ways of overcoming them.
In January, the projects were concluded and presented to the Technical Director
of Memória de Mim Day Care Centre and are currently available for use by the users
of the institution.

4 Projects for Memória de Mim Day Care Centre

While previous projects carried out within Design Lab course were targeted to the
partner institutions’ needs [2], this project for Memória de Mim Day Care Centre
was targeted to the needs of a specific population, People with mild Dementia. As
mentioned by Maldonado, dementia severely affects the patients’ autonomy in their
most diverse daily activities, so “dementia care inevitably focuses on the daily neces-
sities, such as feeding and hygiene, often leaving little space and energy for finding
ways to communicate in alternative and meaningful ways” [15]. In this sense, there is
an urgent need for professionals, including Communication Designers, to make the
environment of these patients more functional and accessible, to assist in their daily
routines and to create a set of supports for cognitive stimulation and to encourage
socialization and communication.
This project for the Day Care Centre, introduced the students to a concrete
reality, by identifying specific needs directly related to the daily life of its users and
suggesting that the contributions fall within two possibilities—the study of signage
for the Centre and the study of cognitive stimulation materials.
For the first proposal, one of the students chose to develop a system to identify the
Centre’s spaces. This project was complemented by the project of another student
who developed a set of thematic illustrations to be seasonally framed in the dining
room. These illustrations aim, on one hand, to reinforce the identification of the
Centre’s spaces and, on the other hand, they act as a cognitive stimulus by alluding
to the different seasons of the year, i.e., they contribute to orientation in space and
time.
Another signage project consisted of an identification system for the users’ lockers
based on sets of images related to themes such as professional activities, football club,
places in Portugal, cuisine, among others. These images were created based on the
answers to a survey made by the students to the Centre’s Technical Director about
the users, addressing topics such as where they were born or where they live, favorite
hobbies, professional activity, and other aspects of their personal experiences. The
images created are made available to users who can choose the ones with which they
most identify and, thereby, personalize the doors of their lockers, reinforcing the
identification system. This project, when put into practice with the help of the Centre’s
therapists, may also provide moments for sharing experiences and memories (stories
about professional activity, places where they were born/ lived, favorite foods…),
acting as a cognitive stimulus.
188 C. Lima

Fig. 2 Goose Game by Anabela Thomé and Diana Cruz, 2022

For the second proposal, study of cognitive stimulus materials, students focused
essentially on playful activities assuming that the use of these materials would be
done through the mediation of a therapist or an assistant from the Memória de Mim
Day Care Centre.
Two students developed an adapted version of the Goose Game (in Portugal known
as Jogo da Glória) based on Portuguese popular culture with the purpose of stim-
ulating the users’ cognitive memory and encourage moments of socialization and
conviviality (Fig. 2). Different themes were addressed in the game, such as Food
(typical Portuguese dishes, foods that the users most/least like), Experiences (memo-
ries of holidays or journeys made, stories from school or work), Music (questions
about popular Portuguese songs, songs that have marked the player’s experiences
and, occasionally, encouragement to sing well-known songs) and Popular Sayings (a
challenge to complete popular Portuguese sayings). These themes and the way the
challenges are presented within each of them, aim to provide moments of leisure,
dialogue, sharing and conviviality, while simultaneously act as a memory stimulus
for each person. In other words, they aim to contribute to ameliorate the symptoms
of memory loss and social distancing.
Two other students developed a coloring book that appeals to the five senses
to invoke memories of the past. The illustrations in this book are focused on iconic
sites and monuments of the places where the Centre’s users live(d) or were born, sites
and monuments of reference for them, such as the Douro Vineyards, the Matosinhos
beach, the Castelo do Queijo (Fort of São Francisco do Queijo), the Serralves Museum
or the Crystal Palace. This project proved to be a real challenge for these students
since they are French and were doing this course under the Erasmus Mobility for
Students. As they were foreign students, in-depth research on Portuguese cultural
and local aspects was required, along with research on the topic of dementia.
Next to the illustrations designed for the book, a space was created where the
user is invited to share a memory of the place depicted and associate a color, a
sound, a smell, a taste and a texture, reinforcing, through the appeal to the senses,
the cognitive stimulus (Fig. 3). Each illustration is associated with an audio file with
sounds recorded at the place portrayed to be played at the moment the activity is put
Designing for People with Dementia in Academic Contexts 189

Fig. 3 Coloring book by Anna Le Floch and Lara Guivarch, 2022

into practice. The aim is to encourage the user’s immersion in the place depicted and
stimulate, through the sounds, the memory of stories experienced in each place.
One student developed puzzles with illustrations of iconic places of the city of
Porto, also associated with the experiences of the Centre’s users, such as Torre dos
Clérigos or Ponte D. Luis. These illustrations are presented in outline, inviting the
user to color them and, thus, to personalize his/her puzzle. Three different versions
were developed—with 6, 12 and 18 pieces—allowing the degree of difficulty of the
playful activity to be adjusted to the abilities of each person.
Within the scope of cognitive stimulation materials, a Bingo game adapted for
People with Dementia was also developed. To this end, changes were made to the
rules, to the format and to the very way of playing the game, aiming at a greater
suitability to the audience in question. The characteristic numbers of this game were
replaced by illustrations inspired by iconic elements of Portuguese culture, divided
into 4 categories: heritage, festivities, seasons, and professions. Two versions of the
boards were made, one with a set of 4 illustrations and the other with 8 illustrations,
to provide two levels of difficulty that may better meet the individual abilities of
each user. The cards designed for this game also have the potential to be reused in
a memory game through the association between the card with the illustrated figure
and the card with the corresponding silhouette, thus expanding the potential use of
this game (Fig. 4).

5 Discussion

The comprehensiveness of the work proposal and the fact that all projects could be
used by the Memória de Mim Day Care Centre clearly acted as a motivating factor and
fostered greater interest and commitment from students. In fact, there were several
aspects that contributed to the motivation, sense of commitment and engagement
in this project, namely: the possibility for students, as designers, to act in different
areas, according to perceived needs and their particular interests in certain fields of
Design; the possibility of all projects being adopted and used by the Centre, reducing
190 C. Lima

Fig. 4 Bingo game by Mafalda Marinho, 2022

an eventual competition among peers and, consequently, increasing the sharing of

knowledge, opinions and mutual learning; the direct contact with professionals in
the area, namely, the Centre’s Technical Director and the researcher Rita Maldonado,
who shared their knowledge and personal experiences with People with Dementia.
Furthermore, the fact that it was a project for a real client that aims to meet specific
needs of a public often neglected in the field of Design in Portugal, also triggered,
and increased the sense of commitment of students.
Indeed, the work carried out reveals a clear interest by the students in contributing
to solutions to improve the environment and well-being of the users of the Memória de
Mim Day Care Centre. It is evident the respect and consideration for the target audi-
ence, and the desire to deepen the knowledge about the particularities of dementia—
until then unknown to many—through research carried out either in groups (in class
context) or individually, through interviews that they conducted autonomously to
professionals with experience in this area and subsequent contacts with the Technical
Director of the Centre. In this regard, the presentation made by the researcher Rita
Maldonado was also important, not only for the contextualization about dementia
and its forms of manifestation but also for the shared experiences of the long periods
that she lived and worked with and for People with Dementia and for the examples of
design work carried out in this scope, practical and diverse examples that broadened
the students’ horizons about countless possibilities of intervention.
One of the projects shown by Maldonado consisted of a set of “empathy exercises”
through the manipulation of texts in books. Throughout each book presented, the
text was gradually hidden (some through cut-outs, others covered with white ink),
simulating the growing loss of memory. These projects allowed students to better
Designing for People with Dementia in Academic Contexts 191

understand the evolution of one of the most common symptoms of dementia. It is

worth noting that, in an analysis made after the conclusion of the students’ projects,2
Maldonado suggested carrying out exercises in this area in the classroom context, as
they can help students put themselves in the place of someone with dementia, i.e., they
allow a different perception of the disease, more experiential, and complementary
to reading. It is recognized that, in a project of this nature, the ideal would be for
students to have direct contact with the target audience, the People with Dementia, for
a more in-depth knowledge of their characteristics and particularities. This contact
was not possible due to the restrictions resulting from the pandemic. Although the
country was no longer in lockdown, access to health institutions was still very limited,
making this contact unfeasible. In this sense, the contact with professionals from the
Centre, who work directly with these People with Dementia and have an extensive
experience, was the possible way to approach and get to know the public under study.
The impossibility of making a field visit with the class to Centre at the beginning
of the year, as it was initially planned in the syllabus, led students to make visits at a
later stage and divided in small groups. Two advantages resulted from this adaptation
to what was initially planned: on the one hand, when the students visited the Centre
there was already a project concept and prototypes developed which could be shown
and analyzed, resulting in a better adequacy of the projects to the Centre’s users;
on the other hand, the visits in small groups allowed a more individualized and
personalized follow-up of the projects, by the Technical Director of the Centre. In
other words, what seemed to be a constraint in the project turned out to be an added
value in methodological terms.
Another important moment in the project methodology was the individual anal-
ysis and discussion of the projects by the researcher Rita Maldonado, in the middle
of the semester. At this time, the concept of the projects was defined, and the design
was at an advanced stage of development, allowing the expected results to be fore-
seen. Maldonado’s assessment was essential, especially in the guidance on how to
operationalize the materials, considering the particularities of People with Dementia.
For example, in the Goose Game, it was very important to review the formulation
of the game questions to ensure more interesting answers and greater sharing of
experiences, a knowledge acquired through long periods of contact with People with
Dementia and learning from health professionals. In this case, the students had the
themes, but lacked the way to ask the question. In other projects, there was an expec-
tation that users would respond to the activities in a certain way that might not
actually be realistic given the characteristics of the target audience. In this regard,
Maldonado’s contribution was also essential, by guiding and adjusting the projects,
improving their accessibility and usability.
At the end of the semester, the results were materialized in very different projects,
all of them likely to be adopted and used by the Memória de Mim Day Care Centre. In
fact, some of these materials, such as the Bingo game, have already been tested with

2 After concluding the projects, an interview was held with Rita Maldonado on 26 January 2022,
for analysis and discussion of the project, methodologies adopted, and results obtained.
192 C. Lima

the users and the feedback obtained was very positive,3 both as regards their potential
as cognitive stimuli and as promoters of moments of conviviality and sociability, and
concerning issues related to functionality, accessibility, and usability.
Although the cognitive stimulus materials were designed for the Centre, all of
them (Goose game, coloring book, puzzles, and Bingo game) can be put into prac-
tice in other contexts, such as at home. Indeed, they were created having in mind
that these activities will be mediated by therapists or assistants of the Centre, but this
mediation may, however, be extended to family members or Caregivers. Neverthe-
less, and as highlighted by Maldonado (personal communication, 26 January 2022),
it is recognized that the use of the materials at home may be affected by several
constraints since there is a different dynamic that is more difficult to predict given
the affective proximity with the patients, emotional issues and, sometimes, lack of
in-depth knowledge of family members to the particular manifestations of dementia.

6 Conclusion

The project carried out for the Memória de Mim Day Care Centre allowed students
to get acquainted with a less addressed area of Design—Social Design —, and to
understand through practice possible contributions of Communication Design as a
social agent. It was also a project that provided a real work context, promoting the
professional integration of students who are in the final phase of their training in
Design.
Certain adaptations made to the methodology of the project following the
constraints caused by the pandemic proved to be, indeed, an added value. In partic-
ular, the way the visits to the Centre took place, at a later stage and in small groups
of students—a change made to the structure and timing of the project that may be an
aspect to be reconsidered in the future. One possible approach might be a visit at an
early stage—to get to know the partner institution, its collaborators, and users—and a
second visit at a stage when a project concept has already been developed and exem-
plary prototypes have been produced for analysis and discussion of the feasibility
and suitability of the project.
By analyzing the results obtained in the projects carried out between 2018 and
2021, for Portuguese Red Cross and Eu Sou Eu, and the results of the project for the
Memória de Mim Day Care Centre, a set of conclusions can be drawn: (i) the project’s
orientation towards the community (and not the institution) is a factor of increased
motivation; (ii) a comprehensive proposal from which distinct projects may emerge,
and might be applied, eliminates eventual competition between students and results
in greater sharing of knowledge and collaboration between peers; (iii) the frequent
interlocution with professionals and researchers in the area under study increases
the sense of commitment and allows a more specialized knowledge, factors with a
positive impact on the outcomes.

3 Marta Melo, personal communication, 7 February 2022.

Designing for People with Dementia in Academic Contexts 193

Following the results of this project, the continuity of pedagogical practices in

this field is now under study, still in partnership with Alzheimer Portugal but on a
national scale, involving other fields of design (graphic, illustration, multimedia) and
other university institutions.

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How Design and Technology Can
Contribute to Learning: The Mobeybou
in Brazil Educational Game Case Study

Rafael Fernandes, Cristina Sylla , Nuno Martins , and Maitê Gil

Abstract Currently, there is a generation of children that tend to be exposed from

a very early age to digital media, especially in the most economically and culturally
developed societies. Thus, it is necessary to think about ways in which technology
can contribute to learning, namely by seeking to converge the recreational component
with the educational while preventing or suppressing potential dangers. This study
aimed at extending the Mobeybou pedagogical materials, i.e., a Digital Manipulative
for storytelling, and a set of interactive story applications, thus integrating the easy
access that children have to technologies and the positive characteristics of games.
In this context, here we present a descriptive case study of the design process of
the interface for a game to be integrated into the Mobeybou in Brazil story app.
The game interface is intended to reinforce the knowledge conveyed through the
reading of the story app, therefore contributing to the development of language skills,
creativity, and digital literacy. The game interface should be easy and intuitive to use,
its development followed a design thinking methodology. A pilot test carried out with
a group of five children aged between 8 and 9 years-old revealed very encouraging
results, showing that the game interface was easy to use and engaged children with
the story content.

Keywords UX design · UI design · Design thinking · Mobile game · Mobeybou

R. Fernandes
School of Design, Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave, Barcelos, Portugal
C. Sylla
Research Centre on Child Studies/LARSyS, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
N. Martins (B)
Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, School of Design, Polytechnic Institute of
Cávado and Ave, Barcelos, Portugal
e-mail: nmartins@[Link]
M. Gil
Research Centre on Child Studies, University of Minho, Interactive Technologies Institute (ITI /
LARSyS), Braga, Portugal

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 195
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
196 R. Fernandes et al.

1 Introduction

Never before have young children been exposed to digital media as today [1, 2].
A study carried out by Common Sense Media in the United States [3], on the use
of media by children up to 8 years of age, pointed out that children, between 5
and 8 years-old, spend an average of three hours a day in front of a screen. The
two activities where they spend most of their time are watching television or videos
(73%) and playing video games (16%).
Depending on how these digital technologies are used, they can be beneficial or
detrimental for children [4]. Using age-appropriate and well-developed technologies
has the potential to promote learning in a playful way [5]. On the other hand, there
are also negative effects when children visualize inappropriate content [4]. Excessive
use of smartphones or tablets may also pose a risk to children’s health, such as visual
problems and physical inactivity.
This work emerged in the scope of Mobeybou1 (Moving Beyond Boundaries), a
research project that consists in the study and development of a set of digital tools
for the creation of narratives aiming at contributing to the development of cognitive,
social, and linguistic skills in young children within a multicultural context [6]. It
aims to take advantage of the easy access that children have to technology and the
positive characteristics of games and playful technologies.

1.1 Project Background

The central tool of the Mobeybou materials is a Digital Manipulative (DM). DM

are objects with embedded computational properties that serve as interfaces for
manipulating digital content [7]. Mobeybou is composed of 60 physical blocks that
communicate with a computer device via Bluetooth and with each other via magnets
embedded on the sides. Each block represents a story element from different world
cultures. Connecting the blocks triggers the embedded digital content such as static
and animated images, ambient sounds, and music (see Fig. 1). The children create
their stories by connecting the blocks to each other while they verbalize their stories.
The stories can also be recorded. A digital version of the DM, the StoryMaker, allows
using the digital environment without having the physical blocks.
Additionally, there is a set of interactive story apps (Mobeybou in India, Mobeybou
in Brazil, and Mobeybou in Cape Verde) that give children information about the
different cultures represented in the DM and the storyMaker. Here we will focus
on the interactive story app Mobeybou in Brazil. Like all the Mobeybou story apps,
Mobeybou in Brazil uses the cultural elements represented in the DM. The story starts
in the south of Brazil and the protagonist travels through the different regions to the
north, visiting different landscapes and overcoming several challenges along the way.
To read the narrative, the child can choose between a boy and a girl protagonist. To

1 [Link]
How Design and Technology Can Contribute to Learning … 197

Fig. 1 The Mobeybou DM (left), Home screen of the story app, Mobeybou in Brazil (right)

reinforce the knowledge acquired during the reading of the story app, we decided to
develop and integrate into the app a game with its story elements. This paper reports
the development of the game interface. In the following section, we will begin by
presenting the theoretical framework and then a descriptive case study of the design
process of the game interface.

1.2 Theoretical Framework

User Experience Design (UX) and User Interface Design (UI). To develop the
game interface, it was necessary to consider the dimensions of the User Experi-
ence design (UX Design), User Interface design (UI Design) as well as the product
usability. These are essential dimensions that need to be analyzed when creating
digital products. UX Design is the process of creating an experience that meets the
needs of the user when interacting with an interface [8]. The quality of the user expe-
rience is determined by the ease or the difficulties that the user experiences while
interacting with the interface [9]. Morville [10] considers that for having a positive
experience the product must be useful, usable, desirable, findable, accessible, cred-
ible, and valuable. Usability is directly linked to the user experience. Usability is
referred as a quality that reveals the ease of use of an interface [11, 12]. Nielsen [13]
refers to usability encompassing five components:
1. Learnability: how easy it is for the users to complete the tasks the first time they
use the interface;
2. Efficiency: how quickly the users complete the tasks after knowing the interface;
3. Memorability: how easily the users regain usage proficiency after a period
without using the interface;
4. Errors: number of errors that the users make and how easily they recover from
them;
5. Satisfaction: level of satisfaction that the user has when using the interface.
Usability can be used as a product’s quality that can be evaluated or as a set
of principles that help achieve that quality. These are known as the ten usability
heuristics, developed by Nielsen [14]. These usability heuristics are general rules
198 R. Fernandes et al.

and not specific usability guidelines. A way to evaluate the usability of a product is
through usability tests. The tests allow identifying design problems and opportunities
[15]. According to Nielsen [16], a usability test conducted with five users allows
detecting up to 85% of the usability problems of a product.
UI Design plays an important role in creating experiences, it consists of the design
of the interface elements, e.g., buttons, menus, and other interactive elements that
allow the interaction between a user and a device [17]. Here the designer must have
graphic and digital design skills to adjust the visual properties of these elements,
such as color, shape, typography, graphic composition, and hierarchy to create an
interface that is both appealing and functional.
In short, UX Design and UI Design are complementary concepts that depend on
each other to create relevant digital products. If one of both fails or is underestimated,
it may jeopardize the quality of the product [9].
Integration of Gamification Elements. The idea of integrating a game into the
Mobeybou in Brazil app resulted from the knowledge that gamification activities
provide a good opportunity to reinforce learning [18]. Gamification is the process
of designing activities and experiences that are similar to games [19, 20]. Gamifi-
cation can be used in various situations and for various purposes. Here, we sought
to investigate its applicability in educational contexts. According to Lee & Hammer
[18], there are three main areas in the educational context where gamification can
intervene, namely:
1. Cognition: The trial-and-error process that takes place when the players exper-
iment and discover complex game rules encourages critical thinking, problem-
solving and creativity. After an initial phase, the games should be adapted to
the player’s skills, progressively increasing the level of difficulty;
2. Emotions: Games can provoke emotions in the player e.g., enthusiasm, joy, or
surprise, among others. At an early stage, games require experimentation, and
often players fail repeatedly before learning to play. Gamification can provide
emotional support in this phase of negative emotions and even make them
positive, reframing failure as a necessary part of learning;
3. Social: Players can try out new identities. This possibility allows players to
explore new facets, for example, a shy player can try to be a leader.
Gamification can be applied using several game mechanics e.g.: points and
badges—to quantify the player’s actions; levels, quests and challenges—to give
insight into the player’s progress in the game; and leaderboards and achievements—to
compare players, generating competition between them [21, 22].
These elements can be used in educational contexts to motivate children and
promote learning by transforming uninteresting tasks into interactive and captivating
tasks, maintaining the child’s involvement with educational subjects [18].
Regarding story apps, gamified activities can generate more involvement with
the story, enhancing learning and providing support for vocabulary acquisition [23].
When developing an educational game, it is essential to bear in mind that children
do not yet have the same skills as adults, also it is necessary to consider limitations
imposed by mobile devices, e.g., the size of the buttons. According to Miller &
How Design and Technology Can Contribute to Learning … 199

Kocurek [24], it is essential to pay attention to the motor skill required by the game,
and to use language that is familiar to children.

2 Methodology

This study followed a Design Thinking methodology [25, 26], comprising five
phases: empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test [27].
In the empathize phase we sought to clarify the problem and gather a comprehen-
sive knowledge of the theme under investigation. This included a literature review
on gamification, User Experience Design (UX Design), User Interface Design (UI
Design), as well as an analysis of the Mobeybou DM.
In the define phase, we synthesized the information collected in the previous
stage, identified opportunities, and established requirements. We then defined the
types and profiles of possible users. We developed a navigation diagram with user
flows, mapping all the screens and the route that the users would take in the game.
The ideate phase was dedicated to the design and exploration of various interface
solutions to find the most viable one and advance to the next phase. Outgoing from
the navigation structure defined in the user flows, we designed wireframes to obtain
a low-fidelity representation of a possible solution. Visual design decisions were
made regarding typography, chromatic, and UI elements, which resulted in a visual
interface design.
In the prototype phase, we developed an interactive version of the interface that
was used during the design process to communicate ideas and get feedback on the
interface’s progress.
In the test phase, we carried out a series of usability tests to evaluate the usability
and effectiveness of the proposed solution with the target audience. Based on the
results obtained, problems were identified and subsequently corrected.
We collected demographic information on the use of educational games on mobile
devices via online surveys involving children, parents, and educators. In total, we
collected responses from 37 children, 42 parents and 12 educators.
In the following section, we will detail the various phases of the development.

3 Design and Development of the Game Interface

3.1 Phase 1—Empathizing with the Product

Following the Design Thinking methodology, we started by defining the problem and
its limitations, therefore, several meetings were held with the Mobeybou research
team to understand the project and the concepts behind the development of the
materials.
200 R. Fernandes et al.

We then collected information about the potential users. This helped to make
decisions based on their needs and interests, as well as to create the profile of the
potential users of the game. We have collected data via online questionnaires with
our target users. We collected a total of answers from 37 children, 42 parents, and
12 educators. The results of the questionnaires showed that 24% of the children use
mobile devices for less than 30 min a day; 30% use digital devices between one
and two hours a day and 46% use mobile devices between 30 min and one hour per
day. Children’s preferred activities are playing games and watching videos, followed
by browsing the internet and reading stories. In the games category, children prefer
puzzle games, followed by action and adventure games, Legos, and memory games.
Around 57% of the children stated that they occasionally play educational games,
whereas 20% do not usually play games.
Regarding games, parents consider that the most important thing in a game is
to foster reasoning, strategic thinking and learning to accept defeat. Twenty-eight
parents (66.7%) reported playing games with their children and having preference for
educational, puzzle, and/or adventure games. Around 52%, stated that their children
have the habit of playing games, while 38% inform that their children play only
occasionally. Some parents stated that their children ask them for help when they
do not know how to interact with technology, and that most of these problems are
related to information architecture and navigation.
From the twelve inquired educators eight (66.7%) said that they use games for
teaching; three (25%) use games occasionally and one does not use games at all. The
used games range from analog games such as naval battle or multiplication tables,
to interactive platforms. All the educators in the study believe that games contribute
to increasing children’s learning motivation.

3.2 Phase 2—Defining the Problem

Creating Personas. Following the information obtained in the previous phase, we

synthesized the collected data and created three potential user personas [28]. Personas
are fictitious representations of possible types of users who may use a product or
service [29]. These fictitious representations are created based on the characteristics
of real people and provide a way to empathize with the potential users and understand
their behaviors, goals, and needs [28]. Keeping potential users in mind helps to make
decisions according to their needs, which in turn contribute to creating meaningful
user experiences. Based on the information collected in the previous phase, we have
created a persona for each type of user, namely, children, parents, and educators (see
Table 1).
Creation of the User Flows. Based on the information collected in the previous
phases, we created a user flow focusing on the child’s persona to design the navigation
within the game (see Fig. 2). The user flow describes the connections between screens
and the sequence of steps that the user takes from the beginning to the conclusion
How Design and Technology Can Contribute to Learning … 201

Table 1 The user personas

João Silva Ana Silva Maria Gomes
Child Mother Primary school teacher
5 years-old 40 years-old 45 years-old
Characteristics
• Enthusiastic and curious • Often plays with her son • Uses multimedia content to
• Enjoys watching videos, • Prefers educational, puzzle, teach
playing games, browsing and adventure games • Often uses games in class
the internet, and reading • Has low technological • Uses interactive platforms as
stories proficiency an educational complement
• Uses the Tablet on average • Believes that educational
1 h a day games contribute to
• Usually finds it easy to increasing children’s
interact with games or apps learning motivation
• Occasionally plays
educational games
• Prefers puzzle, action,
adventure, Legos, and
memory games
Use case
João likes to read stories and Ana has a 5-years-old son who Maria is planning the weekly
play games. He wants a fun knows how to use his tablet and class on the countries of the
game to play while learning loves to play games. The games world. To complement the
new things. Because it’s an that her son plays don’t have school manual, she looks for
educational game, maybe his educational content. She is an engaging way to teach
parents would let him play looking for a fun educational children about the culture of a
longer game that her son would be particular country
interested in
Needs
• Learn in a fun way • Games with adjustable • Educational material with
• Easy to use difficulty level challenges
• Accessible language • Interactive mini-games • Didactic games
• Possibility to share with • Solutions for creating stories
friends • Digital solutions to
• Monitor the child’s progress complement the class
• Games with narrator or
guidance
Goals
• Learn to read better • Teaching English to her son • Teach her students
• Develop cognitive, social, • For her son to exercise or captivatingly and effectively
critical thinking and develop cognitive skills • Develop her students’
creativity skills • For her son to learn to accept creativity, writing and
defeat narrative skills
Frustrations
(continued)
202 R. Fernandes et al.

Table 1 (continued)
João Silva Ana Silva Maria Gomes
Child Mother Primary school teacher
5 years-old 40 years-old 45 years-old
• Having little reading • Some games are not adapted • School manuals are not
autonomy for small screens attractive; they don’t arouse
• It takes some time to read • Too much distracting curiosity in children
• Asking for help (can’t find information in the game • Limitation of multimedia
something, having doubts • Excessive advertising in free equipment in schools
about how to play or when games • Manage conflicts because of
making a mistake) • Free games with additional competition in the game
• Unknown or difficult words paid features (freemium) that between students
her son could buy by mistake

Fig. 2 User flow of the possible solution for the game

of the game. The user flow helped to organize and structure the game screens and to
plan the gamification techniques.
As previously referred, the game is integrated into the story app Mobeybou in
Brazil. Like the reading activity, the user can choose between the boy or the girl
character to play the game. The game is made up of a series of missions, some
consisting of several stages. A stage refers to the task that the user must complete.
For example, in the first mission, the stages are the objects that the user must find.
The missions, including their stages, have a time limit for completion. The time limit
How Design and Technology Can Contribute to Learning … 203

must be sufficient for the user to solve the task while preventing her from randomly
trying out various options.
Along the missions, the user needs to remember parts of the Mobeybou in Brazil
story to complete the tasks of each stage. To facilitate this, we created a feedback
button. When clicking the button, the user accesses information about the respective
task. In some stages, it is possible to use the feedback functionality twice. Since the
missions have a time limit for completion, the user needs to learn to manage the
time s/he spends reading the hints. For each completed stage, the user receives one
star. The only exception to this rule is the second mission, which only consists of
one stage. At the end of each mission, the user is awarded stars according to his
performance. The following mission is only unlocked when the user gets at least two
stars, otherwise, she will have to repeat the mission.

3.3 Phase 3—Ideation

This stage is aimed at generating and testing different interface solutions. Outgoing
from the user flow previously created we designed various wireframes and created
a visual system for the construction of the game screen, considering typographic,
chromatic, and the choice of UI elements.
Development of Wireframes. Following the creation of the persona’s models
and the user flows, we created the wireframes of the various screens of the game.
Wireframes are structural drawings, in the form of a sketch that represents the content
of the screens of an interface (see Fig. 3). The sketches make it possible to quickly
experiment with various interface concepts without compromising the visual aspect.

Fig. 3 Low-fidelity wireframes with and without the Mobeybou’s graphics applied
204 R. Fernandes et al.

Their purpose is to investigate not only the usability but the information architecture
of the interface, without considering visual design options, e.g., choice of colors or
fonts. The sketches helped to organize the content of the application and to commu-
nicate ideas, allowing us to gather feedback and validate possible solutions with the
Mobeybou team. Getting feedback early in the design process prevents wasting time
on solutions that may not be feasible.
As the game is part of the Mobeybou set of materials, to test the flexibility of
Mobeybou’s graphic language and to understand its limitations, we have developed
several low-fidelity wireframes using the Mobeybou’s graphical elements to organize
the interface and gamification elements, as well as to open the discussion to the rest of
the team who might have difficulties interpreting grey wireframes. The wireframes
made it possible to discuss ideas and adjust the direction of the project with the
Mobeybou team, which was fundamental for the design. The wireframes showed
that the game interface would need several elements that did not exist yet.
Development of the Visual Design. Following the wireframe studies, we began
developing the visual elements of the game interface. The design of the interface
elements followed Frost’s atomic design system [30], a methodology that starts from
the design of smaller components for the constitution of larger components. This
process is inspired by an analogy observed in science where atoms compose the
main structures of nature, which in turn build other elements. In the case of design,
this can be seen in web pages that can be divided into smaller elements. For example,
a web page can be split into sections like the header, which in turn can be split again
into smaller elements, like text and images.
This method ensures the cohesion of the interface and the visual language, as
well as producing reusable elements. Therefore, the smallest elements of the game
interface, e.g., typography, color, iconography were first defined and were followed
by the layout of the mission screens.
Regarding the font, Mobeybou uses the Sassoon typography, a sans-serif typeface,
with a calligraphic and rounded design, inspired by the writing of children. It was
created by Rosemary Sassoon, who investigated which are the best typographic forms
for children to read [31]. In partnership with font designer Adrian Williams, she
developed several typefaces intended for teaching reading and writing. As Sassoon
is a font developed to meet the needs of the children, this typography was also used
in the development of the game interface.
Regarding the color scheme, the colors used in Mobeybou were used to create
a chromatic palette. We have identified three main colors: red, the ground color of
Mobeybou, which is also the color of its logo; green, obtained by the vegetation and
landscapes of the countries; and, browned yellow, which is used in text boxes of the
apps (see Fig. 4). To make the color palette more versatile, a darker color was added
for each color.
The green and red colors were chosen because they have useful connotations for
the game. Red is recognized as representing danger, while green has the opposite
meaning. Since in the game it is necessary to indicate the result of the users’ actions,
this chromaticism is convenient as it forms part of a universally recognized code.
How Design and Technology Can Contribute to Learning … 205

Fig. 4 Mobeybou’s color palette

Mobeybou’s iconography has a defined and justified visual style, inspired by the
crayons used by children. For this reason, we decided to keep the visual appearance
of the icons and create new ones based on the existing graphic standard (see Fig. 5).
One of the problems detected through the wireframes was the visual inconsistency
created by the different shapes and dimensions of Mobeybou’s illustrations. We have
explored alternatives to visually balance the illustrations presented on the game
screen by using a shape to delimit the area of the images (see Fig. 6).
Using a shape to contain the illustrations helps create congruence in the images.
After several explorations, we have decided to use a square shape with relief at the
bottom, which gives it a three-dimensional appearance.
This option was chosen because it is a reference to Mobeybou’s DM, which
is composed by square blocks. Thus, a child who was used to playing with the
blocks would recognize their functionality through the shape. The previously defined
color scheme was used to create the visual feedback of the elements when they are
chosen correctly or incorrectly. The crayon texture used in the icons and the rest of
Mobeybou’s visual language were used in the outline of the game blocks.
The three-dimensional appearance of the blocks was the key concept for the
interface. Based on this concept, the remaining UI elements of the interface were
developed, namely, the time bar that shows how much time the user has to complete
the mission and the text boxes, e.g., the tips and the text at the beginning of the
missions.

Fig. 5 Mobeybou’s iconography

206 R. Fernandes et al.

Fig. 6 Game blocks stages

The time bar makes use of the defined chromatic palette. The bar is divided into
three parts. At the beginning of the mission the bar starts filling and over time when
reaching the intermediate and end time, the bar changes its color.
Concerning the feedback hints, the graphics of the blocks were also used, creating
a legible area where text could be placed. This solution was not only used for the
feedback hints but also in other representations, for example, for the initial text of
each mission, for modal windows, or other types of pop-ups.
Having defined all the necessary elements, we created a layout to inform the
construction of the game prototype.

3.4 Phase 4—Development of the Prototype

Development of a High-Fidelity Prototype. During the design process, several

partial prototypes were created to help understand the navigation flow through the
game and support communication with the Mobeybou team. The prototype was
something that evolved throughout the project and underwent several changes as the
design process unfolded.
After defining the UI elements of the interface, the visual design was implemented
in the final wireframes. In addition to the visual aspect, the texts and cultural elements
of each mission were also inserted. The result was a functional mobile app developed
by Mobeybou’s programmers, ready to be tested with future users (see Fig. 7).
How Design and Technology Can Contribute to Learning … 207

Fig. 7 High-fidelity prototype screenshots

3.5 Phase 5—Testing the Game Interface

One of the ways to study, evaluate and validate the usability of a given product
is through usability tests. The tests are carried out with representative users of the
product and aim at detecting usability problems and identifying opportunities for the
improvement of the design [15].
Based on this knowledge, in this phase, we conducted a pilot test with the target
audience, to evaluate the usability and effectiveness of the solution.
Usability testing. The usability tests were carried out with a mixed group (boys
and girls) of five third graders, aged between 8 and 9 years-old. The tests were
performed with the high-fidelity game prototype. The children interacted with the
prototype individually, and each test lasted approximately 15 min. Table 2 shows the
tasks that the children need to complete.
The data collection focused mainly on qualitative analysis, observing the chil-
dren’s behavior and reactions during interaction with the prototype. The tasks were
rated as completed/uncompleted according to each child’s ability to finish the task
seamlessly.
The usability tests revealed that the interface achieved a 96% success rate (see
Table 2). According to the observations made during the usability tests, we concluded
that all the participants were able to perform the proposed tasks.
Regarding the user experience, all children considered the experience positive
and enjoyed playing the game. All said that the game was easy to play and that their
peers would have no difficulty playing it.
208 R. Fernandes et al.

Table 2 Usability testing: tasks and results

Task number Task Success rate (%)
1 Entering the game 80
2 Starting the game with the girl character 100
3 Playing the first mission 100
4 Using a hint 80
5 Consulting the story chapters 100
6/9 Playing the second, third; fourth; fifth missions 100
10 Change character 100
11 Understand in which mission are you 100
Total success rate 96

4 Conclusion

We presented a descriptive case study of the design process of the graphical interface
for the game integrated to the story app Mobeybou in Brazil. The main goal of this
process was to develop an intuitive and easy-to-use interface directed to pre-and
primary school children, and contributing to the reinforcement of language skills,
creativity, and digital literacy.
The process began by analyzing the Mobeybou materials, particularly the story
app Mobeybou in Brazil. The design thinking methodology guided the development
of the project. Along the design process, we have used several methods, such as
surveys, personas model, user flows, wireframes, and prototyping. The design tools,
especially the more visual ones, such as the user flows and wireframes, made it
possible to communicate ideas and plan the next steps, aligning the entire team in
the process.
During the entire process, the central point was the user’s needs and cognitive
limitations intrinsic to the project age group. This cooperation between designer and
user was essential to achieving this result.
The limitations found in the development of this work were the restrictions caused
by the COVID-19 pandemic. Given the situation, it was necessary to find alterna-
tive solutions to those initially planned. For example, the usability tests had to be
carried out with a limited number of participants. Despite these limitations, the results
obtained were not impaired. This change caused a slight delay in the study but did
not affect its results.
The validation of the interface through a usability test revealed a success rate of
96%, thus ensuring an intuitive and effective use by the target audience. The tests
also showed that the interface promoted a high degree of satisfaction by the users.
Finally, the visual system developed during the project provided design patterns that
may be useful in the expansion of the game or, in the future, in the elaboration of
other cultural games.
How Design and Technology Can Contribute to Learning … 209

Acknowledgements This work has been financed by national funds through the Portuguese Foun-
dation for Science and Technology (FCT)—and by the European Regional Development Fund
(ERDF) through the Competitiveness and Internationalization Operational Program under the
reference POCI/01/0145/FEDER/032580.

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Hermeneutic Methodology to Design
the Skin of the City

Liliana Soares and Ermanno Aparo

Abstract This paper support the concept of skin as design’s control to create
building’s epidermis. The first part develops the meaning of skin and its interpretation,
considering time, space and circumstances. The second part analyses several case
studies that define western reality between Ancient Egypt and Art Nouveau. Method-
ologically, the paper is based on hermeneutic approach. With this new philosophy in
mind, the authors want to prove that although it is risky and cloudy to—summary—
analysis the main conceptions that were found throughout past, it is also a strong and
singular choice without the prejudice of history. For this reason, it is a choice that
takes on the power of semiotics, culture and knowledge. In this research, the authors
avoid the critique of architecture—that catalogs space in typologies, such as, reli-
gious, private and public—in order to choose the right of autonomy to judge the skin
of buildings as images that adds new data, and interacts with the users, connecting
ancient symbols with current symbols that provoke sensations and emotions. Ulti-
mately, the paper relates knowledge in a dynamic way, assuming elements from
different cultures, in a recyclable and sustainable way.

Keywords Hermeneutic as design methodology · Semiotics as design

competence · Scenarios construction

1 Introduction

Etymologically, skin means the outer covering of the body, the cutis, the epidermis
[1]. In this study, the authors will consider the different meanings of the word,
without neglecting any one [2], considering all hypotheses, even if they are average

L. Soares (B) · E. Aparo

Instituto Politécnico de Viana Do Castelo, Av. Atlântico. 644, 4900-348 Viana do Castelo,
Portugal
e-mail: lsoares@[Link]
Research Centre for Architecture, Urbanism and Design, Alto da Ajuda, Polo Universitário,
1349-063 Lisbon, Portugal

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 211
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
212 L. Soares and E. Aparo

conjectures. In its application to design, one should consider satisfactory hypotheses

[3] before stating by one.
On one side, the Latin word cutis means taking care, wrapping something, the
exterior of a thing, the varnish or the appearance [4]. Cutis shows an approach to
the scope of design as the skin that takes care of something—which in this case
could be the building or the outer shell of the building. On the other side, the word
epidermis is a semi-transparent membrane that covers the skin and forms the outer
lining of the skin [5]. The epidermis is an image made up of a group of small parts
that are always in circulation, which are recycled. It is a sensation “(…) reduced to a
group of molecular movements. And the image, an essential element of psychic life,
will appear in due course in this reconstruction, it will come to occupy a previously
determined place in it” [6]. Therefore, the epidermis of a body is sustainable semi-
transparent, a very thin layer that covers the skin of the body, as if the epidermis is
a project integrated into architecture, but projected by design.
With this idea in mind, liquid reality [7] requires thinking about the epidermis
as an essential part of the building’s skin, because it is the first image that interacts
with the user, that provokes sensations, that stimulates him/her, attracting or pushing
him/her. Therefore, at this point, following the foregoing considerations, the research
questions were: In order to interpret it today, historically, how does this exterior
skin took care of the building? What does it mean to take care of an object? And
how and why can design create competences to take care of existing buildings? In
order to develop this thought, it is important to relate design with other fields, as
suggested the hermeneutic methodology proposed in this research, instead of trying
to find the differences and product-oriented meanings. In particular, in order to be
objective, regarding both the design honesty and the appearance(s) that the city’s
surface intends to communicate today.
In this study, the authors chose to learn with history before the impact of Modern
Movement on building surface design. This limit in time is related with the absence of
industrial production, considering that this process would raise other considerations
in the analysis as the absence of ornament in semantic process and the introduction of
new materials that might create noise in the present analyze. Therefore, in this paper
it seemed important to understand the creativity process among fields since Ancient
Egypt until Art Nouveau period. The analysis of the surface history of buildings from
the Modern Movement to the Liquid Reality is important, but it will be an exercise
for another study.
Appearance is a reference to the relationship established with the essence of
the object. That is, in order to create a relationship between the appearance of
the building and its essence it is essential to constantly consider the process of
appearance. The multiple appearances possibilities of the building must be revealed,
therefore, all the hypotheses of the meaning of the word surface are weighed as a
phenomenon, changing with time, space and circumstances. The designer who imag-
ines the external surface of a building thinks of images hypothesis as something that
is always renewable and evolving. The designer considers the image as the skin of
the building, knowing that it is made up of different vertical layers and that the top
layer is the epidermis, which is organized by parts that are in permanent circulation.
Hermeneutic Methodology to Design the Skin of the City 213

An image that will first provoke the experience of sensation about the building, and
after the experience of knowledge.
In this paper, the idea of the epidermis as a skin that adds new data is expressed
as the essential part of the building’s skin. It is the image that interacts with the user,
which provokes sensations and stimulates him/her. Although, if human being wants
to live an experience of knowledge, it is necessary to relate ancient symbols with
current symbols. The designer, as a storyteller, relates to knowledge in a dynamic
way, assuming elements from different cultures, in a recyclable and sustainable way,
because he/she lives in the context, with meanings and sensations.

2 Methodology

If we want the principles of hermeneutics to be applied in the understanding of

material culture, all the factors—new and old—that compose the context, must be
enunciated. For Hans-Georg Gadamer, the appropriation of the concept of hermeneu-
tics takes place when something is made understandable or brought to the correct
understanding. “Hermeneutics is the practical art, that is technë, involved in such
things as preaching, interpreting other languages, explaining and explicating texts,
and as the basis of all of these, the art of understanding, an art particularly required
any time the meaning of something is not clear and unambiguous” [8]. Hermeneutics
thus, presents itself to design as a science that, through cultural signs, dissects, frag-
ments and explores problems. Then, interpretation is a performing and circular act
between the whole and its parts. “When designing, designers are continually being
questioned. They can facilitate that process by laying themselves open to the ques-
tions, leaving themselves vulnerable, at risk, by taking the questions as a probing of
their prejudgments; or they can proceed in a one-sided manner, asking questions of
the situation, but protecting their pre-established biases by not allowing themselves
to be questioned in return” [9], which means that for designers hermeneutic cycle is
a process-oriented process. Therefore, in this study hermeneutics is a methodology
to think the skin of the buildings.

3 Case Studies

In past, urban places were seen as scenarios of important events, of ways of adapting
to public and private spaces, of social and cultural expressions. Today, the metropolis
appears to be a complex and fluid object in the relationships between people, goods
and information. So, it is difficult, sometimes, to define and distinguish the limits
between public and private. In the contemporary city, it is possible to design an exte-
rior spatial module in the public space—like a micro-architecture—as it is possible
to project an interior spatial module in the public space—as in a shopping center. In
the urban territory, there are some periods of the City’s History—such as Ancient
214 L. Soares and E. Aparo

Table 1 Premises to design the skin of buildings

Heading level Example
1st level of design It is essential to enunciate singular and conjectural responses oriented
towards new solutions that meet the demands of the present moment
2nd level of design Diagnosing the complexity of factors as something that must be done
continuously and not something that we can do or cannot do
4th level heading It is interesting to think about the uniqueness of the surface of the buildings
with an inspiring interpretation model that starts from a basic
concept—which stimulate evaluation and re-evaluation—before giving an
answer. The design of the interpretation of the skin of buildings is
hermeneutical and dialectical. The surface is one of the components of the
scenario that interacts with the human being

Greece—that clearly defined and elected the ‘Àgora’ as a public space of collec-
tive belonging. In other cases, public circulation spaces—such as the street or the
square—suffered an appropriation sometimes disordered as happened, for instance,
in the European cities of the medieval period.
Specifically, the design of the wall—as the part of a building—can be seen as
the essence of design language, the starting point for a new experience between
what is inside and what is outside a building or a moment in where the experience
actually happens. It is the edge of not returning to the previous, without completely
refusing the previous—which in this case one can consider as interior space—and the
posterior—the external space—can be called the edge of the experience of ambiguity
that could be interpreted as a phenomenon of understanding. When the process of
perceiving what happens on the edge between the two spaces, contemplates the
cultural context, it is a comprehension and includes and considers several factors
such as culture, time, and environments and, it is not an isolated act.
Thus, this paper analyzes the history of building skin in the western reality.
Although, as Christian Norberg-Schulz [10] argues, this is not a history of the facade
or the history of the epidermis of buildings, but the choice of some of the most impor-
tant appearances and critical moments. An archeological methodology of fragments
that can start, for example, in the eighteenth century and end in Post-Modernism, as
Manfredo Tafuri states in his book: ‘The sphere and the labyrinth’ [11]. In this case,
the research starts on the Ancient Greece and ends in the Art Nouveau.
From this reflection, 3 main points stand out in order to design the skin of buildings
as it is written in Table 1.

3.1 Case Study: Ancient Egypt

As stated by Friedrich Hegel, Architecture in Ancient Egypt born out of the need to
express itself, so everything is symbolic. “(…) Such a meaning also has the number
of columns; and the images, which belong to sculpture like memnons, sphinxes, etc.,
Hermeneutic Methodology to Design the Skin of the City 215

are not just works of sculpture, but also of architecture, to which they belong because
of their colossal structure” [12]. The power of the image was very strong assuming
the role of scenario between a Person—the pharaoh—that intends to transmit an
omnipresent message to a receiver—the people—trapped in this expression. Whether
close or far away to buildings, the architecture ensured that the receiver knew the
meaning of the referent—the pharaoh.
Thus, the facade of buildings was used as a support to communicate a message.
Concerning the presence of hieroglyphs on the facades of the buildings, each symbol
had a meaning and a specific placement on the walls of the royal palace. “The serekh
is the first format of the king’s name in hieroglyphics, comprising phonetic signs,
placed within a project for the palace facade, which was dominated by the image of
a falcon” [13].

3.2 Case Study: Ancient Greece

In Ancient Greece, the facade of a building was the place for political power to
communicate with the city, expressing and witnessing its strength. A case that exposes
this reflection is the Parthenon, built by Pericles on the Acropolis of Athens, under the
supervision and the responsibility of Phidias—who was also delegated the design of
the decorative sculptures and the design of the architecture of Ictinos and Callícrates.
On the facade, specifically, “in the metopes, the obsessive repetition of themes that
refer to mythical conflicts restores to the spectator the ancient image of a city that
symbolizes all Greek culture as a civilization opposed to barbarism. At the same
time, the pediments celebrate the goddess with the main myths they refer to, namely
the Pan-Hellenic of her birth and the place of conflict with Poseidon for the conquest
of Africa” [14].
From this perspective, the analysis of the facade composition system can be
inserted in an organic vision of the walls of architecture. A system that integrates each
decorative element as a part of the plastic essence of the temple. “The series of multi-
colored leaves, the delicate meanders, the exuberant ornaments, the tender and vivid
tendrils and flower decorations are never superimposed from the outside to animate a
dead surface, like decorative accessories, like ornaments, but forming joints, connec-
tions and the supreme conclusion of the building as a mediating ‘expression’, in those
points where the bases and the weights meet or are extinguished” [15].

3.3 Case Study: Ancient Rome

In Ancient Rome, the relationship between the exterior and the interior was mate-
rialized through richly ornamented facades, revealing “(…) the skill of a coura-
geous and enterprising population, in an external and reassuring model about security
216 L. Soares and E. Aparo

in the future” [16]. Roman society used the surface of the city—buildings, equip-
ment, ephemeral architectures or micro-architectures—to demonstrate the meaning
of power to the exterior.
As Thomas Hope argues in an analogy about the importance of covering in Roman
architecture and Greek culture, “the ancient Romans, on the contrary, made great use
of bricks; either because it was a common material among themselves, or because
they found it easier to work with than stone. Not only were they laid out in horizontal
planes to form, as we still do today, the body of the walls, but they were also used
for the exterior cladding, and thus the subtlety of the raw material of the bricks, as
well as the solidity of the cement with which they were connected, ensured that the
buildings lasted as long as this one was built in stone” [17].

3.4 Case Study: Muslim Culture

In Muslim culture, the analysis of the epidermis of buildings must take into account
religion, so the house is closed to the outside world and, it is opened to the interior.
“The simplicity of the facade is well accused because it does not deserve attention:
they are walls that seal off, that drastically separate the exterior from the interior”
[18]. In the Muslim house, for instance, the sense of the street does not exist, hence
the buildings appear in a way that, not only does not allow the idea of perspective but
also, not accept one to look from the outside to the inside of the building. Likewise,
in the surface analysis of Muslim buildings, the existence of a courtyard inside the
house must be considered, which is justified by the climate and the influence of
the Roman tradition, given that the design of Muslim housing adapts to the concept
of life of an individual turned to faith in God. If the exterior of the facade of a
Muslim dwelling appears neutral, the interior of the Muslim facade has a symbolic
significance, especially when one think of religious buildings, such as ‘mihrab’ whose
representation of the door is intentional. So, as if the door referred to the house of
God, “undoubtedly, the door it represents is an exterior facade, a facade whose
model continues in this mosque from the seventh and ninth centuries to the twentieth
century” [19].
The semantic value of the Muslim facade depends on the immaterial referent (God)
represented in Mecca, therefore, in the Muslim household—whether in domestic or
social life—the interior facade opens to connote the exterior of a symbolic referent
and the Exterior facade closes to hide the essence of the individual’s intimate life
inside. For a non-Muslim user, the outside of the mihrab is the appearance and
the inside is the essence, and the edge between the two is an access to achieve
knowledge about a culture. For a Muslim user, seen from the outside the mihrab
wall is the appearance, but when he/she is inside and seeks the essence he/she finds
a new appearance, in the form of an open door, which is the exterior of the same
symbolic referent. The analysis of the epidermis in Muslim culture must take into
account cultural and symbolic factors, material and function.
Hermeneutic Methodology to Design the Skin of the City 217

3.5 Case Study: Middle Ages

In medieval times, the transmission of meaning and the symbolic value of the
facade are evident in ecclesiastical architecture. The building becomes a vehicle
for spreading the Christian message, moving from a bare structure to a manifestly
decorative prosperity. The biblical narrative component, which before this period was
limited to the frescoes present inside churches, is now represented on a sculptural
support and placed on the facade. In the medieval facade, the communicative inser-
tion gradually helped to improve the relationship between the structural elements
and the sculptural parts. Thus, improving its plastic effect and increasing its visual
lightness. “This is a formulation of the relationship between sculpture and archi-
tecture inevitably compatible with the tendency to steal any sense of wall from the
facade, replacing it with the crosstalk of windows, becoming dominant, around the
thirteenth century, as if check the cathedrals at Reims or Burges” [20].
In a decisive and coherent way, this phase of space construction reinforces the
exploration about the hypothesis of evaluating the buildings surface as a subproject
of the building that is autonomous and that, in turn, is composed of different layers.
As if the surface was composed of a system and the top layer was the epidermis,
ready to display both the connotative elements of the interior and the elements that
denote the dynamics of people’s lives in the outer space.

3.6 Case Study: Renaissance

With the Renaissance, the facade strengthens its symbolic/evocative value, inter-
preting the building’s role as a metaphor for its function and, at the same time,
reinforcing the legacy that existed between the structural and symbolic functions
of the individual architectural component. The discovery of the Greek classics, in
particular the Latin language, has a decisive influence on the rediscovery and study
of Greek and Roman architecture. In this sense, the thoughts of René Descartes and
Niccolò Macchiavelli will be decisive in the interpretation of the epidermis as a
system of components that form a whole and in the analysis of reality as it actually
was. As defended by Giusta Nicco Fasola, one of the authors who applies surface
composition as a coating system is Donato Bramante. In a text proposed by Leon
Battista Alberti on the interpretation of architecture as construction, Giusta Nicco
Fasola emphasizes that this argument “is contrary to Gothic decoration, becoming
the initiator of an illusionist principle, of forgery,—of which Bramante, in the seven-
teenth century, will serve himself with greatness and with moral disinterest—for the
fetishism of the ‘stone colonies” [21].
With Donato Bramante, the covering—understood as a part of the building’s
body—acquires a projectual autonomy in relation to the whole. One case that support
this rule is the facade of Santa Maria Nuova’s cathedral. Designed in 1497 in Abbi-
ategrasso, Milan and attributed to Donato Bramante, the facade emphasizes design
218 L. Soares and E. Aparo

independence and the importance of epidermis as an element that takes care of archi-
tecture. Regarding this point of view, the interest in construction was moderate as an
expression of Mannerism. In addition, men get used to create beauty on the surface
of the buildings and, to merely consider technical the constructive aspect of life.

3.7 Case Study: Baroque

In Baroque, the growing centralizing political force of the church/state has a decisive
impact on architectural dynamics. The strong symbolic value, together with the
equitable rigor, transform the relationship between the interior and the exterior of
the building’s surface. For Christian Norberg-Schulz, “persuasion and propaganda
only become significant in the relationship with a center that represents the basic
axioms of the system” [22]. Architecture finds a very strong role in the theatricality
of the baroque city, a function that both architecture and other arts assume, dazzling
and educating the people who were, for the most part, ignorant and illiterate.

3.8 Case Study: Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau manifests itself considerably in Brussels, due to the good reception
for new artistic works. One of the authors who better worked the skin of buildings
was Victor Horta. As Sigfried Giedion argues for the ‘Maison du Peuble’ (1897),
“Horta broke the facade wide open, and filled it with glass and iron” [23]. The
practical function was controlled by iron, glass and bricks, helping Victor Horta to
define the body of the building and, consequently, to calculate its support. In terms of
symbolic value, as Paolo Portoghesi states, in the ‘Maison du Peuble’ “the symbology
based on the equation ‘transparent facade: = air-and-light-luxury-of-the-poor’ (i.e.)
is intended to perpetuate itself equally in the more radically revolutionary attempts
of the avant-garde, from Gropius to Russian constructivism” [24].
The use of iron and glass on the facade of the ‘Maison du Peuple’ transforms the
design of the skin of buildings into a very interesting case of perfect symbiosis
between structural and symbolic functions. An intense relationship between the
facade that seduces and speaks to a user who is also predisposed to be related to
it, taking a long look at it, like someone who is looking into a mirror in order to
discover another being reflected and transformed. Something that Renato de Fusco
defines as “empathy, understood more broadly as the intimate relationship between
architecture and those who enjoy it, between architecture and the environment, in
the most typical works characterized by the cult of line as in those characterized by
the cult of the plane” [25].
During the Art Nouveau period, the facade of the ‘Maison du Peuble’ was an
example of how the skin of the building could be interpreted as a critical moment
of synthesis between structural function and decorative balance. This was also an
Hermeneutic Methodology to Design the Skin of the City 219

occasion to reinforce a political message, determining contact between social classes.

As Angelo Trimarco points out, “it is not a case, moreover, that, marking the image of
this ‘unique factory’, as De Fusco called it, Horta wrote on the terrace’s balustrade
words and names such as Science, Cooperation, Labour, Karl Marx, Proudlhon,
Fourier, Robert Owen: names and words, certainly significant, surpassed, however,
by the name of the building itself, La Maison du Peuple” [26]. In this work, the
project of the building’s epidermis was conceived autonomously as a subproject of
the whole. Guided by design, these autonomous prostheses emerged from the facade
to ask for identity.

4 Conclusions

In this study, hermeneutics was interpreted as a project methodology, because the

hermeneutic cycle presented itself as a cyclical and renewable alternative and, there-
fore, it became a knowledge hypothesis about the nature of things. Semiotics was
interpreted as a competence of design, because it allowed the exercise of semiosis,
the association of signs with other signs in a labyrinthine path that only allowed
for progress. Therefore, it became a continuous transformation. A proposal for the
production of signs and images that changed in the context. Thus, semiotics enhanced
a hypothesis of intuition and hermeneutics became a technique to explain design
method in the twenty-first century, supporting the thesis of crossing several types of
observations and connotations. Concerning this research, it means that in the future
it will be possible to project the skin of buildings by applying a regenerable and cycle
methodology.
In this paper, the skin of the buildings was entitled cultural and knowledge things
interpreted by the design process. It was about understanding design as a field that is
in an interrupted renovation. The first moment is nebulous and the second moment
is universal and is experienced in the edge of becoming a cultural experience for the
user. An action that benefits from the fragmentation of time and searches for cultural
signs of the past accomplished of giving meaning to the user. Specifically, it means
that the skin of buildings has a nature, a potential that asks to become something in the
moment. This potential of the building’s essence must be understood in the fluidity
and ephemerality that define our time. A contradictory reality where, perhaps, there
is no context, where nothing and everything has already been created, a moment that
represents the idea of function and meaning and not form.
So, if we want a singular moment between the user and the building it is imperative
to create a connection with the skin of the building, producing the experience of
sensation and, with it, the practice of emotion. Hence, the aesthetic experience is
very important to create an attraction between subject and surface. As this is an on-
going research, in this first level of knowledge, the surface will consist of a system
of parts that establish a relationship with the individual, assuming a message of
sensations, knowledge and cultural content.
220 L. Soares and E. Aparo

The analyzed case studies from the past will serve as a reference for the future
research to produce a diagnosis of the complexity of factors that define the current
reality. An action that is practiced continuously and not something we can do or not.
In other words, although architecture is based on historical and semiotic reasons, it
does not means architectural solutions are the model for interpretation. Thus, using
hermeneutic methodology to design the skin of the city means applying a technique
that considers complexity, uncertainty and ephemerality. A methodology that crosses
old symbols with current symbols to design with the sense of future things that create
emotions and knowledge in people’s life.

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Visactivism: A Conceptual Model
to Identify Information Visualization
as an Expression of Design Activism

Pedro Duarte de Almeida

Abstract Can Information Visualization be an expression of Design Activism? This

question leads an exploratory research that seeks to identify parallelisms between
these two domains of design practice. Following an interpretive approach and a case
study methodology, the research focus on three Information Visualization projects
aiming to identify Design Activism characteristic attributes, namely the kind of moti-
vation, purpose and discourse inherent to these projects. The results show that a visu-
alization may be an example of Design Activism when three conditions are combined:
the project is motivated by the ethical stance of the designer towards a specific cause;
the designer aims to contribute to the disclosure, awareness and/or public discussion
about the subject addressed; the visualization is designed as a persuasive discourse
that challenge and/or influence the end user. These results allow us to propose the
conceptual model of Visactivism that describes the practice of Information Visual-
ization as an expression of Design Activism. As well as nurturing the relationship
between the field of Design Activism and the specific domain of Information Visu-
alization, this model is also a theoretical contribution to deepening the interpretation
of the specific foundations, objectives and characteristics that identify Design as an
Activist practice.

Keywords Information visualization · Data visualization · Information design ·

Design activism · Visual communication

1 Information Visualization as Information Design

Visible reality is not restricted to what the human eye is able to see naturally, but
is significantly increased through instruments that expand the spectrum of visibility
to phenomena that are not even of a visual kind. Just as certain technical instru-
ments, such as the microscope or the telescope, expand the natural reach of human

P. D. de Almeida (B)
Centro de Investigação e de Estudos em Belas-Artes (CIEBA), Faculdade de Belas-Artes,
Universidade de Lisboa, Lg. Academia Nacional de Belas-Artes, 1249-058 Lisboa, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 223
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
224 P. D. de Almeida

eyes, graphic devices like maps, diagrams and charts also enable the perception
and understanding of different invisible, abstract or complex phenomena [1]. The
specific features of these phenomena, combined with the need to explore, analyse,
discover, understand and communicate this kind of information, are the key factors
that motivate the design of diverse visual devices that allow us to envision informa-
tion and encompasses a wide field of image production that is now called Information
Visualization [2].
The relationship between Information Visualization and Design can be under-
stood if we call upon the design as interface definition proposed by Bonsiepe [3].
According to his conceptual model, design is ontologically constituted by the trian-
gular relationship between a user, a tool and an action with a specific purpose. In
this context, the user is someone who needs to perform a certain task, whether of
physical or cognitive kind. The tool is the artefact, material or immaterial, necessary
to perform that specific task, and it encompasses both physical and semiotic devices.
The purposeful action refers to the performance needed to accomplish the addressed
task and assumed as the design’s predetermined goal (e.g. analyse data, understand
a complex process). This three entities are related through the concept of interface,
understood here as the practical and utilitarian interaction that shapes the design
itself.
Considering Bonsiepe’s model, Information Visualization is a design process
aimed at representing categories and quantities, relationships and processes, in order
to allow observations and interpretations taking advantage of human visual percep-
tion skills. It is a process of information organization and representation that aims
to make visible and understandable phenomena whose invisibility, abstraction or
complexity challenge human understanding needs [1, 2, 4, 5] and it emerges in
several contexts and takes on different names (e.g. Data Visualization, Scientific
Visualization, Infographics, etc.). Not rejecting those distinctions but recognizing
their affinities, Cairo [2] argues that this field encompasses any kind of visual repre-
sentation of information designed to enable communication, analysis, discovery,
exploration, etc. (p. 28). In this perspective, visualizing information is an informa-
tion design process based on the selection of the presentation method and a layout
for the information, taking into account the capabilities and limitations of the visual
system [6] whose result is materialized in diverse visual instruments, like charts,
thematic maps, infographics, interactive data visualizations or news applications,
that we may simply call visualizations [5].

1.1 The Different Purposes of Information Visualizations

Although having the general purpose of visually present information, a visualization

device can be designed with different specific purposes according to the information
content in question and the context in which that information will be used. Iliinsky
and Steele [7] distinguish between two general types of visualization according to
Visactivism: A Conceptual Model to Identify Information Visualization … 225

two essential functions: exploring and analysing data or explaining and presenting
previously synthesized information.
As such, an exploratory visualization is designed to analyze and interpret data
in order to extract meaning from it. It allows disclosing new information and it may
be used, for instance, when an analyst draws a scatter plot to look for a relationship
between two different statistical variables.
In turn, an explanatory visualization is a communication tool that aims to display
previously synthesized information and its purpose is to explain a certain issue to
the end-user. Thus, this type of visualization can be exemplified by a newspaper’s
infographic through which the reader can get a detailed overview over a specific
issue (e.g. accident, sports event, etc.).
This distinction proposed by Iliinsky et al. [7] has the virtue to distinguish between
two primary purposes for Information Visualization: explore data to discover new
information or explain and present specific information. In this sense, as communi-
cation tool an explanatory visualization can be also defined according to the specific
relationships that is established between the three entities involved in the communica-
tion process: data, designer and reader. Based on the predominance of the relationship
established between these three entities Iliinsky et al. suggest three sub-categories to
identify explanatory visualizations: artistic, informative and persuasive.
Artistic visualization results from a specific relationship between the designer
(or artist) and the data. This kind of visualization does not necessarily aim at an
objective interpretation of a certain dataset, such as that intended from a scientific
chart or newspaper infographic. Alternatively, it provides an aesthetic experience
and may suggest the reader a subjective visual understanding on the addressed issue.
Informative visualization privileges the relationship between the reader and the
data, seeking to offer a clear, objective and understandable view of the information
in question. It is the type of visualization that is expected to be found in the media,
in scientific papers or in statistical documentation, communicating the information
in the most efficient and effective way as possible.
Persuasive visualization is based on the primordial relationship between the
designer and the reader. For this type of visualization, data is collected, selected and
presented in order to convey a specific message, which corresponds to the designer’s
point of view on the addressed subject. The main purpose of this type of visualization
is to influence the user’s opinion and attitude towards the subject matter.
Masud, Valsecchi, Ciuccarelli, Ricci and Caviglia [8] also identify three kinds
of visualization by its specific purposes. Their categorization is based on a model
that describes the Information Visualization design process as a correspondence
to different ways of implementing the Data–Information–Knowledge–Wisdom
continuum (also known as DIKW), a conceptual hierarchy recognized in several
academic fields [9]. Following that model, Information Visualization’s design can
result in three different types of visualizations: Analytical, Communicative and
Formative.
Analytical visualizations are produced in contexts where it is necessary to extract
meaning and obtain new information from the exploration and analysis of data, such
226 P. D. de Almeida

as statistics studies or financial markets. In this context, the designer and the consumer
of the information visualized can be the same person (e.g. a scientist).
Communicative visualizations represents previously synthesized information or
knowledge. The purpose of this type of visualization is to expose information and
disclose the meaning, which allows the audience to understand the addressed subject.
The use of infographics in journalism is a clear example of this kind of visualizations.
Formative visualizations shares some of the purposes and features of commu-
nicative visualizations but differs from it by focusing on the presentation of informa-
tion in a particular context and for a specific audience. Its distinctive feature is that
it approaches the user through a pedagogical discourse and, as such, it tries to affect
the decision-making and influence the future behavior of the user.
The two categorization proposals just presented [7, 8] demonstrate that the practice
of Information Visualization can have different specific purposes, which transcend
the simpler objectives of revealing and communicating information. Indeed, Engel-
hardt [10] suggests that visualization can be used with the specific aim to raise public
awareness on socially relevant issues. He exemplifies this use of visualization with
the idealization and implementation of the Isotype [11, 12] system by Otto Neurath
(1882–1945) and the use of dynamic graphics to communicate global statistical infor-
mation within the Gapminder foundation [13, 14] by Hans Rosling (1948–2017). As
such, this relationship between the practice of Information Visualization and the
communication of social causes suggests the possibility of an intersection between
Information Visualization and a specific approach to Design that merges it with
Activism.

2 Activism and Design Activism

Activism is the use of direct and noticeable action to achieve a result, usually a
political or social one [15]. It encompasses different initiatives that aim to trans-
form society in relation to an issue that a certain group of people recognizes as
being necessary to change. This may include, for example, boycotting the purchase
of products from a company that does not respect workers’ labor rights, or dissemi-
nating messages and signing petitions demanding that a country’s government respect
human rights. In any case, these initiatives are characterized by the sense of challenge
that involves the demand for a change in relation to the current situation and by the
ethical stance that unites the activists around an alternative vision on the addressed
topic [16, 17].
Thus, an activist initiative is based on a vision of a better world. Activists are
responsible for introducing and affirming new moral values that reflect an alter-
native view of the future for societies over several different issues and, therefore,
are at the forefront of the ongoing process of social transformation [16]. This role
in the dynamics of society’s transformation is witnessed by multiple global move-
ments that contributed to new frameworks of moral values in which, for example,
inequality of treatment between genders, racial discrimination or the depredation
Visactivism: A Conceptual Model to Identify Information Visualization … 227

of natural resources are generally considered unacceptable today [18]. In this way,
if we consider that political activity does not refer exclusively to institutions and
protagonists recognized as ‘political’ (e.g. parliament, deputies, political parties) but
involves all initiatives carried out by individuals, groups or organizations involved
in public activities aimed at debating, guiding and transforming society, activism is
crucial to the dynamics of democratic life [16].
Like activism, design is also an activity that, in its very essence, aims to transform
an existing reality with the aim of improving human living conditions. However, this
does not imply that any design process is a form of activism or vice versa. Indeed,
although the practice of design can be framed and influenced by values that shape
a vision for ‘a better society’ (e.g. Modernism), activism develops around specific
causes (e.g. animal rights’ defense). In turn, as a professional activity, design is
mainly developed within a socio-economic framework defined by the market logical
processes, by production and consumption cycles and by supply and demand law,
which contrasts with the context in which the activists initiatives are inscribed [19].
Indeed, these are developed according to a logic of claim and transformative appeal
that often questions and challenges the context in which professional design works
[16, 20].

2.1 What Is Design Activism

But if design cannot be generally considered an expression of activism, that does

not mean that there are not projects that may be identified with this doctrine and its
practices. In fact, activism and design are two activities that may share an essential
purpose: to intervene in a transformative way in the socio-cultural sphere. Generically
defined by Herbert Simon as a projected action that aims to transform an existing
situation into a preferable alternative [21], design takes an obvious parallel with
activism. Indeed, the relationship between design and activism is already established.
Several authors have approached that link [22–25], but Fuad-Luke [20] is probably
the one who delved deeply in this matter. He defines Design Activism as design
thinking, imagination and practice applied knowingly or unknowingly to create a
counter-narrative aimed at generating and balancing positive social, institutional,
environmental and/or economic change (p. 27).
This definition of Design Activism suggests that there are three characteristics
that identify the practice of design in an activist mode:
• Design Activism is transdisciplinary as it embraces diverse modes of expression
in different design fields like communication, product, fashion, architecture, etc.
• Design Activism is activated by the designer’s critical view on a specific subject
matter. Thus, the design process is motivated by the designer’s ethical stance and
has the purpose to intervene in the socio-cultural sphere with a transformational
aim.
228 P. D. de Almeida

• Design Activism offers a critical view on the project’s addressed matter. As such,
it is a kind of counter-narrative discourse that challenges the user and calls for
change.
To better understand what is at stake when we deal with Design Activism, we may
look at a project that illustrates the definition proposed by Fuad-Luke and in which
visual communication of information plays a central role. As part of the Occupy
Wall Street protest movement that rise up back in 2011 [26], the Occupy George [27]
project consists on the use of banknotes as a support for the disclosure and diffusion
of information about the economic and social inequalities in the U.S. (Fig. 1). This
project aims to spread messages that the authors considered relevant for the all society
and, as such, it was designed to provide the possibility of accessing templates that
allow any citizen to print information on banknotes. In this way, the user becomes
an active agent in the communication of these messages.
Thus, Occupy George illustrates clearly the critical stance and the public inter-
ventionist approach of its designers in relation to the addressed topic—economic

Fig. 1 Occupy George printed banknotes samples. Source [Link] last accessed
2022/02/26
Visactivism: A Conceptual Model to Identify Information Visualization … 229

and social inequality in the U.S. society. In parallel, the communication process and
media used also illustrates the disruptive nature of the project’s discourse and, as
such, it is an obvious example of Design Activism in action.

3 Information Visualization as Design Activism?

The definitions presented, and its previous discussion, support the assumption that,
under certain conditions, Information Visualization can be an expression of Design
Activism [28]. To confirm this assumption we need to find compatibilities between
Information Visualization practice and the specific attributes of Design Activism,
namely the same kind of Motivation, Purpose and Discourse.
For this, we use an interpretive research approach based on the case study method.
This methodology allows the analysis and interpretation of different kinds of research
objects, identifying their specific characteristics and the contextual relationships that
distinguish and define them [29, 30]. With it, we seek to respond to the research main
objective, namely to identify and characterize examples of information visualization
projects that we can consider as compatible with the main Design Activism attributes.
But to achieve that essential goal, we need to address more three specific objectives:
• Identify the reasons that motivate the development of those projects;
• Understand the intentions underlying its design and implementation;
• To characterize the type of discourse that embodies them.

3.1 Argument and Methodology

Based on the literature review, especially on the Design Activism definition proposed
by Fuad-Luke [20], the argument that sustains the research process is that Information
Visualization projects can be classified as examples of Design Activism if three
specific relationships are identifiable.
Motivation—Ethical stance
Activist designer’s motivation is based on the recognition of causes (e.g. human
rights, natural environment protection, social justice issues, etc.) worth of starting
a project. As such, motivation is sustained by the ethical position that determines a
critical view on a subject and that ignites the designer’s will to visualize it. Thus,
in this context, ethics is considered as the individual assumption of a specific moral
framework that supports the definition of what is good and wrong, acceptable or
unacceptable, etc. [31].
Purpose—Public Intervention
The activist designer assumes the aim of publicly intervene over the addressed
subject. As such, design can be a way to promote the disclosure, understanding
230 P. D. de Almeida

and/or critical awareness about a certain phenomenon and the visualization may be
the device that is used to achieve that goal. In this research, this kind of public inter-
vention, made through design, is grounded on a conception of political activity that
goes beyond the procedures and institutions conventionally considered political [32].
Discourse—Persuasive message
Design Activism’s projects defy the established views on certain issues. As such, it
is a kind of disruptive design approach that questions the usual state of a situation or
the usual development of a process or event. Thus, in such a context, a visualization
communicates information that challenges the status quo and persuades the end
user by raising awareness, promoting alternative interpretations and suggesting new
attitudes and behaviors around the subjects addressed [7, 20].
Based on this argument, the research develops through the selection of the projects
to be analysed and the data collection that may allow to do it. According to the
specific attributes that distinguish Design Activism the choice of cases is based on
four criteria:
Recognition—The selected projects are recognized as paradigmatic examples of
information visualization according to the definition previously presented.
Independence—The selection is oriented to self-initiated projects or projects
developed in a context which allows a high degree of projectual freedom (e.g.
academic).
Accessibility—The chosen projects are available online, also considering the ease
of access to complementary information that favors their analysis.
Diversity—The cases address different topics, come from different geographical
contexts and are configured with different solutions for visual representation.
Using the case study method, we collect data from three different sources. This is
a recommended procedure as it allows the study results to be corroborated through
triangulation between sources [30]. The information sources used are:
Observational research—gathering of data based on a controlled interaction
between the researcher and the study’s object, considering the objectives of the
analysis.
Documents analysis—systematic collection of data from related texts and other
documents produced and made available by the authors of the projects.
Open interview—conversations carried out with the designers/authors, via e-
mail, chat or telephone.

3.2 Case Studies Analysis

According to the research assumption and the argument presented, we select and
analyse three information visualization projects:
The Water We Eat, designed by Angela Morelli (2012).
U.S. Gun Deaths, designed by Periscopic (2013).
Um ecossistema político-empresarial, designed by Pedro Miguel Cruz (2013).
Visactivism: A Conceptual Model to Identify Information Visualization … 231

The Water We Eat [33] is an infographic story developed by the italian designer
Angela Morelli and publicly presented after 2012. This visualization focuses on
the concept of virtual water, the amount of water that is implicit in food produc-
tion and distribution. It was developed following involvement that the designer has
been keeping with this theme for several years. The user experience begins with a
question—What if I told: you eat 3496 L of water—and unfolds in a scroll-down
narrative sequence in which the user is confronted with a series of charts and graphics
representing the amounts of water consumed in different contexts. The experience
culminates with the description of virtual water concept and its explanation applied
to beef production. The visual representation supported by graphics, text and image
emphasizes the fact that the production of one kilogram of meat implies the consump-
tion of 15,400 L of water. Based on this information, a final appeal is made to change
consumption habits that can minimize that water consumption (Fig. 2).
An analysis of this project, supported by the detailed observation of the visual-
ization [33], the reading of related documentation [34] and the researcher’s dialogue
held with the designer back in 2016, allowed to understand that.
The project was initiated due to a particular involvement and concern with a
natural resource that the designer recognizes as essential for humanity. In this sense,
the designer recognizes her passion for the subject and assumes moral and ethical
reasons for the development of this project.
The infographic narrative is conceived as a communication tool that is used to
unravel and diffuse scientific information that the designer considers to be of public
interest. Based on this information, the visualization is designed as a means to raise
understanding of the issue and spark actions in order to change consumption habits.
The infographic discourse is based on an apparent semantic paradox—the water
we eat. The use of this argument allows, on the one hand, to reveal the specific
content of the information in question (the virtual water incorporated in food) and,
on the other hand, constitutes a rhetorical exercise that confronts the users with their
knowledge limits. After all, the infographic is an explicit persuasive tool that urges
the users to change their attitudes and behavior.
US Gun Deaths [35] is an animated and interactive visualization project devel-
oped by the company Periscopic (Portland, U.S.) following the deadly shooting at a
school in Sandy Hook, in December 2012. It focuses on the use of firearms in the
U.S., showing simultaneously the annual number of victims and also the time of life
lost with these deaths. That is, in addition to presenting a cumulative record of deaths
resulting from the use of firearms, the visualization also shows an estimate of the
number of years of life stolen to these victims (Fig. 3).
The experience begins with the animated representation of an orange arc on a
horizontal axis over a black background. Shortly after, a point falls from this arc. A
life has ended. From that point on, the arc turns gray and represents the years of life
that this person has lost. Moments later, the left end of the horizontal axis changes
to a fountain of orange arcs. Tens, hundreds, thousands of arcs turn into gray arcs
representing years of lost life. These arcs represent the thousands of victims and the
sum of hundreds of thousands of years of life lost, counted simultaneously at the
top of the screen. Once the animation is completed, it is possible to access specific
232 P. D. de Almeida

Fig. 2 The Water We Eat website screenshots. Source [Link] last accessed
2022/02/26

interactive charts that represent the main conclusions and it is possible to filter and
explore the data presented.
The analysis applied to this project, based on the observation of the visualization
[35], the interpretation of complementary information published by the authors [36]
allows us to understand that.
Periscopic’s design team describes a personal, emotional and social engagement
with the visualization theme. In this sense, the authors assume an ideological and
ethical motivation to justify this self-initiated project.
Visactivism: A Conceptual Model to Identify Information Visualization … 233

Fig. 3 US Gun Deaths website screenshot. Source [Link] last accessed

2022/02/26

Given the discussion that this topic has been generating in the U.S., this visualiza-
tion project aims to raise awareness, change perceptions, promote public discussion
and, ultimately, motivate change regarding the use of weapons.
The representation of the time of life lost for each anticipated death offers an alter-
native view of this issue and suggests an emotional interpretation of the information.
As such, it promotes a disruptive engagement with the theme, implicitly calling for
reflection and suggesting a new approach of the user over this issue.
Um ecossistema político-empresarial, Portugal 1975–2013 [37] is an interac-
tive visualization that represents the relationships between the political-party and
business fields designed by Pedro Miguel Cruz in 2013. The term ‘ecosystem’
summarizes the recognition of interdependence between the exercise of political
functions and the presence in company administrations. In this sense, this project
aggregates and represents data on 130 personalities who exercised government func-
tions and respective party affinities, 354 companies and 906 positions held by this
different personalities in these same companies.
The user experience begins with an introductory page with the title and a short
textual description that allows to understand the interaction interface. Gray circles
represent companies and their area is proportional to the number of political figures
who have held relevant positions in it. In turn, politicians are represented as insects
that surround the companies where they occupy places.
From the top of the page appears a swarm of insects with various shapes and colors
that begin to invade the circular structure representative of the business system. The
shape of each insect is related to the number of business positions that the represented
personality has held and the color symbolizes its partisan affinity. The system comes
to life and, in a continuous movement, the insects begin to circle the different circles
and move between them, representing the journey of the personalities through the
different companies where they are occupying places (Fig. 4).
234 P. D. de Almeida

Fig. 4 Um ecossistema político-empresarial, Portugal 1975–2013 website screenshot. Source

[Link] last accessed 2022/02/26

By analyzing this project, through direct observation [37], complementary reading

on the project development [38, 39] and a talk with the designer, it is possible to
conclude that.
Developed in an academic environment, the motivation to design this visualiza-
tion is directly linked to engagement of the designer with the theme – promiscuous
relations between politics and business. As such, the designer assumes that this is an
issue that worth more informative and visual attention, which reveals his ethical and
ideological motivation.
The designer assumes that the purpose of this visualization is to promote aware-
ness on this specific issue and complement the discussion that this theme raises in
society and in portuguese media.
The use of an ecosystem metaphor, in which political personalities are character-
ized as insects that explore the companies, offers the visualization a satirical tone. In
this sense, this project takes on a critical approach to the way this question affects
portuguese society and implicitly suggests that people and institutions shall behave
differently over this issue.
Visactivism: A Conceptual Model to Identify Information Visualization … 235

3.3 Research Results

The results obtained with the analysis of the three mentioned projects support the
assumption and the argument that determine this research—Information Visualiza-
tion can be identified as an expression of Design Activism because it was possible
to identify the characteristic attributes of Design Activism.
Indeed, the three projects are, explicitly or implicitly, motivated by the ethical
position of their designers in the face of varied issues linked to the environment,
society or politics. Simultaneously, the three projects can be identified as public
interventions that contribute to unraveling information considered important, raising
collective awareness and promoting an informed public discussion of the issues
addressed. Finally, although covering different subjects and using different visual-
ization strategies, the three projects have in common a discourse that, explicitly or
implicitly, challenges the visualization’s user to take a stance and appeals for a change
over the addressed issues.
Based on these results we propose a conceptual model that describes the practice
of Information Visualization as an expression of Design Activism (Fig. 5).
Visactivism can be defined as the practice of Information Visualization that crosses
Design Activism by sharing parallel motivations, similar purposes and the same type
of discourse. As demonstrated, an Information Visualization project can be, explicitly
or implicitly, motivated by the designer’s ethical stance over a certain issue that is
identified as a problem worth to be responded. As a consequence of that ethical
call to action, a visualization can be designed to address the importance of that
specific problem, disclose less known data, raise awareness or promote a needed
societal debate. As such, visualization is a public intervention that can be politically
grounded. At the same time, this intervention is, explicitly or implicitly, a persuasive
discourse that defies the most conventional views and challenges our way of dealing
with different environmental, societal or political issues.

Fig. 5 Visactivism—a
conceptual model
236 P. D. de Almeida

4 Conclusions

This research explored the possible intersection between Information Visualization

and Design Activism. By case studying three projects, it was possible to confirm the
assumption that a visualization can be an expression of design practiced in an activist
mode. Indeed, a visualization project may have the designer’s ethical motivation,
the public intervention purpose and the persuasive discourse that are identifiable as
specific attributes of Design Activism.
Thus, Visactivism identifies a specific design practice domain that intersects Infor-
mation Visualization and Design Activism. This conceptual model proposal may
allow a critical assessment and classification of Information Visualization in the
broader Design field and shall be considered a contribution to nurturing the theoretical
ground of Design Activism.
The Visactivism conceptual model is the result of an exploratory research and,
as such, is open to further developments and contributions. Considering the limited
scope of the cases studied and the lack of an external validation instrument that would
strengthen the results, future work can be directed to an extended case study with
additional research validation options and instruments.

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Digital Design Branding
Capitalist Visuality: Branding,
Architecture, and Its Visual
Reproduction. A Case Study in the City
of Porto

Ana Miriam Rebelo , Heitor Alvelos , and Álvaro Domingues

Abstract This chapter examines the promotional image of the city of Porto, created
and disseminated in the last decades, as a means through which core capitalist
values, objectives and operative logic are disseminated and naturalized in public
space. Mirzoeff’s conceptualization of visuality, as the aesthetic means through
which dominant systems seek to present their legitimacy as self-evident, informs
our examination of branding, architecture, and its visual reproduction, as discur-
sive practices employed in the deployment of what we will designate as a capitalist
visuality. Local tradition and cosmopolitan modernity are identified as the two main
concepts in the promotional strategy designed to enhance the city’s appeal, which
representation relies to a large extent on architectural aesthetics, namely vernacular
heritage, and international architectural icons. The chapter analyzes the recurrence
of these concepts in branding, promotional imagery, and architectural management.

Keyword Capitalist visuality · Place branding · Architecture · Porto

1 Context

In 1996 the historic center of the city of Porto was recognized by Unesco as a World
Heritage Site. The glaring physical degradation of the city center was then a matter
of concern. Residents’ numbers had been decreasing for decades. In 2001 the city
was nominated European Capital of Culture. A major urban regeneration plan was
conducted in the context of this event. In 2005 the recently created Porto Vivo—
Society for Urban Rehabilitation launches a masterplan for the rehabilitation of the

A. M. Rebelo (B) · H. Alvelos · Á. Domingues

University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
A. M. Rebelo · H. Alvelos
Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, Porto, Portugal
A. M. Rebelo · Á. Domingues
Center for Studies in Architecture and Urbanism, Porto, Portugal

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 241
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
242 A. M. Rebelo et al.

city center, marking a turn towards a new generation of urban rehabilitation policies,
based on principles of competitive urbanism, that prioritizes the development of
tourism and attraction of private investment [14]. In 2005 the concert venue Casa
da Música, designed by Rem Khoolhaas, was inaugurated, bringing a prestigious
piece of architecture to the city. In 2007 the social neighborhood S. Vicente de
Paulo was demolished. 220 residents were displaced, despite manifest resistance.
In 2008, the economic crisis was countered with the reinforcement of national and
municipal measures to attract foreign investment [10]. In 2011 the first of five towers
of the social housing complex known as Torres do Aleixo was imploded. The mayor
watched from a boat in the river in the company of 100 guests, while enraged residents
were forced to disperse with pepper gas. In 2012 the city was elected Best European
Destination for the first time. In the same year, over a thousand citizens manifest
against the eviction of a self-managed cultural collective from a deactivated school
and reoccupy the building. The collective was re-evicted soon after. In 2013, a high
segment residential project on the site of the former Aleixo towers is approved by the
City Council. In 2014 the newly elected municipal executive launches the “Porto.”
brand. 600 billboards present the brand to the city, while applications in light rail
vehicles carry it to the surrounding regions. In 2005, due to the increasing affluence
of tourists, the historic library Lello started to charge entrance fees. In 2017 the local
airport registers over 5 million arrivals, which represents a growth rate of over 140%
in one decade. [7]. The ratio between accommodation capacity and residents reaches
85.4 per 1000 residents. Housing prices almost doubled in the previous 5 years [10]. In
2018, a 40 million euros privately funded project for a new business, cultural and civic
center designed by Kengo Kuma is announced by the City Council as the new Casa
da Música.1 In 2019 the Council presents a project for the construction of a housing
project comprising affordable as well as market priced housing, at the site of former
S. Vicente de Paulo neighborhood. Former residents manifest their disagreement that
such housing prices are considered affordable and reclaim their right to inhabit the
place. By the end of that year, after unfruitful negotiations, the small kiosk that hosted
the Worst Tours walking-tours-agency, known for being critical of the development
model adopted by the City Council, was demolished. In 2020 the Covid pandemic
forced the suspension of tourism for several months causing a considerable number
of accommodation facilities and restaurants to shut down. The same year, a group of
citizens delivered a petition to the National Assembly against the construction of a
new shopping mall at the site of a deactivated railway station, proposing instead the
creation of a public garden and the conservation of the station’s remaining building.
The government and the local administration both state the decision to build the mall
is irrevocable. In the local elections of 2021, the number of registered voters in the
historic center is 25% lower than it was in 2005.2 25% of the housing units in this

1 [Link]
de-toquio-ao-matadouro-de-campanha.
2 Calculated according to official statistics from the Ministry of Internal Administration.
Capitalist Visuality: Branding, Architecture, and Its Visual Reproduction … 243

Fig. 1 Clockwise form upper left: site of the demolished S. Vicente de Paulo social neighbor-
hood © Ana Miriam; promotional image depicting the historic center [Source europeanbestdes-
[Link]]; construction of the new Lapa Renaissance Hotel © Ana Miriam; building wrap
displaying the “Porto.” brand © Ana Miriam; site of the demolished Worst Tours kiosk © Ana
Miriam; advertising for new luxury apartments at the river front [Source [Link]]

region of the city are unoccupied.3 A new six storey, 14,000 m2 , high range hotel is
emerging in front of Monte da Lapa, a small hill covered by small modest houses.
There is presently no visible trace of the Aleixo Towers in their former grounds. The
site of the former Worst Tours’ Kiosk remains empty. Housing prices continue to
rise (Fig. 1).
The above events evince the accelerated transformation process that has been
taking place in the city of Porto for the last decades and the contrasting realities
and narratives that coexist in the city, on different levels of visibility. Watching the
spectacle of capitalist development transform the stage of their lives, how can citizens
make emancipated sense of what they see, in relation to what they are told and what
they experience?
This chapter addresses this question by examining the promotional image of the
city, created and projected in the last decades, as a means through which core capitalist
values, objectives and operative logic are disseminated and naturalized in public
space. Mirzoeff’s conceptualizations of visuality, as the aesthetic means through
which “domination imposes the sensible evidence of its legitimacy” and counter-
visuality, as the right to produce autonomous sense of the reality imposed by visuality
[11], inform our examination of branding, architecture, and its visual reproduction,
as discursive practices employed in the deployment of what we will designate as a
capitalist visuality.

3Data retrieved from the Censos 2021. [Link]

sos21_dados&xpid=CENSOS21
244 A. M. Rebelo et al.

2 The “Porto.” Brand: Local Tradition and “Cosmopolitan

Modernity”

Mirzoeff’s conceptualization of visuality examines visual culture as a medium for

the dissemination and legitimization of power, as well as for its disruption. Building
on Rancière’s “distribution of the sensible” [16], visuality designates the aesthetic
means through which dominant systems seek to present the legitimacy of their world
views as self-evident. It is not a matter of mere perception, but also of imagination,
a dimension that Rancière also alludes to when he asserts the reconfiguration of
possibility as a defining characteristic of political acts. As such, visuality and coun-
tervisuality involve perceptions of current situations, of the inscription of the past in
the present, as well as incursions into possible futures.
As visuality works to impose a given reality as ineluctable, “counter-visuality
claims the right to make autonomous sense of reality, while at the same time proposing
an alternative” [11]. The exercise of what Mirzoeff designates as “the right to look”
is a subversive act, political in the sense proposed by Rancière. This chapter is
constituted as an attempt at one such exercise.
The effect of place branding as an instrument of visualization of the capitalist
system is twofold: it reproduces and embodies the hegemonic capitalist logic that
views places as products that must be enhanced through promotional strategies, in
order to perform successfully in a highly competitive global market; simultaneously,
it seeks to establish and naturalize a vision of the city that matches the idealized
product. As Sorkin has put it: branding “entails the sale of both advertising and
product” [23]. Naturalization plays a crucial role in the pursuit of both effects.
Mirzoeff identifies naturalization as a defining operation of visuality complexes.
It is the means through which its conceptualizations are made to seem right, through
which it seeks to ensure consent by presenting them as self-evident. Visuality, in
Mirzoeff’s terms, is much an issue of inevitability, of things presented as incon-
testable facts. As we have previously argued [17], place branding has found a very
effective naturalization mechanism in the equation of the expressions place brand
and place identity. “While the word branding is explicit on the constructed nature
of its products, and generally connoted with profit, the word identity is associated
with intrinsic, essential characteristics” [17]. Thus, presenting a brand as something
intrinsic to a place, naturalizes a construct, intentionally confounding places with
their branded images. Place branding is likely one the most favorable marketing
fields for promoting the idea that “brand is simply the equivalent of culture and its
styles of inventing identity” [23].
The “Porto.” brand, implemented by the City Council in 2014, is a very evident
example of a place brand’s strategy to achieve validation through naturalization.
The central feature of its graphic identity, designed by Eduardo Aires and White
Studio, is its logo, displaying the city’s name in a bold, blue typeface, followed by
a full stop (Fig. 2). This simplicity is meant to be read as blunt: “Porto, period. It is
unquestionable, unavoidable, incomparable (…) Its affirmation is not external, it is
Capitalist Visuality: Branding, Architecture, and Its Visual Reproduction … 245

Fig. 2 ‘Porto.’ graphic identity | © Eduardo Aires/White Studio

intrinsic to Porto” [1]. The brand’s manual provides many other examples of intended
confusion between the city’s intrinsic identity and the brand [17].
While external communication was assumed by the City Council as the priority of
the brand’s creation [4], a lot of effort is also put in fostering residents’ identification
with the product being developed. For the product to fully work, citizens must buy
it as well. Identification in turn favors public consent of the vision and development
strategy pursued by the local administration. In this way, the city brand works both
as advertising and propaganda.
The promotional strategy of the “Porto.” brand is disseminated through formal
means, namely through the brand’s manual [2], and endlessly replicated by the diverse
industries and actors that, on different scales, live on the city’s profitability. It is
anchored on a narrative on the city’s past, an understanding of its present and a
vision of its future, from which two contrasting concepts stand out: local tradition
and “cosmopolitan modernity”.4 While presented as core characteristics of the city’s
identity, these are, above all, its best commercial assets.
The brand’s graphic identity highlights these two assets, by depicting traditional
local elements, using a contemporary, international graphic language. This widely
adopted design formula has nevertheless been producing paradoxical homogeneity
among place brands at a global level, contradicting the very purpose of place identities
(Porto Pelo Porto [13]). While the content is specific, the form is generic. On the
other hand, this strategy seems to offer the tourist a comfortable balance between
exotism and familiarity [9], providing a tamed translation of the city’s potentially
challenging alterity, into easily recognizable global references, suitable for rapid
touristic consumption.5

4 This last expression was employed by the current Mayor in the manual of the “Porto.” Brand [2].
5 For a detailed discussion on this subject see [17].
246 A. M. Rebelo et al.

Fig. 3 Building wrap. Municipal vehicle © Ana Miriam

The brand’s rhetoric is made visible in public space—both physical and virtual—
through overwhelming ubiquity and repetition. The brand’s sudden and spectacular
appearance in 2014, depicted in 600 billboards, travelling the city in public transports,
labelling municipal buildings and vehicles, building sites, and municipal workers,
set the tone for what remains a strategy marked by a blatant concern with visibility.
Through different scales of placement, from gigantic building wraps to labels on
street dustbins, the brand’s presence is both imponent and pervasive (Fig. 3).
Although directly impacted, the common citizen is a mere spectator of this
branding operation. In a typical exercise of visuality, the City Council asserts “that
exclusive claim to be able to look” [11], the prerogative of stating its own reading
of matters as reality. By projecting a vision of the city that has more to do with the
values of global capitalism than local idiosyncrasies, it affords legitimization to a
development model based on a capitalist logic that equates the concepts of economic
growth with public prosperity, thus establishing it as self-evident objective.
Yet a semblance of participation is advisable. It was provided by an inaugural
event in which citizens were invited to draw new elements for the icon network that
surrounds the brand’s logo, some of which were included in the brand’s repertoire.
More than an actual opportunity for participation, this late involvement of residents
was a means to validate the brand [4].

3 Architecture and Capitalist Visuality

The deployment of a capitalist visuality and the dissemination of the narrative that
promotes the city of Porto is achieved through a diversity of instruments which
concur to effectively transform the city into the idealized product and naturalize a
commercial approach to its development. Thus, the brand’s representation of the
city, at once reflects and supports urban interventions, which in turn progressively
confirm the city’s branded image, through selective rehabilitation and investment in
the production of particular architectural aesthetics, operating a dynamic of mutual
legitimization. As remarked by the authors of project “Porto pelo Porto”, invited
to present a proposal for the city’s graphic identity: “(…) which Porto we choose
Capitalist Visuality: Branding, Architecture, and Its Visual Reproduction … 247

Fig. 4 Images of Porto’s historic center local displayed in local businesses © Ana Miriam

Fig. 5 Promotional imagery: Advertising for shopping mall at a subway station: “20 restaurants
with a traditional architecture” © Ana Miriam. Real estate advertising [Source: Invest Porto booklet]
Touristic promotional imagery [Source: Visit Porto Facebook profile]

to privilege and project, are decisions that contaminate the present as well as the
dreamed city. We cannot separate representation and vision of the city. The first
implies the second” (Porto Pelo Porto [13]).6
This synergy relies on yet another crucial instrument: visual reproduction. Images
expand the visibility of iconic urban views at a global level and replicate it in every
corner of the city (Fig. 4). Through repetition, these images populate the collective
imaginary of residents, and prefigurate the tourist gaze, before it meets the real city
[21]. Given the relevance of tourism in the city’s economy, promotional imagery
is to a large extent targeted at tourists, but also at investors and prospective new
residents, and finally at local consumers. As economy is the city’s main drive asset,
its promotional image is the dominant tune.
An analysis of promotional images for the city of Porto, comprising communica-
tion and advertising issued by different agents, including the City Council, tourism
promoters, real estate agencies and local businesses, reveals a recurrent display of
built heritage, often punctuated with contemporary architectural icons. The promo-
tional rhetoric that sets local tradition and “cosmopolitan modernity” as the city’s
highlights relies to a large extent on architectural aesthetics: vernacular heritage on
one side, and international contemporary architecture on the other (Fig. 5). As a

6 Translation by the authors.

248 A. M. Rebelo et al.

major asset of the city as a product, architecture is part of the product, but it is also
part of the narrative. It is a referent but also a signifier.
Promotional images thus confirm the selection operation taking place on the phys-
ical level, with greater efficiency, as the selection performed by images effectively
excludes all that is not displayed. The management of the visibility of the city’s
architecture thus operated, on the physical plane as in the plane of images, is part
of a strategy pursued by the local administration comprising the “constitution of
a cultural and iconographic scenery”[15],7 favorable to the attraction of tourism,
investment and new residents.
As a result of Unesco’s declaration of Porto’s historic centre as a “world heritage”
site, the traditional architecture of its medieval core has become the city’s trademark,
the object of increasing efforts of conservation and refurbishment and massive visual
reproduction. In the book that celebrates the 20th anniversary of Unesco’s declara-
tion, makes a comprehensive analysis of the role of heritage discourse as a cultural,
economic and political device, noting how the historic city was endowed with a
discursive construction swaying between the urgency to protect and preserve and the
opportunity for making business, between the sacralization and commodification of
heritage [6].
Various authors have examined the relationships between the cultural role and
the commodification of heritage at a broader level. Sola Morales [21] analyzed the
heritage processes through which objects, such as architectural constructions, are
elevated to the status of works of art and historic documents, entering a specific
consumption system, as well as their conversion into images that become the basis
of history, aesthetic experience, and local identity, and come to represent concepts
as progress or cosmopolitanism. His analysis builds on Sorkin’s conceptualization
of the theme park to address the sense of simulation pervading in historic centers,
and Debord’s examination of the relationship between the society of spectacle and
capitalist commodification.
As a valuing system, heritage discourse sets a hierarchy upon cultural objects,
and is strongly entwined with political and economic rhetoric. Guillaume [8] argues
that: “They operate by sorting, differential destruction, selection. They rehabilitate,
transform, reuse. All in all, they hierarchize, order and stage elements that are useful
to them for the management of the present, to acclimatize the future. Heritage is
made educational, touristic, a setting of economic investment and experimentation
of advanced techniques.”8
In a city as old as Porto,9 the management of the existing built estate is a crucial
rhetorical arena. Besides its protagonism in the promotional strategy designed to
enhance the city’s appeal, heritage is also an effective resource for the creation
of identity narratives that play on the citizens’ sense of belonging and collective
pride, crucial factors in the naturalization of the city’s promotional image. This
instrumentalization of architectural heritage is nothing new: not so long ago, we may

7 Translation by the authors.

8 Translation by the authors.
9 The city’s oldest buildings date from the twelfth century.
Capitalist Visuality: Branding, Architecture, and Its Visual Reproduction … 249

recall how the conceptualization and dissemination of the style of the “Portuguese
House”10 was employed to consolidate a certain construction of Portuguese identity
during a nationalist dictatorship grasping at colonial power and fighting modernity.
The touristic rhetoric of authenticity finds particularly fertile ground in the city of
Porto, where a historic rivalry with a capital seen as sophisticated has strengthened
a tradition of direct speech, and blunt character. Not only does it fulfil what seems
to be a global touristic demand for authenticity, it meets local narratives, providing
a process of identification that often favors uncritical approval. Hence the success of
“Porto period”, through the instrumentalization of local idiosyncrasies, in favor of
legitimizing the commodification of local culture.
On the other end of an architectural spectrum, in which visibility is concentrated
in the extremes, we find contemporary architectural icons. These have become indis-
pensable signs of innovation and wealth for cities aiming to stand out in a global
competition. Their role in the “capitalist quest to transform places and cities into
marketable brands” [24] is widely acknowledged and explored by governments and
local administrations. Examinations of the role of iconic buildings in making capi-
talist hegemony visible demonstrate an instance of capitalist visuality. As remarked
by Sklair [18], capitalist corporations and their political and professional allies domi-
nate the construction of built environment, a position that allows them to inscribe
their own interests in public space. In “The Icon Project” Sklair argues that iconic
architecture is an important instrument to “create and solidify capitalist hegemony”
at a global level [19].
In his critique of the centrality that business and branding has assumed in contem-
porary architecture, [23] Sorkin argues that the brands of renowned architects’
provide “high-cultural legitimatization” to corporate powers, noting that branding
reduces architecture’s meanings to mere advertising. He further remarks that in the
post-modern era, the “aesthetic supplement” comes to “embrace the criteria and
symbols of global capital.”
The dissemination of this visuality, beyond public space, relies in the massive
reproduction enabled by digital images. If photography was already a fundamental
vector of architectural commodification since the onset of modernism, this dynamic
has become ever more relevant as digital photography vertiginously expanded the
circulation of architectural images, into the new virtual public space. The digital
revolution has also enabled the rise of architectural renderings, increasingly difficult
to distinguish from “actual photographs” [12]. They are “views of an idealized future”
that push “mediation a step further” as testified by the architects of the Urban Think
Tank [3].
In the city of Porto, the function of representing the city’s “cosmopolitan moder-
nity” in promotional imagery, has fallen largely upon Rem Koolhaas’ Casa da Música,
built on the occasion of the city’s nomination as European Capital of Culture in
2001. While other buildings by celebrated architects exist in the city, namely by two
local Pritzker prize recipients—Siza Vieira and Souto de Moura—they do not play

10The concept of the Portuguese House was developed by Raul Lino in his 1929 book “A Casa
Portuguesa”.
250 A. M. Rebelo et al.

Fig. 6 Rendering of the future Business, Cultural and Civic Center, by Kengo Kuma

a prominent role in the promotional iconography. Their aesthetics seem to lack the
spectacular character that is required to produce iconic images. The sobriety and inte-
gration of these buildings in their locations seems to compromise iconic potential.11
Khoollas, in turn, is one the four designers identified by Sklair as major producers
of iconic architecture.
In the near future, the new business, cultural and civic centre by Kengo Kuma,
announced as “the new Casa da Música”, will increase the city’s ratio of “cos-
mopolitan modernity” per local tradition. Its “unique visual impact” is being explored
well before its construction, which should begin in 2024, through the dissemination
of renderings. (Fig. 6)12 This is a key project for the current administration, marking
its development strategy and reinforcing the city image it aims to project, which
is to mirror the executive’s own image as a cosmopolitan, liberal administration.
This demonstrates awareness and operationalization of the fact that “the selection
of iconic foreign architects for prestigious national and urban projects has become a
prominent feature of capitalist globalization” [18].
Common citizens are, here again, spectators to urban processes that transform
their environment. Residents are symbolically invited to take part in the discussion
of fully developed projects and plans, only to the extent to which they do not obstruct,
but conveniently validate them. An example of such pro forma procedures is the call
to the public discussion of the recent revision of Porto’s Municipal Master Plan. This
type of consultation occurs at the final stage of the process, in which research has

11 See for example Siza Vieira’s Serralves Museum and Souto de Moura’s Casa das Artes.
12 [Link]
jeto-que-fez-para-o-matadouro-que-ja-tem-luz-verde-para-avancar.
Capitalist Visuality: Branding, Architecture, and Its Visual Reproduction … 251

Fig. 7 Representation of the future Monte da Bela housing project

demonstrated there is less opportunity to effectively influence the final document,

since at that moment only specific and often technical issues can be addressed and
not general principles or directions [5]. According to the report on the process of
public discussion,13 only 14% of the contributions were fully integrated in the final
document.
The lack of citizen participation here demonstrated in the instances of branding
and urban development, is revealing of the domination of public space as a discur-
sive scene by the alliance between political power and major corporations, that has
become typical of western urban environments. Meanwhile, groups of citizens spon-
taneously contest municipal plans that from their perspective, ignore their needs and
expectations and often violently infringe elementary principles of democracy and
justice. Such is the case of the former residents of Monte da Bela, scattered across
different locations after their neighborhood was demolished over justifications they
did not comprehend.14 Fifteen years later, they reclaim the right to be included in
a new residential project, which is to be built at the same location, overseeing the
river15 (Fig. 7). However, despite integrating a municipal strategy to provide afford-
able housing, this new housing project is not accessible to their revenues. This is a

13 [Link]
14 [Link]
bairro-de-sao-vicente-de-paulo-240318.
15 [Link]

sair-telmo-ainda-sonha-que-mora-no-bairro-de-sao-vicente-paulo/242958/.
252 A. M. Rebelo et al.

very concrete example that indeed, “the effort to reclaim the city is the struggle of
democracy itself” [22].
Besides tradition and “cosmopolitan modernity”, ordinary life proceeds in the
functional austerity of generic apartment blocks, in the unclassifiable creativity of
informal housing, in the raw aesthetics of scarcity, in expectant terrain-vagues [20]
and abandoned buildings appropriated by autonomous agents. What image of the city
can be composed from these other realities? How long before the marginal vitality
that emanates from some of these spaces is neutralized by the ever-expanding co-
optation that constitutes the defense mechanism of branding, by a system of which,
it has been said, there is no outside (Koolhas, as cited in [23]). Can they explicitly
be constituted as alternatives without exposing themselves to such mechanisms, or
is their potential of subversion better kept underground?
The research and production of visual means that can foster alternative visions of
the past, present and future of places, and challenge the established role distribution
that prevents common citizens from actively participating in the construction of
their environments is, we argue, an important path in the continuous endeavor of
reimagining power and possibility, that is the core of countervisuality.

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A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising:
A Case Study on How Outdoor
Advertising Can Support Local Identity

Ana Seixosa and Maria Cadarso

Abstract Throughout its history, Kyoto has been considered a well-designed city,
with drawings of its natural and urban landscape reproduced in a myriad of everyday
objects. To protect this panorama amid the modernization of the city and the growing
number of disruptive outdoor advertisements, brought about by globalization and
economic progress, policies of landscape preservation and city planning have devel-
oped severe restrictions, holding much higher standards than any other city in Japan.
Using Kyoto as a model city, this study explores the benefits of a greater contribution
from brands in the dissemination of the intrinsic values held by a given place through
its outdoor advertising. To establish a basis capable of assessing the importance of
quantitative and qualitative variations in advertising, the current Japanese socio-
logical, cultural, and aesthetic situation was analyzed. Through a field study based
on visual research, a sample composed of 180 advertising objects was collected in
Kyoto and examined in three sequential phases: descriptive analysis, content anal-
ysis, and interpretive analysis. The results show a cultural and aesthetic preference
in the outdoor advertising of Kyoto which could be explored by brands to support
local identity, as well as establish a more effective, meaningful relationship with the
city’s inhabitants.

Keywords Kyoto · Local identity · Outdoor advertising · Cultural preferences ·

Aesthetic preferences

A. Seixosa (B) · M. Cadarso

Arts, Technology and Design Faculty, IADE, Av. Dom Carlos I, 4, 1200649 Lisbon, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
M. Cadarso
e-mail: mcadarso@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 255
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
256 A. Seixosa and M. Cadarso

1 Brief Overview of Kyoto City

1.1 From Edo Period Onwards

Although the country’s capital for more than a thousand years until 1868, Kyoto had
said title overthrown during the feudal period (1603–1868), with the establishment of
the central government in Edo (present-day Tokyo) by the shōgun Tokugawa Ieyasu
(1543–1616) [1]. Notwithstanding, Kyoto remained the center of imperial power—
although with no political authority—as well as an academic and cultural center
supported by the noble society of the court. These members of the imperial court,
although financially dependent on the shōgun, would continue to support the fine
arts in the city, employing the most gifted artisans in Kyoto to supply their needs for
refined pieces [2], and thus, the manufacture of various luxury items led the local
economy to flourish in the direction of traditional industries such as nishijin-ori,
pottery, ceramics and bronze wares [3]. In the second half of the Edo period, the city
known for its temples and shrines had a population of almost 400,000 inhabitants
who identified with the elegance and refinement befitting of the imperial court [2].
The art produced in Kyoto at the time was also less limited than the art produced in
Edo, the latter being restricted to a set of expressions due to its direct contact with
the shōgun regime [4]. Consequently, and as attested by Okakura, several academics,
scholars, and thinkers considered Kyoto their refuge, developing new schools and
art forms there that would eventually serve as a fulcrum for the Meiji restoration.
Nowadays, Kyoto’s cultural heritage is one of the country’s main assets, which
is why the government, as well as the city’s inhabitants, remain committed in main-
taining the same traditional atmosphere, introducing, to this end, radical reforms
[5, 6]. According to Sugimoto, Kyoto inhabitants represent the culture of western
Japan in an insightful way; enjoying interpersonal relationships influenced by prin-
ciples of non-intervention, partial commitment, and mutual freedom, thus devel-
oping a more refined and modern style of group dynamics than the—historically
hierarchical—dynamics held by Tokyo inhabitants [6].

1.2 A Government-Designated City

Throughout its history, Japan has selected a certain group of landscapes containing
aesthetic appreciations, designating them as scenic places [7]. Regarding the scenery
of Kyoto prefecture, since the period of state of war in Japan, Muromachi period
(1336–1573), drawings of its landscape have become particularly popular in the
country, encouraging the practice of visiting shrines and temples for its sightseeing
purposes among the people [3]. Over more recent years, the modernization of the city
and disruptive advertising objects have slowly transformed this previously esteemed
landscape, causing landscape planning and preservation policies to acquire greater
A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising … 257

importance to deal with the expansion of the urban area and the increase of the
commercial activities [3, 5].
The fear of losing its cultural heritage in the near future due to the irregular
urbanization of the city, led Kyoto to establish the Council on Landscape Formation
of Kyoto Shining Forever [3]. Following new recommendations from this council,
in 2007, the city of Kyoto created a New Landscape Policy where, among other
projects, was the implementation of stricter regulations on outdoor advertising. Thus,
to existing restrictions, ordinances such as: the use of a more restricted color palette
(prohibiting the use of bright red and yellow tones as base colors as it is considered
disruptive to the immediate scenario); the standardization of the format of lateral
signboards of shops; the removal of twinkling lights and inappropriate mobile adver-
tising; and the removal of advertising panels from the top of buildings were added
[5]. This review aimed to create agreement in relation to the local characteristics of
height and design of buildings, especially regarding the urban attributes of the kyo-
machiya (traditional townhouses), which carry great cultural value. In addition, the
city created incentives related to the design of advertising objects that can contribute
to making each of its districts more attractive. Thus, advertisements with a historical
design, and intended for the well-being of the community, favored a relaxation of
the restrictions, particularly in terms of dimension and height [5].
This last point is of particular importance, considering that a greater focus on
the appreciation of the scenic landscape may cause a neglect for the everyday envi-
ronment, as well as the experience of the local inhabitants. According to Saito,
the disregard for such variables may result in an impoverishment, both aesthetic and
ecological, of the everyday landscape that, ultimately, will affect society on a deeper,
more constant level than the distant scenic places [7].

2 Problem Definition

Pondering the restrictions on outdoor advertising established by the Kyoto govern-

ment, we intend to verify if they are beneficial, not only in protecting Kyoto’s
landscape but also in disseminating its identity and ensuring community well-being.
Regarding outdoor advertising as an integral part of the urban landscape, we
hope to demonstrate that its ability to adapt and recognize different socio-cultural
contexts will reinforce the local identity and a sense of place in Kyoto. Thus, this
investigation explores the adaptation of outdoor advertising based on the possibility
of its consideration—in its various languages—of the local identity, aiming to reveal
if current outdoor advertisements in Kyoto present specific cultural and aesthetic
preferences.
258 A. Seixosa and M. Cadarso

3 Contextual Framework

To ensue this investigation, we deal with the essential themes to analyze the reality
of Japanese society and the way in which advertising has adapted to its changes
over the years. In this sense, the necessary information for the construction of the
contextual framework of this study was organized into four study areas: sociological
variations; cultural variations; aesthetic variations; and the History of advertising in
Japan. The contribution presented here is taken from an investigation carried out
during a master’s dissertation where an extensive literature review was produced,
and which explored outdoor advertising tendencies in the cities of Kyoto, Osaka,
and Tokyo. For the purposes of contextualization for this paper, and an ongoing
Ph.D. investigation, only the most relevant findings related to the city of Kyoto will
be analyzed, where we develop on the initial data, now centered on Kyoto city and
its community.

3.1 The Japanese Society

Reflecting on the external image of Japanese society, Sugimoto observed that the
lifestyles and values of certain groups, with greater access to the mass media and
notoriety, acquired a disproportionately high level of visibility in relation to the
rest of the population [6]. Such a tendency implied that Japanese society was often
viewed from a generic perspective, based on a biased sample of the middle class as
representative of the whole. Likewise, nihonjinron (theories of “Japaneseness”), a
discourse frequently utilized in books and academic studies on the country, persisted
as the paradigm that considered Japan the bearer of a single and homogeneous society
[6]. Just as stated by Sugimoto, this idea can be contradicted upon closer observations,
revealing a much more diverse society than the stereotype suggests.
Sociological Variations. The Japanese archipelago, made up of four main islands
(Hokkaidō, Honshū, Shikoku, and Kyūshū) and about seven thousand smaller islands,
has, currently, a population of around 125 million people. If we regard Japan as a
conglomerate of different provinces, divided into regional blocs, it will not come as a
surprise that people will present distinct lifestyles according to the region where they
live. As such, topics such as eating habits, type of housing, language, and mentality
are some of the varying characteristics attributed not only to generational differences,
but also regional ones [6].
Furthermore, for much of history, because of these spatial and cultural variations,
as well as a need for expanding their respective authority, a scenario of competitive-
ness between the Kantō region (an area east of Honshū which includes the Great
Tokyo area) and the Kansai region (an area west of Honshū which includes the
Osaka and Kyoto prefectures) could be observed [6]. This rivalry persisted until
today, as Sugimoto described two distinct Japanese societies: the first, structured
vertically, where hierarchical superiority dominates sectors such as work, education,
A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising … 259

and household (mostly observed in the Kantō region); and the second, more horizon-
tally organized and egalitarian, where women enjoy a higher social status (observed
in the Kansai region) [6].
Cultural Variations. Such as the culture of other complex societies, Japanese
society comprises a multitude of diverse subcultures which can be organized into
three categories: folk culture; alternative culture; and mass culture.
Folk Culture. This type of popular culture is established in the day-to-day life of
the population, i.e., it is constantly being formatted and its content modified from
place to place and as the years go by. Thus, folk culture has a great dependence
on its inhabitants’ historical memory, and it is the reason for regionally diverse
behaviors and traditions such as festivals, folk songs, local dances, etc. [6]. Sugimoto
suggested three Japanese emic terms as fundamental to understanding the folk culture
of the Japanese, namely: hare, ke and kegare. Hare will represent occasions and
events where formal and festive feelings prevail and where people dress up and
enjoy delicacies considered exclusive to “hare events”. In contrast, ke will relate to
what is routine and conventional, its triviality giving rise to the concept of kegare, in
which the vitality of events is lost. How we view opposing types as hare and ke or
hare and kegare, is said to determine the characteristics of a particular society [6].
Alternative Culture. Characterized by forms of mass dissent in relation to the
established order. This category of culture will reflect the displeasure and grievances
of parts of society and the desire to rebel and challenge the cultural status quo of some
groups [6]. Thus, alternative culture challenges the scenarios and visions constituted
by mass culture and folk culture, threatening the established patterns, however, it can
also be indirect, and not necessarily political. Some examples are the mini-komi (mini
communications), such as community newsletters and magazines; counterculture
events and performances; new religions; and the rise of socially deprived groups
for their defiance of authority, sexual orientation or political beliefs [6]. As pointed
out by Sugimoto, contemporary Japanese culture is rife with examples of alternative
culture, that today are exposed and at risk of being lumped together with folk culture
or mass culture.
Mass Culture. Mainly spread through mass media, mass culture will be depen-
dent on its value in the market, remaining relevant as long as it is consumed by a
large number of people. Consequently, mass culture is consumer-oriented, where its
viability is directly subordinated to people’s willingness to consume, or continue
to consume, its contents. Once the public’s disinterest is apparent, mass culture
must transform itself, as is often the case in the music and fashion industry, which,
are constantly changing [6]. Sugimoto also described the fluidity and variability of
forms and styles as a vehicle for the proliferation of mass culture, indicating four
phenomena that achieved worldwide popularity: manga; pachinko; karaoke; and love
hotels, along with other love industry products. More recently, other expressions of
Japanese popular culture such as J-pop, dramas, cinema, live actions, and entertain-
ment programs on Japanese television have been increasingly consumed in mass and
other non-Japanese audiences [8]. The diversity within the mass culture phenomena
elements themselves (e.g., in the J-pop industry, where there is a vast number of
groups, some with an excessive number of members) as well as the connectivity
260 A. Seixosa and M. Cadarso

between some of them (e.g., the collaboration between the anime and pachinko
industries in the manufacture of new games), fulfills the requirements of different
audiences through different products and services. This results in a mass culture that
seems to be completely in tune with capitalism, expanding globally and conquering
a loyal group of fans designated in the country as otaku, and who have become
an actual sociological phenomenon [8]. Currently, mass media supported by the
decline of critical theory, contributed to a system that naturalized the “fan club”
ideology in Japan, where the consumer public is addressed as a fan by companies
in their marketing strategies [9]. As a result, the expression of being a fan, or otaku,
of a particular aidoru (Japanese idol) or product has become a normative way of
identifying oneself in contemporary Japan.
Aesthetic Variations. In this section, the main principles of Japanese aesthetics
were briefly analyzed. Here, the term “aesthetics” appears as referring to a set of
values and principles that allow for artistic distinctions to be made, where an aesthetic
is characterized by distinction, clarity, and repetition [10].
Traditionally, nine Japanese aesthetic principles are identified, namely: wabi-
sabi; shibui; yūgen; iki; miyabi; geidō; ensō; jo-ha-kyu; and kawaii. Some of these
principles can also co-exist, e.g., given their origins, wabi-sabi, shibui and yūgen
naturally share some qualities and values from Zen philosophy.
Wabi-sabi. Is composed of two distinct concepts, wabi (sober refinement, rustic
beauty) and sabi (patina, antiquity) that have merged over the centuries. The inspira-
tion of this aesthetic principle derived from ideas of simplicity, naturalness, and
acceptance of reality, found in Taoism and Zen Buddhism that spread in Japan
during the Heian period (794–1185) [11]. Thus, the values of wabi-sabi opposed the
dominant aesthetics of the time, leading society towards a more rustic and detached
ideology that emerged as a movement of counterculture to the cultivation of refined
elegance, perfection, and polished beauty of Chinese aesthetics, and is typically asso-
ciated with the Heian period. Wabi-sabi represented a departure from these ideals,
giving value to objects that are imperfect, perishable. Thus, natural principles, such
as the impermanence of objects, made them more pleasant, alluding to a depth and
meaning that transcended their physical attributes. During the second half of the
Muromachi period, the wabi-sabi movement gained influence, managing to penetrate
almost all aspects of Japanese culture and sophisticated taste, largely modifying the
view on the tea ceremony which had become an elitist activity at the time [10].
Shibui. Easily found in traditional arts and culture, shibui is considered one of
the most relevant elements for understanding Japanese design [11]. The term first
appeared during the Muromachi period, used to describe something with an astrin-
gent, bitter taste. During the first half of the Edo period, shibui came to express a
discreet beauty, well crafted, but not too captivating, as opposed to ostentation and
extravagance [12]. Similarly, De Mente defended shibui beauty as a carrier of serenity
and sober luxury, distinguishing another type of shibui beauty that results from the
elimination of everything that is unnecessary, reducing the objects to their essence,
where the surface, color, and texture are serene, calming, elegant [11]. Thus, restraint
is one of the main attributes of shibui, where shibui objects are muted and modest,
A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising … 261

with euphemism, and an underlying notion that the least outstanding object will be
the most artistically effective, as characteristics of this aesthetic [13].
Yūgen. Due to its origin as a concept of Zen Buddhism precise definitions are
usually avoided, its meaning varying with its contexts from “mysterious beauty”
to “profound grace” [12]. Thus, De Mente described yūgen as a reduction to the
essence, interpreting the term both as “mystery” and “subtlety”, used to refer to the
beauty hidden beneath the surface or the mysterious grace or spirit of something that
is only hinted at, but which is absent in visual terms [11]. To achieve this visually,
De Mente suggested a design so simple that it is both subtle and elegant, including
an asymmetrical touch of color or a single image as the focal point of an object left,
for the most part, untouched.
Iki. Often interpreted as “originality”, “uniqueness” or “refined style” [12], iki has
its roots among the Japanese merchant class that gained economic influence during
the Edo period, its origin often being attributed to the city of Edo itself. According to
Graham, iki was more evident in the yūkaku (legal red-light districts) of large cities
and in the erotic interactions between its participants, such as between geisha and
their clients. The semantic context of this term was first explained by Kuki Shuzo
(1888–1941) who defined iki as composed of three moments: bitai (coquetry), ikiji
(pride and honor), and akirame (resignation), where the first constituted the basic
tonality of iki while the last two defined the ethnic and historical coloring of a society
[14].
In contemporary culture, iki can be observed in the interactions between the aidoru
and their fans, defined by an affective, but limited, bond. The impossibility that a
relationship with an aidoru can provide satisfaction is, in the end, the link between the
otaku phenomenon and the commercialization of iki, where the aidoru will oscillate
between an inaccessible ideal (the pure) and the infinitely available material (the
sexual) [9].
Miyabi. Presented by Graham as the opposite of the understated and subdued
beauty of shibui, wabi-sabi and iki, miyabi is related to a more opulent, refined
elegance, often associated with the Japanese elite, where the spirit of fūryū or “elegant
behavior” will be manifested [12]. Although particularly connected to the aesthetic
preferences of aristocrats of the Heian period, the term evolved through sociological
events, such as the rise of the samurai class to power and the appearance of great
masters of the tea ceremony [15]. As expressed by De Mente, the rigor placed in the
arts, and the values of the samurai, influenced Japanese artists and artisans who were
encouraged to eliminate everything that was vulgar and extravagant from their works,
seeking to incorporate elegance in everything they build. Likewise, the famous tea
ceremony provided an important contribution to the concept of miyabi, preaching
that for something to be truly beautiful it must be reduced to its essence, to the point
where its spirit can be seen. Consequently, miyabi is related to a refinement that can
make way for the grace and the politeness of appearance and good manners.
Geidō. It is the embodiment of discipline and ethics in traditional arts and crafts.
One of the components shared between the written characters for kyudō (bow and
arrow), judō (martial arts), shodō (calligraphy), kadō (flower arrangements) and
sadō (tea ceremony) is the particle “dō” (道), marking the philosophical-religious
262 A. Seixosa and M. Cadarso

orientation of the practices [16]. Hence, geidō is not a visual aesthetic principle, but
a way of transforming work or action into a medium of art. An example of this is in
the geisha and how commitment, discipline and ethics are not only part of their work,
but also of the way they lead their lives. Moving according to dō means moving with
a natural spontaneity as an embodiment of the concept of “non-action” where the
movements of a geisha while serving tea, or of a nō actor during a performance, go
beyond activity and passivity, where the world moves the body as much as the body
moves in the world [16]. Geidō will allow for a piece to be more than an object of
aesthetic judgment, enabling an appreciation for the creation process.
Ensō. One of the most widespread images of Zen art, ensō is described as both the
simplest and the most complex form, relating a hand-drawn circle formed by a single
brush stroke. Strongly linked to Zen philosophy, the image of ensō must include four
other minor aesthetic principles, namely: fukinsei (asymmetry, irregularity); kanso
(simplicity); shizen (without pretense, natural); and datsuzoku (freedom from habit)
[17]. Regarding the latter, more valuable than the expression and execution of form,
ensō is created to convey the expression of an artist’s mind when unfettered. That
is, the appearance of the circle will depend not only on their style but also on the
way they conduct their life at the time of creation. Thus, ensō is not only an artistic
representation but a transformative experience.
Jo-ha-kyu. It is a concept of modulation and movement where three tempos are
used, translating a rhythm where rituals and performances will start slowly, build
momentum and end quickly. Zeami Motokiyo (1363–1443), master of nō theater,
was the first to write about this aesthetic principle, describing it as a rhythm innate to
the world and, as such, everything naturally obeys the law of the jo-ha-kyu process,
where any work or action that has jo-ha-kyu as a fundamental aesthetic principle
will have the same principle present either in its general structure (macro) or in other
smaller jo-ha-kyu cycles (micro) that constitute it [18]. Consequently, although it
is most frequently discussed in traditional Japanese arts (nō theater, tea ceremony,
martial arts, etc.), the jo-ha-kyu rhythm can also be found in modern culture; music,
cinema, contemporary dance, and even advertising.
Kawaii. It signaled the concept and culture of the “adorable” in modern Japan,
incorporating three basic characteristics: itawashii (pitiable); aisubeki (lovable); and
chiisakute utsukushii (small and cute) [19]. Hence, kawaii refers to any object or
person that retains traditionally childish attributes and behaviors, capable of trig-
gering a protective and affective response in people. In everyday objects, it will
render a powerless/helpless appearance to objects, making them empathetic, while
in people, especially young women and teenagers, neotenic attributes and a delicate,
gentle behavior with a higher tone of voice are appreciated and even encouraged
[11]. Over the years, other ramifications of kawaii have also emerged in Japanese
society (kimokawaii, yamikawaii, yumekawaii, etc.) to illustrate the thoughts and
sensibilities of different groups of people—the psychology behind kawaii leading
to its success with the mass audience, enticing different individuals across all age
groups. Consequently, kawaii has become the most visible aesthetic principle in
Japan’s consumer and entertainment products category, constituting a safe bet for
brands and companies that want to succeed in the Japanese market [11].
A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising … 263

4 Methodology

After collecting the necessary information to ground this study, a research plan was
established in two phases: an observational phase, where all the study material was
gathered; and a confirmational phase, based on visual research [20]. In its entirety,
the investigation was organized according to an empirical methodological proposal
of a case study, carried out in the cities of Kyoto, Osaka, and Tokyo [21]. The results
shown in this paper relate to the sample gathered in Kyoto city, which we analyzed
in order to validate the following research hypothesis: Outdoor advertising in Kyoto
frequently presents elements of traditional culture.

4.1 Characterization of Research

Sample Characterization. By means of an external quantitative research method

(field study), a vast study material related to the city of Kyoto was collected during
the period from October 2018 to March 2019. To construct the sample, photo-
graphic material of outdoor advertising objects was collected randomly in the areas
of Fushimi, Higashiyama, Kamigyo, Nakagyō, Sakyō, and Shimogyō.
From a wider first collection of research material, the final sample was taken,
thus being classified as a non-probabilistic sample for convenience, composed of
180 study objects from 67 different – national and international – brands.
Procedures. Once established our sample, the analysis of each advertising object
took place through the creation of a coding sheet capable of showing advertising
trends and proving the research hypothesis. Thirteen study variables were identified
in this coding sheet: Brand; City; Product/service category; Communication channel;
Material; Size; Placement; Type of technique; Light; Approach; Dominant palette;
Visual Elements; and Content Description. These variables (attributes of the adver-
tising objects) were then divided into 70 sublevels (variations of these attributes),
classified according to the most representative component of each variable.
A second evaluator, with knowledge of graphic design and the Japanese language,
analyzed the Kyoto sample using the coding sheet created, allowing for the discussion
of some variables and the detection of discrepancies. In the end, two coding sheets
were built to analyze the Kyoto sample considering nine variables: Communication
channel; Material; Size; Type of technique; Light; Type of approach; Dominant
Palette, and Visual Elements, (the other variables were omitted for requiring an
advanced knowledge of the study universe by the second evaluator). After that,
Cohen’s kappa was calculated to infer whether the agreement between evaluators
was superior to the agreement by chance. The final validation of this coefficient
showed excellent results in the level of agreement with k > 0.800 and p < 0.001 in
all weighted variables.
264 A. Seixosa and M. Cadarso

Table 1 Frequencies for

Visual elements Kyoto sample
the visual elements variable
in the Kyoto sample Japanese characters 38.3% (69)
Latin characters 18.9% (34)
Japanese and Latin characters 10.6% (19)
Product 8.3% (15)
Celebrity 2.2% (4)
Celebrity and product -
Manga/Anime 0.6% (1)
Mascot 2.2% (4)
Traditional elements 16.7% (30)
Contemporary elements –
Traditional and Contemporary elements 1.1% (2)
Model 1.1% (2)
Total 100% (180)

Upon refining our coding sheet, we proceeded with the final analysis of the sample,
the results being accounted for and presented using the most appropriate tables for
this purpose and with all quantitative data obtained using the SPSS tool.
In the final phase of this study, a discussion and interpretation of the results
within cultural and aesthetic contexts was carried out, allowing us to recognize inten-
tional attributes that constitute different aesthetic principles and explain the possible
meaning of some trends with relevant examples.
Results. The data of the variables that express significant results to the investi-
gation was examined below. To support the prediction of the hypothesis raised, the
frequencies for the variable “Visual Elements” was observed (Table 1).
The results show that the sample values mainly four sublevels in the “Visual
elements” variable, with the following order of perceived importance: (a) Japanese
characters; (b) Latin characters; (c) Traditional elements; and (d) Japanese and Latin
characters. Considering the customary use of written characters in advertising for its
informative and descriptive purpose, it is apparent that elements of traditional culture
are the most distinguishing elements in Kyoto’s outdoor advertising, according to
the sample.
The study of other variables provided additional results that contributed to an
understanding of further preferences, demonstrating interesting trends in variables
such as “Type of technique”, “Dominant palette”, “Approach” and “Material”.
For the variable “Type of technique”, the most valued sublevels for the sample
follow the perceived order of importance: (a) Typography; (b) Calligraphy; (c) Illus-
tration; and (d) Realistic photography. These results can be correlated to the results
for the variable “Visual Elements”, however, it is to note that the value for the sublevel
“Calligraphy” (25.6%) displays an interesting trend, especially when compared to the
results found in the Osaka and Tokyo samples. Despite written characters (Japanese
A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising … 265

Table 2 Frequencies for

Type of technique Kyoto sample
the type of technique variable
in the Kyoto sample Realistic photography 10.0% (18)
Illustration 14.4% (26)
Montage 7.2% (13)
Calligraphy 25.6% (46)
Typography 37.2% (67)
Calligraphy and typography 3.9% (7)
Sculpture 1.7% (3)
Total 100% (180)

characters; Latin characters; and Japanese and Latin characters) being the most repre-
sentative elements of outdoor advertising in all samples, the sublevel “Calligraphy”
is undervalued in the Osaka and Tokyo samples, making up 6.7% and 3.3% of the
total sample value for the variable, respectively [21]. Consequently, the analysis of
the variable “Type of technique” in the Kyoto sample reveals an affinity for the use
of Calligraphy that is not as perceived in the other two samples (Table 2).
Another finding involves the “Dominant palette” variable. Containing four
sublevels, the variable shows the same value for its most frequent sublevels: Sober
colors (31.1%) and Black and white (31.1%), followed by the Vivid colors sublevel
(23.9%) as the third most observed in the sample.
It can, therefore, be established that the sample favors a palette that tends to blend
in rather than stand out. The results found for the Kyoto sample, not only demonstrate
the effects of the restrictions imposed by the government on outdoor advertising in
terms of color palette but also indicate that there is still a considerable number of
cases that evade such ordinances, presenting a noteworthy value for the use of Vivid
colors (Table 3).
Supporting only two sublevels, the variable “Approach” (Table 4) presents very

Table 3 Frequencies for

Dominant palette Kyoto sample
the dominant palette variable
in the Kyoto sample Vivid colors 23.9% (43)
Sober colors 31.1% (56)
Pastel colors 13.9% (25)
Black and white 31.1% (56)
Total 100% (180)

Table 4 Frequencies for

Approach Kyoto sample
the approach variable in the
Kyoto sample Emotional 7.2% (13)
Rational 92.8% (167)
Total 100% (180)
266 A. Seixosa and M. Cadarso

Table 5 Frequencies for

Material Kyoto sample
the material variable in the
Kyoto sample Paper 23.9% (43)
Acrylic 35.0% (63)
Fabric 9.4% (17)
Wood 10.6% (19)
Vinyl 9.4% (17)
Canvas 6.7% (12)
LED lights 1.1% (2)
Other 3.9% (7)
Total 100% (180)

Table 6 Frequencies for

Communication channel Kyoto sample
the communication channel
variable in the Kyoto sample Poster 16.7% (30)
MUPI 5.0% (9)
Electronic screen 1.1% (2)
Billboard 6.7% (12)
Gable 0.6% (1)
Window/storefront 5.0% (9)
Lantern 4.4% (8)
Curtain/cloth 8.3% (15)
Signboard 17.8% (32)
Self-luminous signboard 15.0% (27)
Lateral signboard 11.7% (21)
Totem 2.8% (5)
Easel 3.3% (6)
Banners –
Other 1.7% (3)
Total 100% (180)

high values for the Rational sublevel in the sample (92.8%). This discrepancy seems
to be directly related to the results obtained for the variable “Visual elements”,
in which sublevels with a more cognitive disposition (Japanese characters, Latin
characters, Japanese and Latin characters) represent 67.8% of the total sample value.
The analysis of the variable “Material” (Table 5) presents the following order of
perceived frequencies in the sample: (a) Acrylic; (b) Paper; (c) Wood; and (d) Fabric
and Vinyl with the same value, (9.4%). This variable seems to be directly connected
to the variable “Communication channel”, analyzed in Table 6.
According to Table 6, the most valued sublevels: (a) Signboard; (b) Poster; (c)
Self-luminous signboard; and (d) Lateral signboard, demonstrate a tendency for the
A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising … 267

use of more conventional communication channels in the Kyoto sample. The results
gathered in this table also account for the impact of the restrictions imposed on
outdoor advertising, affecting the frequencies of certain sublevels within the variable,
e.g., limiting the use of billboards and electronic screens in the Kyoto sample, which
is particularly noticeable upon observing the higher value of these sublevels in the
Osaka and Tokyo samples [21].
Qualitative Assessments. After describing and quantifying the results found,
i.e., completing the content analysis, the quantitative data obtained is related to the
theoretical framework developed previously, with the aim of explaining the trends
found and translating some of the visual and non-visual aspects of outdoor advertising
in the sociocultural context of Kyoto.
Adapting outdoor advertising to a regional cultural preference. The analysis of
quantitative results revealed that outdoor advertising in Kyoto has a great affinity
for showcasing elements of traditional Japanese culture. A company that seemed to
understand regional differences and use them to communicate effectively was the soft
drink maker The Coca-Cola Company, where its campaign Region-limited Bottles
supported unique regional designs while maintaining the brand’s typical colors. The
representation of regional characteristics benefited both the inhabitants, invigorating
their feelings towards their regions, and the brand, especially considering that, in
Kyoto, advertisements with a historical design favor a relaxation of the restrictions
imposed [5]. Thus, the representation of traditional elements, such as hanami (the
custom of viewing cherry blossoms) and the 150 years celebration of the Meiji
Restoration (Fig. 1), can be considered a reason why Coca-Cola posters could be
found at the entrance of local stores, despite their vivid red color.
Adapting outdoor advertising to a regional aesthetic preference. Aesthetic
contemplation will break the common semantic meaning of an object, both on an
initial material level and on the possible level of its representations [22]. Admitting

Fig. 1 Coca-Cola Posters affixed at the entrance of local businesses, Kyoto, 2019. Photographs by
Ana Seixosa
268 A. Seixosa and M. Cadarso

a contemplative and open act, where the aesthetic pleasure is in the existence of
the object, not in its purpose, it is possible to analyze advertising objects as objects
capable of provoking aesthetic appreciation.
As discussed in the literature review, to continue advertising in the city, some
brands had to adapt their advertising objects to the requirements stipulated by the
Kyoto government [3, 5]. Although not labeled as such, the compliance with some
of those requirements could be interpreted as following some previously studied
Japanese aesthetic principles.
Figure 2 shows advertisements created for different brands in Kyoto. Due to their
high saturation, considered disruptive to the city’s landscape, the brands’ usual vivid
colors were replaced. The color palette often chosen as a substitute, composed of
various shades of chestnut and russet, is considered a necessary attribute to produce
the calm and subdued effect of shibui [11]. Ultimately, the adaptation of outdoor
advertising in Kyoto considering the characteristics of the kyo-machiya will insinuate
such attributes, naturally associated with shibui beauty.
On the other hand, in the lateral signboards of the city, where the government
required fixed standards to be followed regarding dimensions, design, and placement
[5], a dominance of the Black and white palette was observed in the “Dominant
palette” variable. Especially in the commercial-residential, historical, and aesthetic
preservation districts of Kyoto, the lateral signboards were mostly composed of
white acrylic and black colored fonts, some bearing the name of the establishments
in calligraphic strokes. Recounting the results obtained for the variables “Type of
technique” and “Dominant palette” (see Tables 2 and 3) and observing Fig. 3, we
can attest the affinity of the Kyoto sample for the usage of Black and White and
Calligraphy. This type of design seems to make a deliberate allusion to the Japanese
calligraphic art, shodō, whose name admits to conveying the geidō aesthetic.
It is concluded that there is an appreciation on the part of outdoor advertising in
Kyoto for the representation of Japanese calligraphic styles, equally sustained by its

Fig. 2 Different brands adapt their colors according to a similar color palette, Kyoto, 2019.
Photographs by Ana Seixosa
A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising … 269

Fig. 3 Lateral signboards of different businesses displaying calligraphic strokes, Kyoto, 2019.
Photographs by Ana Seixosa

inhabitants who remain more faithful to the arts and to the traditional methods in
relation to the rest of Japanese society [6].
Regarding the variable “Material”, this investigation pointed to a significant
frequency for the use of natural materials in the Kyoto sample in comparison to
the Osaka and Tokyo samples [21]. The results obtained for the variable “Com-
munication channel” showed that the Poster sublevel reached great significance in
the Kyoto sample. Furthermore, the poster was the only communication channel
observed that, separated from its business, managed to enter and advertise in the
aesthetic and historic districts of the city, such as in the Gion Shimbashi district
where they were affixed in front of several kyo-machiya (Fig. 4). In this scenario
the presence of the advertising poster enhanced the local landscape by transmitting
the atmosphere and lifestyle valued both by the city and its inhabitants, as well as
by tourists who seek these places for their historical value. The use of the posters at
historic sites, where rows of kyo-machiya were built, does not take from its beauty,
rather it helps the city to return to a human scale, reminiscent of the ancient times
cherished in Kyoto.

Fig. 4 Posters affixed in front of kyo-machiya, Kyoto, 2019. Photographs by Ana Seixosa
270 A. Seixosa and M. Cadarso

Equally more evident in these areas was the use of traditional paper lanterns, which
convey the wabi-sabi and shibui aesthetics [11], and wooden signboards. Although
wooden signboards are less decorative, and regularly used for identification functions,
this purpose could become secondary to the natural character and patina that this
medium can hold. Figure 5 illustrates one of these cases, where Okamoto Orimono
Honten kept its wooden sign, despite having lost its legibility over the years.
Time stripped this advertising object of its initial purpose, welcoming the wear and
tear and the imperfections characteristic of the wabi-sabi aesthetic, which add a higher
value—a different function—to the store than originally intended. The communica-
tion channels added around it (such as the lateral signboard and the totem at the
entrance) extend the traditional character of the store by choosing to work with
wood instead of other more popular materials of modern times, e.g., acrylic, which
is most often used in lateral signboards across all samples [21].

Fig. 5 Okamoto Orimono Honten, Kyoto, 2019. Photograph by Ana Seixosa

A Sense of Kyoto Through Advertising … 271

5 Discussion

Regarding the initial question of this study about the ability of outdoor advertising of
adapting to the environment in which it operates, more specifically, if in the adver-
tising universe of Kyoto outdoor advertising presents distinct cultural preferences,
the results found suggest that:
1. Cultural preferences are empirically validated in advertising objects made for
the city of Kyoto through the analysis of the variable “Visual elements”.
2. Visual and sensory attributes of wabi-sabi, shibui, and geidō aesthetic principles
are manifested in Kyoto advertising through the variables “Type of technique”,
“Dominant Palette” and “Material”.
3. Brands tend to communicate discreetly and sparsely, focusing on descriptive
and informative advertisements as pointed out by the study of the “Approach”
variable. Furthermore, the restrictions on outdoor advertisements appear to limit
the representation of visual elements, especially non-traditional ones, and denote
characteristics easily associated with traditional aesthetic principles preserved
by folk and alternative culture.
In this perspective, it is argued that a solution for brands whose advertising objects
are prevented from communicating in Kyoto may involve the adaptation of their
advertisements according to the variables analyzed above.
Lastly, we recognize that an initial imbalance in some variables studied in the
Kyoto sample (especially when compared to the other two samples), as well as in
some of the results, was a limitation of this study, predicted from the beginning due
to the restrictions imposed on outdoor advertising.

6 Conclusions

This study demonstrated ways in which the representation of regionally valued

cultural elements and aesthetic principles in advertising could improve the commu-
nication of a city’s identity and lead to a greater acceptance of advertising objects
in public spaces. Consequently, this study offered good practice guidelines for
brands wishing to communicate more effectively in Kyoto and establish a prosperous
relationship with its inhabitants.
Although the adaptation of outdoor advertising to the city of Kyoto is not entirely
voluntary, the fact remains that the incorporation of traditional aesthetic attributes,
both physical and intangible, has allowed brands to reflect a “sense of Kyoto” in their
advertising objects, instead of a universal look at what is considered beautiful and
pleasant. From this angle, it is proven that when advertising incorporates the values
and aesthetics more suited to a place, the place, as well as its inhabitants, are more
likely to accept the advertising objects, perceiving them as inspiring and intensifying
their intrinsic principles.
272 A. Seixosa and M. Cadarso

However, it is important to note that these benefits will not come from a simple
absorption of the culture and aesthetic pattern historically associated with the region,
seeing that repetition cannot add new value. It is not enough to represent the identity of
different regions; brands must strive to deliver innovation while honoring the cultural
context of a given region. Despite the success of some brands in representing Kyoto’s
identity, the adaptations made can be read as retrograde: the aesthetic concepts found
in the city’s outdoor advertising, although often referred to when discussing Japanese
art and graphic design, are vocabularies hardly used by contemporary Japanese
society in everyday conversations.
Moreover, even though they represent the city and the characteristics generally
addressed to the people of Kyoto, it is important to remember that different cultural
elements (elements of folk culture, alternative culture, and mass culture) are present
in each individual, albeit in different proportions. In this sense, especially in urban
and naturally more modernized areas, it is important to also represent the renewal of
Japanese society, which does not have one constant taste, idealized by local identity.
The complexity of contemporary Kyoto society must be considered when formu-
lating restrictions imposed on external agents, in order not to compromise the urban
experience and restrict its inhabitants to an immutable image of themselves.
It is concluded, therefore, that restrictions imposed on outdoor advertising can be
beneficial for cities, however, there is still great potential in the creative freedom of
brands. We find ourselves in an era in which technological progress and globaliza-
tion standardize places, building tension between local and cosmopolitan styles and
values, yet these same advances can offer solutions to the problems they cause.
That said, the adaptations of external agents to the place should not be used
superficially with the aim of attracting or triggering a transaction on the part of a
potential consumer, but with the desire to actively contribute to the urban experience
of the human being, increasing the value built within the physical spaces that make
up their city, their home.

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intencional. La relación estética, 67:391–416
Brand Management: From Storytelling
to Strategic Narratives

Sérgio Dominique-Ferreira, Sofia Praça, and Catherine Prentice

Abstract Strategic brand management presupposes the use of different strategies.

The dimensions. In this theoretical chapter, the authors analyze how the most known
concepts are related. As a result, brand equity plays a great importance in brand image
and brand identity, implying different approaches in the communication process of
brands. Consequently, storytelling plays a specific role in brand communications,
especially digital storytelling. Creating appropriate narratives, brands can improve
customer engagement, consumer’s emotional involvement and loyalty.

Keywords Branding · Brand equity · Brand image and identity · Storytelling ·

Narratives · Customer involvement · Consumer’s memory · Digital marketing

1 Introduction

1.1 Branding

Brands play important functions for both companies and consumers. According to
the American Marketing Association (AMA 2022) the brand is defined as “a name,
term, design, symbol or any other feature that identifies one seller’s a goods or service
as distinct from those or other sellers”, without forgetting that the main purpose is the
differentiation. As a result, branding is a major concept in the marketing literature
because it is one of the most valuable intangible assets of companies [75].

S. Dominique-Ferreira (B)
Department of Marketing, School of Tourism and Management, Polytechnic Institute of Cávado
and Ave & UNIAG Research Unit, Barcelos, Portugal
e-mail: sdominique@[Link]; [Link]@[Link]
S. Praça
School of Tourism and Management, Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave, Barcelos, Portugal
C. Prentice
Griffith Business School, Griffith University, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
e-mail: cathyjournalarticles@[Link]; [Link]@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 275
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
276 S. Dominique-Ferreira et al.

According to Olins [113], branding is a complex, versatile and multidisciplinary

management activity that allows companies to improve brand reputation and brand
awareness. It can also strengthen consumer involvement with products, which, in
turn, improves to attract and retain customers [86, 122].
Aaker [5] discusses the internal brand and the external brand as important func-
tions in developing a brand. Internal brand emphasizes increasing creativity among
employees, showing positive impacts on both stakeholders. It also allows to share
brand values. The external brand, on the other hand, is focused on the consumer.
Currently, the branding process includes primary elements of the brand such as
visual identity, nomenclature, slogan, or positioning. In this context, developing a
Storytelling (ST) provides consumers with a new and more positive experience.
When strategically developed, ST improves the relationship between customers and
brands, increasing customer loyalty [9, 56].

1.2 Brand Equity

Brand Equity (BE) became popular in the 1980s. Several authors such as Aaker [5],
Feldwick [47] and Keller [73] defined BE based on different perspectives, as well as
its impact on companies’ financial performance [38]. Another perspective focuses
on BE through the consumer’s lens, highlighting the possible positive perceptions
created by BE [6, 73, 116, 154]. Aaker [2, p.68] defined BE as:
A set of assets and liabilities linked to a brand, name, and symbol, which are added to or
subtracted from the value provided by a product or service to a company. For certain assets
and liabilities to determine brand equity, they must be linked to the name and/or symbol of
the brand. If the brand name or symbol is changed, some or all the assets could be affected,
and even lost.

Aaker [6] developed a BE model based on five dimensions: (i) brand awareness,
(ii) perceived quality; (iii) positive associations caused by the brand; (iv) consumer
loyalty to the brand; (v) other assets of the brand. The first four components are
directly related to the consumer and the last dimension concerns the financial value
of assets that create exclusivity and competitive advantage, such as patents and
trademarks. Figure 1 illustrates each of these five dimensions, providing a detailed
explanation.
However, Keller [73] developed the Customer-Based Brand Equity (CBBE)
model, providing a framework that incorporates the role of consumers’ knowledge
and feedback. Keller defines it as “the differentiating effect of brand knowledge on
consumer response to brand marketing” [73, p. 14]. In the CBBE model presented
by Keller, four steps are presented to develop a brand (branding goals) as follows:
1. Define a brand identity, that is, establish a certain breadth and depth of brand
awareness.
2. Create appropriate meaning for the brand through strong, favorable, and unique
associations.
Brand Management: From Storytelling to Strategic Narratives 277

Fig. 1 Brand equity model adapted from [6]

3. Challenge brand responses that are positive and favorable.

4. Generate relationships with consumers, investing in intense and constant loyalty.
To accomplish those four stages, it is necessary to develop the six building blocks
of a brand: salience, performance, imagery, judgments, feelings and, finally, the reso-
nance that the brand causes in the consumer [76]. Brand awareness is not just related
with specific facts of the brand, but also about the thoughts, feelings, perceptions,
278 S. Dominique-Ferreira et al.

Steps of brand Branding goals

development considering each
of the steps

1.
Brand awareness
Brand resonance Identification
(consumer)

2. Favorable, strong
Brand judgments and unique
Brand feelings Meaning associations

Brand performance
Brand imagery 3. Accessible and
Answers positive answers

Brand salience

4. Intense and
active
Relationships relationships

Fig. 2 Model CBBE adapted from Kapferer (2009)

images, experiences and everything that connects the brand to consumers mind [74].
Figure 2 summarizes, all of Keller’s thinking.
Also related with BE, Keller and Machado [77] refer that a key element in brand
development is the choice of brand signs. This BE strategy influences the perception
of consumers, such as price sensitivity.
According to Kotler and Keller, BE is the added value on products of a certain
brand, reflected in the way consumers think, feel and act in relation to the brand.
Furthermore, the greater this value, the greater its impact on the way consumers
think, feel and act in relation to the brand. Still, the perception of this value will also
have a direct impact on prices, market share and even the profit of companies. In
this sense, BE is an important intangible asset that adds psychological and financial
value to brands.
Brands with strong BE have important benefits, such as consumer loyalty and
greater market share [78]. Therefore, BE is a concept of great relevance within
the universe of brands, however, there is still a certain lack of consensus around
the concept (Wood 2000). Further developments are crucial as brands with a high
levels of BE are stronger [52], as well as the relationship between BE and customer
engagement [114].
Brand Management: From Storytelling to Strategic Narratives 279

1.3 From Brand Image to Brand Identity

According to Kotler (1993, p. 269), brand image (BI) is “the set of beliefs about a
particular brand” and it is developed during the process of decoding the six dimen-
sions of the brand identity [65, 130]. It is also reflected by brand associations
kept in the consumers’ memory, thus influencing purchase decision making [73].
These associations can be classified into three types, such as, attributes, benefits, and
attitudes.
Elements such as brand personality play a relevant role in the development of brand
image since consumers prefer a certain similarity between their own personality and
the attributes of the brand’s personality. In other words, consumers prefer brands that
match their self-image [20, 93]. However, according to Brito [24], the image will
not only depend on its identity signs, but also on the brand positioning, combining
preferences, strength and exclusivity of the associations developed.
In consequence, transmitting a brand image to a target market is key [117].
Because changes in brand image are not instantaneous, they occur over time. Instead,
the value of a brand progressively adjusts to match its real value of exclusivity or
similarity [84].
According to Malik et al. [93] there are two perspectives: the perceived image,
which corresponds to the way consumers interpret a certain brand, positioning them-
selves on the receiver’s side and the desired image, which represents how the organi-
zation intends to position the brand, so that it corresponds to the image perceived by
consumers referring to the brand identity. The brand image is passive and focused on
the past, in contrast to the brand identity, which is more active, projecting the future
[1, 71]. So, the search for a balance between identity and image is complex [129].
Meanwhile, some authors merge both concepts—identity and brand image—
suggesting that the process by which an image is developed in the minds of consumers
comes from the way in which the identity is developed and shared.
Kapferer [71, p. 171] defines brand identity as “the set of beliefs of the brand
and its core values”. Identity must be unique, timeless, consistent, coherent, and
adaptable, composed by the brand’s own identity, with a purpose and meaning [3].
But a successful brand identity also needs to fulfill three functions: be in agree-
ment with consumers, differentiate the brand from competitors, and match what the
company can and will do over time [47]. Accordingly, companies should establish
the personality of the product and the value proposition, promote this personality,
including emotional involvement.
In this context, Kapferer [70] presents a model based on a sender-receiver rela-
tionship between brands and consumers. The first assumption is that brands send
and develop the brand identity, developing the “Brand Identity Prism”. This model
is composed by six dimensions, divided in two dimensions: horizontal and vertical.
The horizontal axis presents the elements corresponding to the sender and receiver,
as well as the intersection between them. Subsequently, in the vertical axis, the social
280 S. Dominique-Ferreira et al.

Fig. 3 The Brand Identity

Prism from [70]

or observable elements are visualized, divided by externalization (physical, relation-

ship and reflection) and internationalization (personality, culture, and self-image).
Figure 3 illustrates the “Brand Identity Prism”.
The strategic management of those elements will determine the success of brands.
The congruence between the brand identity and the brand image is critical to develop
positive associations [43].

1.4 Marketing Communication

Integrated marketing communications has evolved over the last years. Keller’s CBBE
model [73] is a good example of how a mix communication platform can increase
brand awareness. The traditional advertising approach is being replaced by digital
options.
Traditionally, communication was unidirectional, opposing to the current multi-
directional and interactive nature of communication [63]. Additionally, current
consumers are more informed and demanding. Therefore, companies need to use
new forms of communication, sending messages that are increasingly customized
[11, 13, 152]. Accordingly, the (marketing) communication mix includes eight main
components: mass media, such as advertising, events, experiences and public rela-
tions, direct marketing, interactive marketing [15]. Word-of-mouth (WOW) and sales
promotion are more personal types of communication.
Regarding marketing communication strategies, the narrative developed by brands
stands out, combining literary narrative techniques and a narrative discourse.
This strategy enables brands to communicate with stakeholders, highlighting the
authenticity of brands [103]. Thus, storytelling plays an important role in brand
communication aimed at consumers.
Brand Management: From Storytelling to Strategic Narratives 281

1.5 Storytelling

The process of telling stories is something that is inherent to the human being and it is
considered one of the oldest arts. With the evolution of the world and the introduction
of new technologies within society, turning human beings into authentic storytellers
[59, 144].Within the academic community, it has not been easy to find a universally
accepted definition. There is a considerable confusion between “story” and “narra-
tive”. Some authors consider that the concept “narrative” should be considered a
synonymous of “history”.
According to Hyland [62, p. 1], a narrative “is a spoken or written account of
connected events: a story”. Differently, Elçi & Çubukçuo (2014, p. 38) refer that “a
synonym of the term narrative is history”, considering that they allow structuring
experiences and knowledge. Other authors consider that the concepts are totally
different, although related to each other [30, 141]. As a result, ST is perceived as an
art from “a film, or an advertising campaign to commercial information or the presen-
tation of a company”, sending a specific message, while involving and promoting
audience participation [110, p. 20].
ST uses narratives for the organization’s communication involving customers
[131]. ST presupposes a bidirectional interaction, written or oral, between someone
who tells a story, and it is a well-known and powerful means of communicating
messages and engaging the public [140, p. 1]. Stories are important as they appeal to
different dimensions of consumers, emotions, intellect, body and will [142, p. 28].
In line with this reasoning, Xavier [150] presents three dimensions related to
ST: pragmatic, pictorial and poetic. Pragmatics is the technique of elaborating and
linking scenes, the pictorial art is the art of molding and putting together the pieces of
a hypothetical puzzle; the poetics is the technique of building imaginary memories
full of meanings. From another perspective [138] states that ST applied to brands is
not like the narrative of cinema, i.e., a simple and functional structure is required,
with a beginning, middle and an end that can be invoked from context, action and
result, respectively.
When brands communicate clearly, immediate recognition is achieved (devel-
oping brand awareness), increasing emotional bonds with consumers [105]. In this
context, authenticity plays a crucial role. From a brand strategy perspective, authen-
ticity is a key element for successful brands, as it forms part of a unique brand identity
[2]. However, the concept of brand authenticity is complex and multifaceted, since
it is an assessment of the consumers’ perception of what they consider to be true or
genuine, rather than being an objective and already consummated fact [50, 58]. If
brands don’t reflect what they really are, they will be perceived as inauthentic brands
[17]. As so, authenticity has been part of ST of brands as a way of brands producing
appealing content. To this end, they develop narratives, with a properly structured
and interconnected thread, with convincing characters. Simultaneously, they design
their products in an engaging, attractive and effective way [146].
In order to appear authentic, the development of the brand story will have to be
partially honest, that is, it does not need to be true word for word, the important
282 S. Dominique-Ferreira et al.

thing is that it seems credible and authentic in a merely sufficient measure [16].
Consequently, it will be the consumers to decide whether the story is perceived
as authentic [61]. This perceived authenticity is key in ST [68, 91].Additionally,
consumers can be disappointed when they believe the story is totally true and later
discover that it was made up and manipulated, a negative connotation that no brand
wants to have, as it is easy to oversimplify the truth and distort everything else [127].
Storytelling as a branding strategy
ST plays an important role in branding as the brand reflects all corporate and commu-
nication behaviors based essentially on the feedback of customers [54]. In fact,
literature has long recognized the power of stories to provide brand meaning, and so
professionals have decided to use ST to enhance consumer involvement [25, 57, 149].
ST can be a tool to create brand value, to create a clear and differentiated brand
positioning, as well as an emotional bond between consumers and brands/products
[98]. Additionally, when marketers only adopt and confront consumers with more
quantitative facts and arguments, they end up creating more distance with consumers
(e.g.: skepticism, loss of confidence) [14]. That is why it is common for stories
to fascinate consumers, becoming thoughts and memories that are easy to retain,
strengthening and increasing positive associations to brands, as well as increasing
customer loyalty [54, 91]. So, the main intention is to create a bond and a genuine
connection between brands and consumers. This can be achieved using universal
archetypes1 that, applied to the ST, are associated with heroic story patterns played
by the characters within a narrative context, demonstrating all their characteristics,
motivations, values, virtues and fears [27, 45, 133, 145].
The modern consumer is no longer guided by the same values as previously
[92]. Well-positioned brands occupy specific niches in the minds of consumers and,
therefore, in certain ways, are easily identifiable, similar and different compared
to competing brands [79]. Pulligadda et al. [123] said that consumers who develop
affective connections with the brand through stories show a greater tendency to share
their experiences with others. As a result, they report that the loyal public is also more
willing to spend a greater amount, if it is to develop their favorite brands.
Digital Storytelling
Digital storytelling or Digital Storytelling (DS) was originally developed as a tool
for community interaction, development and empowerment in the 1990s by Joe
Lambert and Dana Atchley [33]. The attractiveness of this form of digital expression
is underlined by the fact that these stories can be created by people anywhere, on any
subject, and shared electronically across the world.
According to Jensen [67, p. 53] stories are “[…] statements of value, and the
product is just an appendix to incorporate any story that is being sold”. This approach
reflects the value that is given to stories and that in the digital context can also
be applied. In this sense, Miller [102] defines DS as narrative entertainment that

1Forms or images of a collective nature that represent a typical human experience, such as tales,
myths, acts of heroism, among others.
Brand Management: From Storytelling to Strategic Narratives 283

reaches its audience through technology and social media, highlighting interactivity
as something important in brands. This definition focuses the crucial and differenti-
ating aspect of the DS that uses digital technology as a support and the possibility of
sharing between the user and the content creator [8].
Joe Lambert, co-founder of the Center for Digital Storytelling, a non-profit
arts organization in Berkeley, California, is known for developing and promoting
the seven elements of digital storytelling that are an advantageous starting point
for getting started with digital stories. The seven elements of digital storytelling,
according to the founder are presented in Fig. 4.
Later, Lambert [88] updated the seven elements, maintaining and/or improving
those that were already part of it, adding others that are equally important, such as:
general objective of the story, the choice of content; voice clarity; narrative rhythm;
quality of images, video and other multimedia elements; and still, good grammar
and use of language.
Digital art consists of creating a short film, combining digital artefacts such as
images, text, video clips, animation, and music, with a computer program as a tech-
nological base. Usually, they have a narration in the form of recorded audio, which

Fig. 4 The seven elements of digital storytelling from Lambert (1994)

284 S. Dominique-Ferreira et al.

ends up becoming an emotional element in the story. The digital history is saved in
digital format, as the name means, to produce video files, if they are uploaded to
the web. As is the case with traditional narrative, they contain a strong reflective,
emotional and personal component, which implies that the story is quite succinct,
usually lasting between three and five minutes [87]. This is because narratives gener-
ally revolve around an experience, incident or event called, sometimes, an inflection
point, that is, the way the storyteller reflects and interprets the story in concrete,
around their own life situation [64].
The strength of DS lies in its simplicity and, also in its accessibility, applying
to both the creation and the understanding of stories. The focus is not on technical
elements, but on the combination of narrative, audio, and visual elements. Neverthe-
less, consumers choose to learn about a product/service through videos and not only
consider this type of content a form of entertainment given its multimedia capacity
[108, 125]. Furthermore, selecting audiovisual elements stimulates creativity and
metaphorical thinking, leading to audience engagement and the emotional response
[32].
On the other hand, DS is often used as a learning and capacity building tool,
promoting critical thinking, reflection and improving writing skills, as well as
strengthening relationships between participants and/or vulnerable groups [32, 33].
In the digital world, the ST has played a very important role because, nowadays,
people tend to understand better the message that is intended to be transmitted
through these media, since the mind already tends to convert reality into stories,
making it easier to introduce and to fit into people’s minds, so that they can become
memorable [100].
The ST has been generally used in the marketing of companies, with the objec-
tive of trying to unite and attach consumers to characters and brands, in order to
develop business possibilities [115]. However, the impact of ST is difficult to circum-
scribe, that is, it is inevitable to say that stories enrich content marketing, in addition
to humanizing the products themselves through the relationship with customers.
According to the Content Marketing Institute, ST is not intended to be a sales tool,
but a method of building strong relationships and empathy between the brand and
its customers, or a loyal community over time, providing as a basis for content
development.
Content Marketing is an innovative approach in the field of marketing, which
combines social networks and the practice of narrative, that is, social networks have
a communicational function on the internet and ST acts as an instrument for building
relationships and interactions. Content that is supposed to be useful to the target
audience must meet their interests and needs, as well as add value to the customer
[143]. In addition, Hilker [55] defines that the content presented should be mainly
informative, stimulating, inspiring and fun for customers, showing that the main
characteristic is to add more to the brand, not focusing only on the facts and figures
of a particular product. So, to create successful Content Marketing, the content must
describe a problem that affects the target audience, followed by a solution to that
same problem, which helps the customer to immediately identify with the brand [53].
Brand Management: From Storytelling to Strategic Narratives 285

According to Kartajaya and Setiawan [85] there are eight fundamental steps to help
marketers to create an effective content marketing strategy, such as:
1. Definition of goals.
2. Mapping the target audience.
3. Content idealization and planning.
4. Creation of the content itself.
5. Distribution of content across the various platforms.
6. Expansion of content, for example, through well-known influencers.
7. Content Marketing Assessment, through strategic and tactical performance
measures.
8. Improved Content Marketing.
In this sense, companies need to define which type of content best fits their goals.
The content to be used can include articles, creating blogs, video and streaming
platforms, social networks, email marketing, inbound marketing, newsletters, among
others. It should be noted that, currently, the main social networks allow the recording
and dissemination of videos created by users, called stories, emphasizing the real
power of stories, in addition to consumers of stories, users are also the makers of
their own stories.
Digital influencers also play a relevant role in DS because they are able to quickly
spread messages to large online communities [22, 83]. This kind of content improves
the brand awareness and credibility of brands, as well as the emotional bond with
their followers [72].
The use of ST in social networks intends to stimulate emotional bonds and should
impact, educate, intrigue and appeal to humor [94]. Therefore, the ST of brands
should be based on the interests of their targets [115].
Another particularity of the digital environment focuses on the sharing of stories
combined with visual elements. DS is very often related with Visual Storytelling
(VS). As mentioned by Walter and Gioglio [, p. 7], “the rise of social media platforms
such as Pinterest and Instagram, together with the multimillion-dollar acquisition of
Facebook, ushered in an era in which the old adage, a picture is worth a thousand
words, it is more relevant than ever.”
The DS is constantly being reinvented and improved and its purpose is an excellent
platform that allows showing the human side of the brand [126]. Sharing online stories
can occur on different platforms, i.e., Transmedia Storytelling (TS). Jenkins [66]
defined TS as a process in which the elements of a fiction are systematically dispersed,
through multiple channels and languages, to create an experience unique and coor-
dinated, in which each medium has a unique contribution to history, influencing the
production of communication content, as well as human behavior itself.
So, combining words and VS transforms simple narratives into interactive stories,
increasing brand loyalty, generating trust and deeper connection with customers
[126]. With the emergence of transmedia in the art of storytelling, Jenkins [66]
developed the concept of Transmedia Marketing, aiming to emphasize the customer
engagement dimension. Customer engagement tools are important to measure the
286 S. Dominique-Ferreira et al.

reach of communication efforts, such as likes, comments, or any other type of

interaction, i.e., indicators of the success or failure of Marketing actions.
Advertising and Storytelling
Marketing communications perform multiple functions and are built in an increas-
ingly challenging environment. The reality of social media has suffered drastic
changes and for this reason, brand managers must alternate their communication
options to build the BE, that is, choose through a variety of media, if they share
common meaning and content, but at the same time differentiate themselves, with
complementary advantages [36, 107, 106].
Advertising is considered the combination of information and persuasion tech-
niques and activities and it is characterized as a hybrid form of communication
(objective and subjective information) intended to influence the opinions, attitudes,
feelings, behaviors and perceptions of the target audience [112].
Using the ST format in advertising texts, as a way of supporting the consumer’s
connection to the brand, has proved to be extremely effective [, Kaufman 2003).
Advertising texts, in this format, can transform information into a condensed and
memorable message [7]. This strategy can enable the promotion of social reflections
and discussions of consumer interest, thus adding value to the brand [89]. Therefore,
stories could inspire and empathically involve the receiver, as well as giving the
brand a voice of its own.
However, Escalas emphasizes the positive effect and mental excitement evoked
by the stories. Such as Polyorat et al. [121] who corroborate this theory, stating that
the ability of stories derives from the mental stimulation of advertising consumption
that resides in the way the consumer processes it in terms of decision making. On the
other hand, ST is considered an activity and an integral part of what distinguishes us
as human beings, especially in a consumerist environment [29].
According to some studies, individuals interpret and they imagine themselves as
characters in the story and attribute meaning to them, which indicates that there is
a relationship between the narrative and its association with emotional and WOW
responses [69]. When consumers understand an ST ad, this interpretation is based
on personal information linked to the representations, made by the characters, in the
narrative [35]. Naturally, emotions compete a relevant role, providing high levels
of consumer involvement [23]. And, therefore, advertisements combine the stories
they want to tell with the experiences of consumers, generating positive emotions,
leading them to share among themselves.

2 Narrative Construction

It is important to know what makes a strategic story. So, first we must understand
what the narrative means. The term narrative has currently reached the height of
its popularity in the social sciences. Assuming that, before starting the process of
creating a narrative, it is necessary to identify the components that are essential to it,
Brand Management: From Storytelling to Strategic Narratives 287

Fig. 5 Narrative elements

how to define the target audience (segmentation) and the content of the narrative. On
the other hand, there are several elements that integrate the creation of the narrative
world, including the message, conflict, characters, and plot, presented in Fig. 5.
As a result, brand stories should contain a plot and character elements, in addition
to missing any authorship intention, such as a purpose, moral, message or lesson based
on a particular context. Taking this in mind, narratives are said to be constructive
as they fit into a typical story that includes a collection of interrelated episodes
that usually describe sequences of human action. So, narrative thinking must be
structured and context sensitive, that is, where individuals end up processing the
information received as if they were creating a story, fitting characters and episodes
into a narrative envelope, giving meaning to the world and to their lives [12]. Those
stories consist of action-result sequences goal-directed, which create responses in
the characters, whether physical and/or psychological [118]. As a result of these
responses, the characters develop goals that lead to action sequences, which result in
certain outcomes, being able to make evaluations and incite judgments when building
these same stories [46, 119].
So, the structure of the narrative is composed of two elements, chronology, and
causality. First, when talking about chronology, it refers to a certain temporal dimen-
sion, something that occurs over time. That is, the human perception of the meaning
288 S. Dominique-Ferreira et al.

of time is accommodated through episodes, but it is an undifferentiated and contin-

uous flow. Therefore, the universal goal of narrative thinking is to achieve the closure
of the story, by framing these episodes with a beginning, middle and end [81, 120].
In this way, the real interest occurs when the temporal order of events is clear. It is
at this point that the story begins to “make sense”.
Second, throughout the narrative, elements and structures are developed,
according to the organization, to establish relationships and connections between
the narrative elements. For example, first the protagonist feels jealous, next he kills
his rival [37].
When developing stories, individuals organize their experiences by creating an
order to explain unusual events [26]. Events must be organized based on a chronolog-
ical order, so that the episodes/moments have a relationship with the entire involve-
ment of the narrative [120]. Gergen and Gergen [46] theorize that the dramatic
involvement of a narrative depends on the evaluative inclination of the story, building
high and low moments in the action itself.
The construction of the narrative is an excellent contribution in developing the
brand identity, but it also proves to be a challenge for organizations because, not all
ST examples present a narrative capable of connecting consumers [40, 92].
When creating a brand, the narrative should be the first element to be created and,
therefore, starting with a strong, well-designed and quickly recognized personality
will strengthen the dependence and coherence between companies’ strategies and
the perception of consumers [54].

2.1 The Effect of Narrative on consumer’s Memory

Neuroscientists have analyzed the effect of narratives on people’s brain. Results

confirmed an important effect of the narratives [132]. According to Woodside et al.
[149], at the individual level human memory is based on the tale. This means that
memory is the first indication of the behavior of the storytelling act, in which
information is stored and retrieved in the form of stories, sometimes reflecting the
listeners/spectators’ own lives. Thus, the stories end up awakening implicit and/or
explicit awareness, increasing the creation of emotional connections of understanding
in them.
According to Fischer [42], at a social level, stories make the lives of each one of us
understandable among all. Going against this theory, Boje [19] adds that people end
up telling these stories in a conscious way, portraying their own characteristics in the
society in which they live. The main purpose of stories makes it clearer and easier to
remember certain events that took place in social life, facilitating the transmission
of knowledge to future generations [60].
Throughout this process, the associations transmitted by the story persuade
the individual and become fixed in his memory, due to the similarities between
consumers’ thoughts and the narrative. This is consequence of the information
received and the experiences lived by each individual, having as a final result,
Brand Management: From Storytelling to Strategic Narratives 289

persuasion, which results from the balance between the strong and weak arguments
used.
Narratives can be considered an organizational structure that can enhance consis-
tent memory [10, 147]. Narratives are remembered as abstractions or “skeletons
of history”. That is, stories help trigger episodic memory, generating multiple
associations, judgments and attitudes [135].
In line with this reasoning, a story is much easier to memorize than real and
pure information, due to the fact that the human brain is programmed to search
for and even retrieve stories that are attractive [149, 151].The narrative appears
to be theoretical and relevant, as it helps to recall the brand’s elements through
episodic memory, providing consumers with maximum pleasure [149]. In this sense,
stories can be responsible for the production of knowledge according to their own
memorization capacity [153]. One of the basic memory structures techniques is
creative memorization, in which each person’s imaginations can come to “come to
life”, in the sense of connecting with something that makes sense, or that reminds
them of something. For this, this author resorts a lot to the use of metaphor, as another
of the learning techniques in this process, remembering that it is at this point that the
real change can happen (Woodget and Channon 2020).
Due to the fact that stories are memorized in different ways, whether emotionally,
visually or factually, they are reminiscent of the entire content of the story itself
[91]. Due to this natural propensity to think and interpret the world through narrative
thinking, this becomes the way of thinking that best captures and calls attention to
human intention [37].
In the field of marketing, advertising recall is essential. So, it can be said that
the more time the consumer dedicates his reasoning to a particular advertisement,
the greater the probability that same advertisement will be retained in long-term
memory. Or, on the other hand, when a consumer appreciates a product in a particular
advertisement, he or she tries to obtain as much information about it as possible [134].
It is important to take into account the purpose of advertising, that is, if it is to obtain
brand recognition, to remember the product/brand or if the consumer arrives at the
purchase decision [104]. The literature indicates that the memory of a particular
advertisement influences the behavior and, consequently, the consumer’s opinion,
explaining why the message content and the advertising structure are key [134].

3 Conclusions

Very often, consumers involvement is considered a moderating effect of the

consumers decision-making process, based on their needs, interests and values [18,
124]. Together with this involvement, there is a growing recognition of the role that
emotions play in the building of brands [31, 51]. Stories are an effective way of
providing an approximation to the consumer’s identity, which means that there is a
connection between the consumer and the brand. Consumers exposed to a narrative
290 S. Dominique-Ferreira et al.

process are more emotionally connected and are able to identify and recognize them-
selves in the brand, impacting their own attitude towards it [91, 95]. Consumers are
looking for experiences that appeal to their emotions and dreams, so stories support
the reach of these experiences, increasing trust in the brand, as well as its recognition,
awareness and uniqueness [91].
Organizations should create their own stories because narratives stimulate
different emotions in consumers [49]. The use of ST allows for better interaction
and integration of brand values compared to the more traditional forms of communi-
cation used by marketing [54, 109]. Furthermore, brands also provide sensory stimuli,
invoking positive or negative feelings, playing with consumer’s specific state of mind
especially when they engage in an egocentric way with the brand [136]. In line with
this perspective, Escalas and Herskovitz and Crystal [54] refer that ST positively
strengthens emotional connections with brands.
As a result, emotional branding is primarily consumer-focused and characterized
by relationship building, a story-driven approach that leads to deep emotional and
affective promises between the consumer and the brand [128]. The affectivity created
by the ST is perceived as a process with relevant opportunities to improve consumers’
loyalty. So, affective involvement increases levels of commitment to the brand and,
consequently, a willingness to pay a higher amount for the product [123].
Thus, the more inspiring and emotional the story told by brands, the greater the
emotional connection established with the public [39]. Theoretically, the customer
engagement and emotional reactions to brand narrative ads can be explained by two
complementary mechanisms—narrative transport and empathy for the characters
[96]. Narrative ads are generally more persuasive and remind more favorable cogni-
tive and emotional responses than non-narrative ads [82]. The explanation for these
events lies in the fact that human beings think in a narrative rather than an argumenta-
tive way [101]. In addition, due to the episodic nature of memory, consumers tend to
remember stories better than facts or product features, which enhances brand recall
[82, 90]. Narrative can help marketers to create emotional bonds between consumers
and brands and, in this way, facilitate the resonance of the same [4, 149].

Acknowledgements The authors are grateful to the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT,
Portugal) for financial support by national funds FCT/MCTES to UNIAG (UIDB/04752/2020)

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Dynamic Visual Identities: Reflection
on Interaction and Playfulness in Visual
Identity Design by Porto Design Studios

Rita Coelho and Suzana Dias

Abstract This paper is a part of an ongoing research conducted by the authors. As

a primary effort of a bigger study, it aims to grasp a correlation between dynamic
visual identities and contemporary society, considering the concepts of liquid moder-
nity [1], mindfulness [2], playfulness [3] and relational design [4], among others.
Some brands—particularly a sample of contemporary DVI’s from Porto Metropolitan
Area’s design studios—are verified and analyzed through a condensing terminology,
from Kopp [5], Kretuz [6], Olins [7, 8], Marriot [9], Nes [10], Oliveira et al. [11] to
Lelis [12] and Martins et al. [13]. As methodology, we collected important references
from literature review on several areas of study and some qualitative content visual
analysis of dynamic visual identities from Porto’s graphic realm—our city’s design
studios. As value, originality and motivation for this research, we advocate that DVIs
do not seem to be taken into account by much of the scientific research in our field of
expertise in our country, apart from certain authors that we refer to. We seek to share
with design students and brand managers alike, the playful connections the design
of a dynamic visual identity can have through a reduced attention span, that the frag-
mental media and capitalized culture have provoked. As a result of this exploratory
research, we accomplish a preliminary contribution to the recognition of Portuguese
DVIs, markedly from Porto graphic design studios—and critically reflect about how
they are moving in that direction, discussing the benefits and consequences of play
in DVIs.

Keywords Visual identity design · Dynamic visual identity · Play · Liquid

modernity · Porto design studios

R. Coelho (B)
uniMAD; Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, Polytechnic Institute of
Porto_ESMAD, Vila do Conde, Portugal
e-mail: ritacoelho@[Link]
S. Dias
Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave_ESD,
Barcelos, Portugal
e-mail: cdias@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 297
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
298 R. Coelho and S. Dias

1 Introduction

In our contemporary liquid modernity [1, 14], visual identity systems suffered a
great transformation in perception and seek to break through a collective reduced
attention span [15]. The transition to a participatory culture fragmented them, through
multiple digital communication devices. Contemplating the interactive reality and
willingness to participate in society, brands found themselves in the need to be more
than mere labels and to feed themselves in a universe that expands in games, films,
TV series and extends into the virtual sphere. In view of these demands, the graphic
representation of the brand needs innovative solutions. Integrating meaning into the
human experience through design seems, in fact, to have become one of the greatest
ambitions of designers’ practices in recent decades.
We will reflect on interaction and playfulness in visual identity design as a change
in graphic solutions, increasingly manifested through the blurring of boundaries
between emitter and receiver, author and audience, playfulness, function, technology,
and discuss, critically, the benefits and consequences of the relational and play qual-
ities for visual identity design. Chronologically, we will contextualize the theme
from the democratic arouse of Internet (during the 90’s), until we contemplate the
interactive reality and the willingness to participate, in today’s society.
Through this research, we aimed to start to make a literature review connected to
contemporary visual identity design, particularly into the Portuguese graphic design
context from Porto Metropolitan area. To this study—which is part of a larger and
more complete research—we considered some visual identity projects from studios
based in that location as an exploratory survey. Thus, since the training of the authors
was in Art and Design, this paper is part of an ongoing research, which brings together
the playful, participatory and relational dimension subject study [16–21] with the
visual identity design system scientific field [22–25].
In order to describe the characteristics of the DVIs and to demonstrate the
(co)relations between playful visual identity designs made in Porto area and contem-
poraneity, we established literature review on the topic of visual identity design,
supported by other researchers, particularly Olins [7], Kopp [5], Marriot [9], Nes
[10], Kreutz [6], Oliveira et al. [11], Lelis [12] and Martins et al. [13], on liquid
modernity [1], on the collective reduced attention span [15], mindfulness [26], hyper-
modern ludicity [27, 28] and playfulness [3], Callois, [29], on emotion and relational
design [30, 31, 4] to ground a theoretical foundation for our study.
We proceeded with a qualitative content visual analysis [32] in light of a post-
positivist perspective, which embraced subjectiveness and imprecision, aligned with
the concept of a liquid modernity and fragmental points of view [1], in order to
allow a multitude of empirical and conceptual interpretations resulting in a broader
understanding of the phenomena, with the intent of generating more questions for
further research and for academic debate.
Firstly, we will present the theoretical background and literature review in detail.
Afterwards, we review the importance of the use of emotion, relational design and
play, into this design sphere of building DVIs, in light of the concept of a reduced
Dynamic Visual Identities: Reflection on Interaction … 299

attention span. Latterly, we analyze critically, the results found from the operational-
ization of our methodology. Lastly, we present the final considerations and future
outputs from our study.

2 Visual Identities from a Solid to a Liquid Scene

In addition to the technological, social and cultural paradigm shifts in the context
of designing a new visual identity, the zeitgeist in which the design activity oper-
ates, contemplating not only the technology used to operate and to produce visual
identities, but also the technology used to experience them within itself it changes,
so the flexibility of the visual identity system is to be considered [33]. Moreover, a
conventional, static visual identity may develop in its applications and chronological
evolution into a DVI, just as a DVI may have to have one or more conventional,
static solutions to respond to the communicational requests of the various media.
This fragmentation or multiplication of DVIs may have to be tamed or controlled
when migrating to other supports or other mediums and might also have to be drawn
in a more conventional way in order to fulfill other purposes and programs that may
arise.
Here we used the term DVI, but we can find several terminologies utilized by
different authors: some researchers call them variable [5], others mutant [6, 34],
flexible [35, 9, 36–38] open or fluid [39, 40], dynamic [37, 41, 10, 42, 43, 13], mutatis
mutandis [23], logomorphism and liquid [44], elastic [45]. Additionally, there are
different types of DVIs and authors classifications differ as compiled by Martins et al.
[13]. For instance, Nes [10] refers to DVIs in six classifications: container (there is a
constant shape or typography within which there is variation,for example, in MTV,
the characters M, T and V function as a window to multiple textures, colors and
movies),wallpaper (DVIs where there is a flexible background of images and textures
on top of which the fixed logo is juxtaposed, as in AOL by Wolff Olins),ADN (there
are different shapes that clearly belong to a system and share the same principles, for
instance the visual elements of EDP, by Sagmeister&Walsh: this DVI is, according to
Oliveira et al. [11], a combination of the abovementioned classification of wallpaper
in the fact that the logo is stable in front of varying shapes, and the classification ADN
in the fact that those shapes share the same color, transparency and geometry),formula
(there is consistency in the several combinations of elements of the visual system,
given a common code, as in Google),customized (there is interaction and adaptation
to user-based changes, such as in 180 Creative Camp by studio Degrau),and finally,
generative (there are modifications that are algorithm-based, as in Edit, Disruptive
Digital Education, by Volta). Kreutz [46], on the other hand, subdivides DVIs (which,
as we saw, she calls mutant) into two categories: programmed (changes follow a pre-
established set of rules, resulting in a restricted number of variations) or poetic (where
there are virtually endless solutions). On the other hand, Martins et al. [13], analyze
DVIs through the combination of dynamic versus static elements in visual identity
focus (whether in the logotype, graphic mark or tagline),variation mechanisms (such
300 R. Coelho and S. Dias

as in color variation, combination, content variation, positioning, repetition, rota-

tion, scaling, shape transformation),and through their features, classifying them as
flexible (there are different results in adaptation to different outputs), fluid (the DVI
is animated and conveys movement, such as The Form of Form, by R2 or André Dias
Araújo by Another Collective), generated (there are algorithm-based modifications,
such as Edit, Disruptive Digital Education, by Volta), informative (there is adaptation
to portray parallel information, such as in C. M. Aveiro by Providência Design, or
Porto. by studio Eduardo Aires), participatory (there are user-based modifications),
reactive (there are external data-based changes, such as Troll by This is Pacifica),
and finally unlimited (DVIs where there are endless variation possibilities).
Despite these different terminologies and classification categories, there is,
however, consensus in the sense that there are static elements in a DVI that maintain
its visual system’s integrity, graphic equity and recognition of a visual family, and
variables, which convey the dynamic element to the DVI.
Says Kopp [47] that debates about the shift in the zeitgeist of visual identity design
can be seen back in 1996 with Lupton and Miller [48], as well as at the turn of the
twenty-first century with Cauduro [49], Gruszynski [50], Kopp [5], Poynor [28] and
Bomeny [51]. A shift that we consider inside de relational design concept as it was
proposed by Blauvelt [4].

2.1 A Relevance of Play, Emotion and Relational Design

In a world where everything stimulates us with seductive, increasingly sophisticated

strategies, attention is saturated, fragmented and numbed, resulting in a reduced
attention span [15], propelling us to automatic and visceral responses. What char-
acteristics have developed in visual identity design to install a synthetic message in
the memory of this, almost constantly, distracted audience? In fact, within the rela-
tional approaches to design, a list of terms has emerged to classify DVIs that involve
similar issues, such as stimulation of emotions, empathy, collaboration, dynamism,
interaction, or experience.
To support this reflection, we call for the investigation of Ellen Langer [26, 52],
a scholar of positive psychology in Harvard, that has focused for several decades
on issues related to attention and awareness. It contributed to the recognition of the
concept of mindfullness (active awareness), a growing term in psychology in the
90 s, and currently a popular term. According to this scientist, it is in the idea of
certainty that we find a lack of awareness or inactive attention. This means that
when everything is believed to be known, little attention will be paid by our brain.
We will have the same question addressed by authors like Csikszentmihalyi [30] and
Donald Norman [31] in the thesis that the dynamism of the experience lies in the
incomplete, in what is required by the viewer to be understood or filled out. Active
attention is encouraged by demand and by a certain degree of dissatisfaction, and this
factor indicates the importance of a dynamic experience in an engaging relationship.
Dynamic Visual Identities: Reflection on Interaction … 301

The nature of the interaction is experience, therefore, it is relevant to create design

solutions that activate attention and a continuous interest.
We know that visual perception is a cognitive process determined by the memory
of previous experiences [2]. Hence, if a DVI is characterized by the changeability of
its visuals, the cognitive process demands a more complex interference of memory.
In other words, memory is requested more frequently, resulting in a more complex
neurological process of experimenting, and observing a DVI. Consequently, to
perceive changes as such, in the visual appearance of each graphic solution of a
DVI—be it macroscopically, in correlation to the whole visual narrative of the iden-
tity in a holistic way, or microscopically, to a previous keyframe demonstrated in a
motion form of a DVI animation—incitement of memory, arousal of emotions and
the element of surprise (which is linked to consistency in a rhythmic way) are vital
elements [6, 23, 53].
Psychologist Ellen Langer concludes that achieving active attention is not easy,
“we need to break through established patterns of perception and experiences (…)”
[54], p. 8]. In other words, there must be a disruption, which can be facilitated by
external agents incorporated in the design. Nevertheless, the relational design in a
playful approach, imposes certain rules in a particular time and space. Seemingly
opposed ideas appear to be defended, such as dynamics (of the experience) and dura-
bility (of memory), uncertainty and guidance. Paul Rand, for example, in his text
Design and Play Instinct [55], already referred to the pertinence of using game prin-
ciples—the existence of limits defined by a discipline—as one of the most important
aspects for the motivation and creation of new, meaningful solutions by the designer.
The concept of game and play is understood here as a phenomenon of cultural
significance, based on the theories of Johan Huizinga [3] and Roger Caillois [29],
which marked this dimension. Although these authors do not consciously analyze
the playfulness in design, they approach cultural manifestations in a broad sense,
allowing us to make this approximation. Here we can find an important similarity
between games and relational-based design projects. Both “introduce[s] temporary
and limited perfection into the confusion of life and imperfection of the world,
demanding a supreme and absolute order: the least disobedience to this ‘spoils the
game’, depriving it of its character and of any value” [3, p. 13].
Thus, the existence of rules and systematic approaches, such as constraints in
color palette, in use of fonts, in use of families of geometric shapes, or in visual
language, are fundamental to guide the viewer of DVIs through its many variations.
Otherwise, the complexity and difficulty in grouping the variability to one cohesive
visual narrative would leave the viewer adrift. More than informing how to experience
it, and promoting certainty and rigidness, design should attract the audience to a
process, that is, to the playing arena.
In the cultural and social context where interactivity is an attraction and culture
is participatory, the design that is now taking place in an expanded field [56], has
shown a growing interest in the involvement of the recipient and a commitment
to mobilize it, resulting in the emergence of projects of a relational, dynamic and
emotional nature that change appearance or that move through time. In this sense, the
relevance of the new approaches to design has been argued as being a way of facing
302 R. Coelho and S. Dias

a constantly changing environment: “the challenge is not how to design a response

to a current issue, but how to design a means of continually responding, adapting and
innovating.” (Burns et al. p. 21, 2006, Cit. By Sangiorgi [57, p. 29]). It is essential
to reinforce that we live in a fragmented communication environment, without the
old hierarchies in which the audience moves with a new libido—the desire to be a
producer [58].
The relational-based proposals, which develop with a hybrid, experimental and
dynamic character, have intensely explored the unpredictable nature of the audience’s
behavior and involvement. In fact, the idea of the independent designer of a commer-
cial relationship, which develops as an author and producer, finds in human avail-
ability a raw material on a completely new scale. This reality has made it possible to
develop and apply participatory methodologies, in which the process and the perfor-
mance activity are more relevant than the final result. In those design approaches,
the designer becomes a kind of co-interpreter, determining the structure and rules,
as if it were a game. As an example of this decision, there are participative DVIs
still with few examples in Porto area. One such case is Câmara Municipal de Vila do
Conde’s visual identity, which empowers each user to make the brand their own by
writing the user’s name; there is a specific visual result for each character digitized
by the user, that has the same lexicon of shapes, colors and grid as the main visual
identity of CM Vila do Conde, conceding it flexibility. It is, however, confined to
a small space on the CM Vila do Conde website without much visibility for wider
use. However, access to participation through recreational moments, pleasure and
immediate stimuli, does not necessarily imply symbolic depth, nor the experience of
an effective ‘experience’, as discussed in “Play as a trigger for designing significant
experiences” [21]. The playful element is commonly used in the creation of pleasant
experiences, but eventually superficial and fleeting. According to that paper, several
studies show that the greatest emotional reaction is triggered by less expected events,
as opposed to familiarity, which tend to reduce the user’s reaction and attention.
Donald Norman [59] also concluded that good design solution (or a visual identity
with high communicative potential) is one that takes into account the dynamism of
the experience. In other words, it is a solution that is moderately revealed (it is not
immediate, not revealing everything at once), so it has the factor of surprising and
generating enthusiasm. In this process, the subject becomes part of that game, to
which he/she voluntarily dedicates. A solution that provides a dynamic experience
is one that, contrary to the fast-paced speed we live in, is durable. That is, it resists
time due to its capacity for seduction, moving away from neutrality, normality or
familiarity. In other words, the design solution must continuously feed the user’s
interest [31].
For the designer Jeremy Girard [60], the playful element is fundamental in the
communication experience. However, according to him, this factor will only become
memorable if the amount of humor is added in the correct proportion, otherwise
it can be an obstructive element to the rest of the experience: “too much can have
Dynamic Visual Identities: Reflection on Interaction … 303

the opposite effect, driving users away due to an over-the-top approach”. As a well-
resolved example of this situation Girard points out the Google logo which multiplies
the ‘o’ for the ‘more results’ button. The fun factor never compromises the access to
the service itself.

3 Porto Studio’s DVIs: Exploratory Research

Our profession as Polytechnic teachers and as researchers in higher education design

courses, and as communication designers ourselves, has been developed in northern
Portugal. Our geographic context was important as we seek to be aware about market
communication, and we wanted to think globally and interact locally. For the devel-
opment of this research, we first defined the sampling criteria to be our area of
expertise, located in the site of Porto city area.
For this first approach we started by contacting some design studios, via telephone
and email, without differentiating the more established studios from the most recent
ones founded by younger designers.
In this framework, we selected, from their online portfolios and by direct contact,
freelance designers and design studios located in Porto Metropolitan Area that devel-
oped visual identities. Through this process of visual analysis and interviews, we were
able to collect studios that had designed and implemented DVIs.

4 Analisys

As stated, we found redundancies in the terminology used by the several authors

analyzed [46, 37, 10, 42, 40, 43, 34, 13], so we simplified the categorizations and anal-
ysis factors of the DVIs in order to result in students’ awareness and empowerment
through pedagogical knowledge.
This preliminary study, part of a bigger research, supported us to critically suggest
that there are mainly three types of DVIs in Porto design studio’s activity: (i) DVIs
which have movement or animation, (ii) DVIs with an interval of solutions recre-
ated and recombined almost endlessly by the design studio; and (iii) DVIs that are
generative, where there is coding involved, allowing adaptation either to external or
user-based modifications, even though few examples have been collected.
As an example of the first classification (i), we can mention DVIs such as Play-
ground, by This is Pacifica; 180 Creative Camp by Studio Degrau; The Form of Form
by R2 Design; and André Dias Araújo, Arquitectura e Design by Another Collective.
For the second classification (ii), we can mention DVIs such as Câmara Municipal
de Aveiro, by Providência Design or Porto Ponto by Studio Eduardo Aires. And,
finally as an example of the third classification (iii), we can mention Edit by Volta.
Other designers, for instance, Luís Cepa referred the fact that they were working
304 R. Coelho and S. Dias

on generative DVIs using, in this case, Processing and [Link], but were still under
construction.
Next, we highlight one example per each category.

4.1 Movement or Animation

The Form of Form, by R2. Invited by R2, Henrik Kubel designed new glyphs for the F,
R and M and the letter O is reshaped in a variety of squares and rectangles, generating
a dialogue between different spaces, just like the intent of discovery and debate
construction around architecture, around its visual dimension, social and technical
impact of the Lisbon Architecture Triennale. The logo animation is portrayed in
suitable new media (Fig. 1).
André Dias Aquitectura e Design, by Another Collective, is an Architecture and
Design Office. The DVI is characterized by simple, continuous morphological vari-
ations of the letters A and D that define de acronym, supported by neutral sans-serif
typography that has no variations, other than its location in relation to the acronym.
Similar to the studio’s adaptations to the programmatic variety of its projects, the
DVI shows flexibility in the scale variability and form of the line, resulting in fluid
motion (Fig. 2).

Fig. 1 Frames from The Form of Form, Lisbon Architecture Triennale, by R2, 2016. Website R2:
[Link]

Fig. 2 Frames from André Dias Araújo Arquitectura e Design, by Another Collective. Another
Collective website: [Link]
Dynamic Visual Identities: Reflection on Interaction … 305

4.2 DVIs: Interval of Solutions

Câmara Municipal de Aveiro, by Providência Design, is an institutional DVI with

variants introduced to distinguish the entity’s multitude of services. The typography
is static, the iconographic variations are framed in a fixed grid that can be filled in
different positions depending on supports, media outputs and informative purposes
(Fig. 3).
Porto. by Studio Eduardo Aires, has a static logotype, surrounded by variability
in its iconic system and its position inside the grid that the studio has structured. This
system is inspired by Porto’s tiles and informs the user of the C. M. Porto’s stories
or services. (Motion can also be present in suitable media by animating the icons’
lines.) (Fig. 4).

Fig. 3 Câmara Municipal de Aveiro, by Providência Design, 2017. From Brand Identity of Aveiro
(CMA). Providência Design website: [Link]

Fig. 4 Porto., by Studio Eduardo Aires. From brand identity of Porto (CMP). Studio Eduardo Aires
website: [Link]
306 R. Coelho and S. Dias

Fig. 5 Frames from EDIT Disruptive Digital Education, by Volta. Volta Brand Shaping
Studio website: [Link] ([Link]

4.3 DVI: Generative

Edit, Disruptive Digital Education, by Volta. In a 4 × 4 grid, each square represents

the pixel, framing each letter of the word EDIT. The combinations of frame sizes and
positions are endless, portraying a digital attitude for this school on digital design,
marketing and creativity. The logo, albeit static in typography, is variable within the
structure of its grid (Fig. 5).

5 Conclusion

As a result of this exploratory study, we are able to observe the following:

(a) a sample of the contacted Porto Metropolitan Area design studios were unsure
of the scope and definition of a DVI;
(b) there are fewer examples of DVIs based on generative solutions, of participative
or reactive nature, that use the context of the user to feed the code constraints and
conditions that were used to design them. However, as stated earlier, there are
cases of generative solutions still in the making, some of them through software
such as Processing and other coding languages (for example by designer Luis
Cepa or Francisco Providência), that haven’t been implemented yet or are still
in the process of a graphic competition.
(c) most of the collected studios’ DVIs seem to take hold in an interval of options
designed by the designers, that can be rearranged in a virtually endless way.
(d) we also found that it is mainly the younger studios analyzed from our sample
who have experienced more on DVIs, in contrast to studios that have been
established for a longer period of time.
This research, speculative in nature, analyses DVIs with the intent of studying
and describing the characteristics of this type of visual phenomenon and playful
interaction with technology and the user’s emotions. The case studies presented here
had no intention of making universal or dogmatic generalizations, nor to state that
DVIs are in any way better than conventional visual identities. Nevertheless, our
Dynamic Visual Identities: Reflection on Interaction … 307

endeavor by using this approach and methods, was to contribute to a new vision
on DVIs, through the perspective of playful, emotional and relational interaction
that describes a new social and technological zeitgeist and raises design students’
awareness on these intertwined topics.
We are living in a moment that might correspond to a recent openness, by designers
and their studios, to this trend of DVIs. This situation may also mean that, in terms
of design education, there is still plenty of space to create relationships between
the most conventional and classic graphic design courses with the information and
communication technologies and digital processes. As teachers, we can witness that
this interconnection in higher education already exists, but there may be space to
strengthen this multidisciplinarity in the academic project and in the structure of
pedagogical design programs in the metropolitan area of Porto.
Along with humanity’s evolution, technology and the way in which we communi-
cate, have evolved tremendously, at an incomparable speed that hasn’t corresponded
to the velocity in development of our brains and emotions. This new technocratic,
globalized world we live in, craves for attention from our optical systems that are, by
and large, overloaded. Analogous to our cerebral processes which are configured, in
striking similarity, to the ones of our ancestors, which helped us fight or flight from
our predators, we are suffering a dramatic reduced attention span due to excessive
visual requests.
Nonetheless, it seems our brain is aligned to engage in a more complex way to the
presence of play and movement, be it real or perceived as such, due to animation or
changes in composition, color, content, morphology, in a DVI, and consequently, be
aroused by the presence of one. DVIs show playful features, evoke memory, provoke
emotional responses that help establish a relationship and identification with its
hypermodern situated audience. Studies in the scientific fields of psychology are, for
this reason, fundamental added contributions to instruct communication designers
with scientific arguments, safeguarding, however, the importance of their sensitivity
and intuition when designing a DVI.
We can also verify that velocity in mutations, characteristic of today’s cultural,
political, societal, economic sectors we live in, is mimicked and reflected by a
dynamic, playful visual identity, of a DVI. These features seek to stay adequate to the
varied circumstances their target audience lives in, that doesn’t abide by controlled
or strict rules that can be frozen on a conventional manual of norms. These rapid
advances in technology are also the reason why it is even possible to accomplish the
design of recent DVIs. Much like a gesture in a person’s identity, dynamism can be
also a low-tech feature, similar to color, that adds a new characteristic to a visual
identity.
Aspiring designers and design students should be aware of this lifting of tech-
nological constraints, beyond conventional graphic design rules and education and
be open to design with animation, movement, coding and algorithmic, generative,
participative or reactive nature: allowing a flexibility in their design of visual identi-
ties, in order to potentially predict their relevance in polysemic and pluralistic needs,
purposes, audience expectations, and desires of interaction.
308 R. Coelho and S. Dias

If it is true that levels of elevated arousal—such as the ones resulting from the
mutability of a DVI and the consequent superior request of memory to perceive those
changes as being part of plural solutions within one same visual identity narrative—it
can improve engagement, then it is only safe to say that DVIs constitute an enriched
cognitive mechanism with the viewer, transforming one’s perception in a subcon-
scious way. In other words, a playful strategic is a manner to obtain engagement and
interaction with the audience.
For Brand managers and design students alike, the challenge is to acknowledge
that dynamic experience held by DVIs can surprise and delight through an unex-
pected added image, an added texture, an added position, location, form, color,
typography, composition, rotation … Indeed, an unexpected new graphic solution,
indelibly engraved in the memory of those who participate in their interpretation,
and thus construction, and should go beyond craving for the user’s attention in a
gratuitous manner. In consequence, engagement is held internally, but never neutral.
In other words, the communicative power of a design solution is in the activation
of the user’s emotions, retrieved by the associations and memories that are evoked
during the moment of interaction through the design.
Therefore, more than dictating prescriptions, we were successful in observing
different examples on how to promote experiences through visual identities that
guide, both author and receiver, through constraints that are to be played out almost
like a game, but convey rhythmic and consistent solutions for a given communication
problem of identification.
This preliminary research gave us a perspective on the importance of investigating
more on the topic, that does not seem to be taken into account by much of the scien-
tific research in our field of expertise in our country. We concluded that it is still a
very much fresh subject in our area of expertise and influence: both lacking a full
body of scientific writing and a full tangible implemented design work through most
of the studios. Some of the contacted Porto design studios were unsure of the scope
and definition of DVI. As we have seen, there are few examples of generative, partic-
ipative, and reactive DVIs designed by Porto area studios. Processing technology,
such as [Link] is beginning to be a technology that is starting to be used by young
designers, but as abovementioned, this identity in motion and play can be a low tech
feature, adding complexity, depth and emotion and, as consequence, memorability
and uniqueness to a visual identity.
As limitations, not every studio replied to our contacts, and by constraints of time
and lockdown due to Covid-19, we were able to analyze in detailed form just a portion
of the visual identities from the studios in our study collection. Our aim, however,
was not prescriptive or universal in any way, therefore, we hope to motivate further
investigation, and this will be our starting point for future developments on this topic
in our area.
With this research, we believe we have contributed to the communication of such
a synthetic design as the visual identity, in particular DVIs from Porto Metropolitan
Area. Although preliminary, this research served to observe the pertinence of the
theme in the national context. In future studies, it will be important to gather and
analyze a greater number and variety of DVIs with common lines of action—in
Dynamic Visual Identities: Reflection on Interaction … 309

which the design is mediated by playful, participatory and relational factors—in

order to establish a new grid of meaning in the creation and development of the
graphic identity, examining DVIs reception from its audience and scrutinizing if
there is a perception, both by its viewers and its creators, of the playful qualities of
its mechanisms of variation.
Finally, if we consider the existence of rules and systematic approaches funda-
mental in the design experience and in the playing arena, where conventional or
unconventional visual identities live, contacting and touching those around them, we
are certain that the current pandemic context will have a strong influence in the way
brands will communicate in the near future.

Acknowledgements We would like to identify the designers and design studios who have had a
relevant role in the development of this research: André Cruz, Antero Ferreira, António Modesto,
Carlos Mesquita, Catarina Dantas, Eduardo Aires, Francisco Providência, Guilherme Ferreira,
Helder Dias, Jorge Marques, Jorge Pontes, Laura Pina, Lourenço Vieira Neves, Luís Cepa, Mariana
Marques, Né Santelmo, Pedro Amado, Pedro Sousa, Rui Mendonça, Rui Sereno, This is Pacifica,
Tiago Nogueira, Vítor Quelhas.
We also thank José Oliveira Pereira, our research collaborator.

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Developing an Integrated
Communication Plan in the Digital Age

André Teixeira, Sergio Dominique-Ferreira, Nuno Martins,

and Cristina Sylla

Abstract Marketers are constantly exploring the best communication channels to

deliver the best possible message to their targets. Therefore, technological advances
are continuously shaping communications, especially in digital environments. Bidi-
rectional and interactive dimensions characterize digital media communications.
This study explores relevant literature on integrated marketing communications and
communication in digital environments, including child-oriented marketing commu-
nications. As a result, theoretical framework on digital communication is provided
for academics and practitioners.

Keywords Digital marketing · Integrated marketing communication · Digital

communication · Business-to-business · Business-to-consumer · Child-oriented
marketing communication

1 Integrated Marketing Communication

Advances in information technology and the consequent expansion of new digital

media have brought new possibilities and perspectives to modern marketing and
have made the management of marketing communications much more complex and

A. Teixeira
School of Tourism and Management, Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave, Barcelos, Portugal
e-mail: a16035@[Link]
S. Dominique-Ferreira (B)
Department of Marketing, School of Tourism and Management, Polytechnic Institute of Cávado
and Ave & UNIAG Research Unit, Barcelos, Portugal
e-mail: sdominique@[Link]; [Link]@[Link]
N. Martins
Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, School of Design, Polytechnic Institute of
Cavado and Ave, Barcelos, Portugal
C. Sylla
Research Centre On Child Studies, Universityof Minho/Interactive Technologies Institute
(ITI/LARSYS), Braga, Portugal

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 313
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
314 A. Teixeira et al.

challenging [1]. According to the American Association of Advertising Agencies

(4As), Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) is characterized as:
A marketing communication planning concept that recognizes added value in a plan that
integrates a variety of strategic disciplines, for example, general advertising, direct response,
sales promotion, and public relations, and combines these disciplines to provide clarity,
consistency, and maximum communication impact. (Shultz p.13, quoted in Amanda Zwerin
et al. [2])

Nowadays, marketers are continually testing different communication channels

to develop an effective communication. The reach of the message has become a key
element of the best marketing practices, helping the companies to meet their goals
and increase their value [3]. Hence, IMC strategy consists of analyzing, planning,
and aligning the communication of the entire company, improving the impact of each
communication channel. Its primary goal is to build long-term relationships between
members of the organization and its customers [4, 5]. Consistency between messages
sent through different channels as well as the consistency with previous messages
are crucial [6].
Therefore, organizations are increasing their advertising budgets to prmote their
products and services on social networks, developing a competitive advantage [7].
To date, traditional IMC consisted of a few popular tools, such as advertising, sales
promotion, direct marketing, and public relations, which are not fully effective in
researching and evaluating the differences of Generation Z [8, 9]. Consequently,
digital marketing and social networks must be integrated into traditional IMC tools
to obtain a fully updated tool for the challenges of technological innovations [10].
As a result, it is expected that in the near future, marketing communication will
undergo constant changes due to the development of technology, which indicates that
new studies and research should be carried out for continuous growth and alignment
with marketing objectives in order to reveal, the true effectiveness of a IMC strategy
[11]. In this sense, the originality of this study is to further explore IMC, trends and
child-oriented marketing communications.

1.1 Integrated Marketing Communication’s Strategy

Currently, with the new communication´s environment, marketers should be able to

structure IMC plans. In this sense, they should start having a clear understanding of
the functioning of all the different types of communications, as well as the process
and consumer buying decision process [1].
The development of a IMC plan sets the basis for the implementation of integrated
marketing communications in organizations [12]. According to those authors, the
IMC plan coordinates the components of the marketing-mix to achieve harmony in
the messages sent to consumers.
Clow and Baack [12] suggest dividing the analysis into two steps (see Fig. 1).
First, it necessary to carry out an analysis of the current external and internal envi-
ronment based on primary and secondary data. Next, marketers should develop a
Developing an Integrated Communication Plan in the Digital Age 315

Fig. 1 Plan steps IMC [12].

Source Own preparation
SITUATIONAL ANALYSIS
adapted from Clow and
Baack
SWOT ANALYSIS

MARKETING OBJECTIVES

TARGET AUDIENCE

MARKETING STRATEGIES

MARKETING TATICS

IMPLEMENTATION

PERFORMANCE'S EVOLUTION

SWOT analysis, analyzing the elements present in the internal and external environ-
ment of the organization. This includes: the identification of the company’s strengths
and weaknesses (internal analysis), opportunities and threats (external environment).
Subsequently, the definition of marketing goals should be suggested. Defining the
primary goals of marketing communications enables companies to define different
types of goals, e.g.: higher sales, increase in market share or a new competitive
positioning. Those objectives must be related to the main target of the company.
Therefore, the fourth step is related with the identification of the target(s). Based on
the outlined marketing objectives and the selected target, the fifth stage concerns the
development of the marketing-mix. Defining strategies should include the marketing-
mix, brand image and positioning tactics, differentiation, and brand information. The
tactical communication plan is the sixth stage of this model, aiming to support the
required actions of the marketing-mix. The final two steps in the marketing plan
are: (i) operationalizing the plan,monitor the performance of each element. Next, the
budget and schedule of the IMC plan must be defined. The last stage of the model
consists of its evaluation and control.

1.2 Tools for Integrated Marketing Communication

Technological developments changed the way companies and consumers commu-

nicate [1]. Over the years, promotional elements have included advertising, sales
316 A. Teixeira et al.

promotion, and personal selling [12]. Furthermore, other advances such as: data
analytics, e-advertising, digital marketing, direct marketing, social networks, public
relations, play an important role in the development of communication in digital
environments.
As mentioned by Key and Czaplewski [13], advertising consists of the develop-
ment of any message, reminder or persuasion directed at a target market or audience,
usually carried out in a generalized, non-personal way, and identified by a specific
sponsor. Television, radio, newspapers, magazines, and billboards have long been
some of the traditional advertising media [12]. In the current digitalization age, the
dissemination of advertising is much faster and more effective, leading to the trans-
mission of a more segmented, interactive, and responsive message [14]. Marketers
can use their digital assets through bidirectional and interactive communication,
namely digital media a part of the Digital Marketing. Digital marketing includes
email marketing, websites, blogs, APPs [12].
Networks are extremely important as they influence users’ social perception and
behavior [15]. Compared to the more traditional communication channels, social
networks are more persuasive as they allow consumers to express their satisfaction
with product [16, 17]. Surprisingly more than 90% of companies use social media
platforms like Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, What-
sApp, Tumblr to increase brand awareness and attract new customers [18, 19]. Social
networks facilitate the location, measurement, and analysis of online strategies,
allowing companies to draw conclusions and adjust strategies rapidly [13].
Traditional advertising has almost always faced several communication chal-
lenges and as such, new approaches have emerged that establish the fundamental
basis of alternative marketing, such as buzz marketing, guerrilla marketing, product
placement, branded advertising. entertainment, and lifestyle marketing [12]. Orga-
nizations identify new opportunities in the customer’s purchase path. Therefore,
companies should prepare their marketing messages to draw attention to these touch-
points, providing a complement to mass media and digital advertising. Carrying
out a guerrilla marketing campaign can also include elements of buzz and lifestyle
marketing, thus showing versatility and synergy between different alternative
marketing programs.
In this context, Data Base Marketing (DBM) plays a vital importance and it
defined as the process of building, maintaining, and using databases of customers,
suppliers, or resellers, with the purpose of creating contact, relationships and carrying
out interactions or transactions [20]. In the same line, Clow and Baack [12] refer that
DBM consists of collecting and using customer data to improve interactions with the
public to achieve customer loyalty. Data warehouses, data encoding, data mining, are
some of the DBM program, allowing companies to better know their targets, which
can make message dissemination more effective [13].
Direct Marketing consists of directing products to consumers, not using other
channel or intermediaries [20, 12]. While advertising consists of non-personal
communications, direct marketing seeks to create individual personal relationships
with the target audience with the main objective of acquiring responses [13]. In
direct marketing, organizations have the possibility to use certain channels to reach
Developing an Integrated Communication Plan in the Digital Age 317

consumers, such as direct mail, direct email, catalog marketing, search engine
optimization (SEO), Inbound and Outbound telemarketing, interactive television,
websites, and mobile devices [12, 20]. In the current digital technological age, compa-
nies are increasingly using mostly direct communications with their customers [21].
Textual paralanguages include the use of visual, audible, and non-verbal elements
that usually replace written language with symbols, images (e.g.: emoji’s) [22]. The
existence of databases is what allows direct marketing to be carried out, which is a
way for companies to better know their customers [13, 20], specially through DBM.
Consequently, Clow and Baack [12] refer that personal selling is an opportunity
to build long-term relationships with consumers. Personal selling is one of the best
techniques applied to convert the preference of the audience’s behavior,however, it
depends a lot on other elements of the communication mix. Personal selling efforts
cannot be optimized without the existence of direct marketing, database support and
advertising dissemination that creates awareness and knowledge about a certain situa-
tion otherwise, personal selling is likely to be lost [13]. According to Clow and Baack
[12] the standard steps of a personal selling process consist of lead generation, lead
qualification, knowledge acquisition, sales presentation, handling objections, closing
the sale, and customer follow-up.
The public relations department manages advertising and other communications
with all groups in contact with the company, with many of the functions being similar
to those provided by the marketing department [12]. Subsequently to Kotler and
Keller [20], public relations offer several options to promote and protect the image of a
company or individual products, including company’s newsletters, internal messages,
public relations communications, correspondence with shareholders, annual reports,
various special events and social networks. Public relations work closely with the
other elements of the marketing mix in an integrated way [13].

2 Integrated Marketing Comunication B2B and B2C

From a marketer’s perspective, it may seem that marketing communication strategies

in business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) industries are funda-
mentally based on price promotions, however, there are several aspects in which both
strategies have many points in common and one of the most important factor for both
processes is customer orientation [23].
According to authors Rėklaitis and Pielienė [23], companies in the B2B sector
focus on the logic and characteristics of the product, while in the B2C market the
decision of consumers will be more emotional, that is, there will be no effort to
analyze other alternatives or competitors. In marketing products and services to the
B2B market, there is little or no personal emotion involved in the purchase decision.
The message is very different when it comes to the marketing approach in the B2B
and B2C business sectors. The B2C marketing message, especially if it is online,
requires immediate action such as: using a coupon, subscribing to a newsletter, buying
at a discount, among others. The B2B marketing message is informative: it calls a
318 A. Teixeira et al.

consumer (or customer) to discover something [23]. Povolná [24] refers that the
advertising messages issued by B2B organizations should be totally creative and
more appealing to maintain a good relationship and attract the attention of business
managers.
Choosing the right media channel can be crucial on the way to a successful
communication strategy. Camilleri [25] emphasizes that B2C companies with limited
budgets choose two or even fewer channels in the dissemination of their message,
which increases the risk of wasting time and resources on activities that do not lead
to the intended goals and objectives. Therefore, the author highlights that organiza-
tions with larger budgets have a greater choice of communication channels, can go
for an electronic media channel (TV and radio), print advertising (newspapers and
magazines), direct offers such as email, personal selling, public relations, and the
internet.
On the other hand, budget constraints in the B2C industry can be overcome by
choosing the right marketing tools and fostering the creation of relevant messages
to attract consumers, unlike companies in the B2B business sectors that tend to use
different communication channels [24]. According to Swani et al. [26], the appro-
priate media channels for B2B companies are television, online communication, and
print advertising. Povolná [24] states that part of B2B communication has become
online and predicts that this trend will continue to increase.
Many business-to-business (B2B) organizations are turning to digital marketing
to increase customer acquisition [27]. In addition to interactive strategies to connect
with consumers, digital marketing offers precise segmentation of potential customers
[28, 29]. Organizations have realized that digital marketing in the B2B space increases
the flow of information and trust between customers [30, 31]. Today through digital
media, B2B customers have access to information about various products and
services, which traditionally were not readily available to buyers and as such, this
information helps B2B customers to make informed decisions. B2B organizations
must maintain an online presence where they convey trust, whether through websites
or blogs in online business communities or through social media platforms [32].
Brands drive business performance by influencing the market’s perception of a
company’s products and services, thus making consumers pay a premium for the
perceived value [33, 34]. Very recently, some studies have explored the interaction
between customers and stakeholders and its effects on the performance of a company
in the B2B sector [35]. Organizations make use of social networking sites as Face-
book, Twitter, LinkedIn, and blogs, to acquire new customers, maintain long-term
relationships with consumers, and increase brand recognition [36–38].
Industrial buyers use social media for their purchase as they compare products,
research the market, and build relationships with salesperson [39].
Due to digitalization customers are becoming more informed and rely less on
traditional selling initiatives [40]. Buyers are relying more on digital resources and
their buying process more often involves the use of social media. For example, in
the research B2B buyer survey, 82% of buyers stated that social media content has
a significant impact on the purchase decision [40]. As a result, these changes in
Developing an Integrated Communication Plan in the Digital Age 319

consumer behavior place high pressure on B2B salespeople and traditional sales
companies [40].
Additionally, 50% of the companies stated that social media has improved their
marketing optimization and customer experience, while 25% stated that their revenue
went up [41]. Even though B2B companies are benefitting from social media used
by marketers, it is argued that research on that area is still in the embryonic stage
and future research is needed [42–45]. There is a limited understanding of how B2B
companies need to change to embrace recent technological innovations and how it
can lead to business and societal transformation [46–48].
Furthermore, the author confirms through previous studies, that the content
available on social networking sites is crucial for building advertising strategies.
According to the authors [27], researchers have found that effective social media
strategies require content that is valuable, engaging, relevant, and timely in which,
should focus on helping rather than selling.
Regading price, Rėklaitis and Pielienė [23] compared to the B2C end-consumer
market, the sales process in the B2B market takes longer. The price factor is obviously
important in a B2B sales strategy, but its importance is limited to the buyer’s budget.
decision making in B2B markets can sometimes become a very formal process as it
can involve several people [26]. Therefore, any organization that focuses on customer
service should focus on after-sales activities such as customer loyalty and clarifying
doubts about the characteristics of products while, in a organization that operates
in the B2B market, it would be wise to provide consultancy services as well as
discussions on technical, technological, legal, budgetary issues even without the
certainty that the sale will be consumed [23].
In general, it can be concluded that the success of the business will be proportional
to the degree of trust between the seller and the buyer since customer service is a
highly important element in a marketing communication strategy regardless of the
market in which the company operates.
Table 1 presents the types of channels and their preferred tools to communicate
in which channel.

3 Child-Oriented Marketing and the New Media Channels

Nowadays, children have many options when it comes to digital entertainment.

YouTube has emerged as an alternative to traditional television content as it offers
new possibilities for brands to promote a degree of interaction with children and their
parents [49, 50]. Young people who use social media are true audience creators and
can easily promote electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) in which they increase the
visibility and notoriety of any brand and possibly gradually increase its sales [51].
By identifying the impact of eWOM on consumer decisions and attitudes, brands
started by approaching social media influencers (users with a high degree of influence
on social media channels and with a large audience of followers) and encouraging
320 A. Teixeira et al.

Table 1 Types and communication channel’s. Source

Channels Communication channels Author(s)
Business-to-Business • Television Swani et al. [26]
• Online Communication
• Print Advertising
• Digital Marketing Pandey et al. [27], Michaelidou
• Social Media et al. [36], Pandey and Singh [38]
Business-to-Consumer • Electronic Media Channel Camilleri [25]
(Television, Radio)
• Print Adverting (newspapers and
magazines)
• Email
• Personal Selling
• Public Relations
• Internet

them to create and distribute relevant content related to the brand, a practice called
influencer marketing [52].
In the last decade, the advertising and marketing landscape aimed at children has
changed dramatically. For example, children find advertising messages from vloggers
on YouTube, read sponsored articles on websites, play advergames on tablets, see
targeted ads on Facebook, etc. [53]. Thus, children are no longer only exposed to
advertising messages on television and print media (such as commercials or brand
positioning), but also with online advertising (such as advergames, social media
advertising, or banners) and are approached by advertisers on their mobile devices
[54].
As mentioned by Schouten et al. [55], celebrity endorsements are a popular way
for marketers to promote their brands, products, and services. Many academic studies
have confirmed that celebrity endorsement significantly increases the effectiveness
of advertising [56]. However, in addition to using ‘traditional’ celebrities like actors,
supermodels, and athletes to add value to their brand, companies are increasingly
turning to social media influencers (also called ‘microcelebrities’) such as vloggers
and ‘Instafamous’ personalities, to endorse their brands [57]. In contrast to tradi-
tional celebrities who gained public recognition because of their professional talent,
social media influencers (hereinafter referred to as ‘influencers’), gained fame by
successfully identifying themselves as experts on social media platforms [58]. By
enthusiastically sharing self-generated content on topics such as beauty, fitness, food
and fashion, these social media users (mostly women) have gained a large following,
turning their online social presence into a core profession such as a ‘fashionblogger’
or ‘fitgirl’ [59].
Influencers attract millions of followers by sharing curated content from their
daily lives on platforms like Instagram and YouTube, evolving around a specific
interest domain [60]. While “traditional” celebrities also found their way onto social
media, influencers built their careers online and were unknown to the general public
before. Not only do influencers have the power to directly influence the purchasing
Developing an Integrated Communication Plan in the Digital Age 321

decisions of a large audience, but their followers also deem them to be credible
sources of information [52, 61].
A growing body of academic research is investigating the merits of influencer
marketing and the processes that play a role in influencers’ effects on brand responses.
For example, Lee and Watkins [62] showed that vloggers positively affect consumer
purchase intentions for (luxury) brands promoted in their vlogs. Similarly, as showed
by Chapple and Cownie [60], consumers claimed to regularly follow lifestyle vlog-
gers’ product recommendations, whether buying a product or recommending it to
others. In another study, Colliander and Dahlén [63] found that a blog post about
a fashion brand resulted in higher brand attitude and increased purchase intent
compared to an online magazine article on the same topic, because readers felt
closer to the blogger. According to authors Djafarova and Rushworth [61], inter-
views with Instagram users suggest that influencers are perceived as more trustworthy
and relatable than traditional female celebrities, and their product reviews have a
significant impact on the purchasing behavior of young women. In a previous study
comparing the effectiveness of celebrity recommendations with product reviews from
an unknown “average” customer, female participants were more positive about a
promoted experience product when it was promoted by a relatable consumer [64].
Previous studies on influencer marketing, conducted among students and adult
participants, have shown that influencers are considered more credible and trust-
worthy than traditional celebrities and are found more likable when they have a high
following, as they are then perceived as more popular [61, 52, 53].

4 Conclusion

The objective of this work was to explore the relevant literature on integrated
marketing communications and communication in digital environments, including
child-oriented marketing communications.
In that sense, we contribute to the innovation literature by showing that in the
current digitalization age, marketing communications are constantly changing due
to the development of technology. As a result, marketers need to continually test
different communication channels to achieve an effective communication. By doing
so, we expand the established by Keller [1] and Patti et al. [11], identifying clear bene-
fits of integrated marketing communications. Consequently, this study is line with
the literature (e.g.: Rèklaitis and Pilelienè [23]), supporting that B2B and B2C indus-
tries should focus on developing a customer’s service strategy to develop a degree
of trust between the seller and the buyer. Furthermore, this work also contribute to
the IMC literature by providing clear evidence of the positive impact that celebrity
endorsement has on brands. This result is line with the recent work of Schouten et al.
[55], making it even more clear that the celebrity endorsement is a popular way for
marketers to promote their brands, products, and services. Relevant insights on the
social media influencers are also provided.
322 A. Teixeira et al.

Acknowledgements Research : "MoBeyBOU: Moving Beyond Boundaries - Designing Narrative

Learning in the Digital Era", referência: POCI-01-0145-FEDER-032580, financiado pela Fundação
para a Ciência e a Tecnologia—FCT, e o Fundos Europeus Estruturais e de Investimento FEDER
através do Programa Operacional Competitividade e Internacionalização.
The authors are grateful to the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT, Portugal) for
financial support by national funds FCT/MCTES to UNIAG (UIDB/04752/2020).

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From Design History to Its
Transdisciplinarity
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural
Heritage and Digital Transformation

Mario Buono , Sonia Capece , Camelia Chivaran

˘ ,
Salvatore Gerbino , Giovanna Giugliano , Alessandro Greco ,
Elena Laudante , Maria Laura Nappi , and Ciro Scognamiglio

Abstract The current context is characterised by the speed of change in the techno-
logical sphere and in particular by the interconnection—to the point of overlaying—
between physical and digital space. This stimulates consideration on the opportuni-
ties to explore the new frontiers of knowledge through advanced technologies and
unprecedented cognitive-sensory perceptions, both from the user’s viewpoint and
from that of the researcher. The chapter provides a critical-analytical reflection on
accessibility and multisensory issues as fundamental tools for transferring multi-
level knowledge between physical and digital. Based on this study, it proposes the
configuration of immersive knowledge-sharing environments where cultural heritage
and scientific research intersect, placing the user at the centre of experience. The
augmented, multilevel fruition, the tracking within the multisensory environment of

M. Buono (B) · S. Capece · C. Chivăran · S. Gerbino · G. Giugliano · A. Greco · E. Laudante ·

M. L. Nappi · C. Scognamiglio
Department of Engineering, University of Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli”, Aversa (CE), Italy
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
S. Capece
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
C. Chivăran
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
S. Gerbino
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
G. Giugliano
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
A. Greco
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
E. Laudante
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
M. L. Nappi
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
C. Scognamiglio
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 329
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
330 M. Buono et al.

psycho-physiological and behavioural users’ data, together with the assessment of

experience itself, have guided the design experimentations undertaken for the new
layout of the Museum of Contemporary Mediterranean Ceramics in Cava de’ Tirreni.
This was conceived as a multisensory and accessible phygital laboratory of inclusion
and dialogue, a dynamic and adaptive space for sharing and experiencing knowledge.

Keywords Multilevel knowledge · Physical-digital relationship · Phygital ·

Multisensory adaptive fruition · Accessibility · Immersive experience

1 Introduction

At a time when the digital dimension transforms the ways of interaction between
user-space-object, it is necessary for cultural fruition to intertwine with research in
order to amplify experience. The convergence and interaction between the physical-
analogical world and the digital one are shaping a new fluid, “phygital” [52] space,
where the narrative ways and the forms of accessibility and experience of knowledge
are changing [39].
The contribution proposes a theoretical-practical approach based on accessibility
and multisensoriality to share the multidimensional knowledge between physical and
digital.
Starting from accessibility in its various forms (physical, cognitive, sensory),
standards and directives regarding the configuration of inclusive spaces for knowl-
edge transfer have been identified, analysing the advanced tools and technologies
that trigger the user-space-object relationship and simultaneously track actions and
interactions, behaviour and emotions generated by the experience of fruition. This
required the identification of innovative communication strategies that go beyond
the physical dimension. Particular attention was given to storytelling as a privileged
tool to transfer visible and invisible knowledge through multilinear contemporary
narrative forms. The intention is to overcome any barrier in exploring knowledge to
engage an extended range of users through new sensory itineraries, where adaptive
interaction gains an essential role.
The critical reading and the interpretation of such factors, together with the design
experiences undertaken for the new layout of the Museum of Contemporary Mediter-
ranean Ceramics in Cava de’ Tirreni, have enabled the definition of new models of
advanced fruition [15]. Furthermore, a multisensory environment-laboratory was
configured as an adaptive space for knowledge sharing, where the user is placed at
the centre of the immersive experience in constant dialogue with the researcher, who
aims to assess and optimize such experience.
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 331

2 Towards Inclusive Approaches: Principles, Directives

and Standards

We witness a true “revolution in accessibility” as a result of the many advances

and development of strategies, techniques, and solutions specifically designed to be
accessible to all [49].
Despite the amount of research found in literature showing the strong connection
between the enjoyment, use, accessibility and inclusion of cultural heritage, today
there are still several limitations in applying these concepts [15].
In fact, fundamental importance is given to the extensive and complex regula-
tory system that approaches accessibility in its various forms—physical, cognitive,
sensory—representing an effective tool for knowledge sharing and for the transfer
of tangible and intangible innovations to the market.
From the analysis of the European and International regulatory framework of
interest, it is possible to “enhance” the factors related to accessibility through the
definition of requirements and specifications for the design of products and services
“for all”, with particular focus on the implementation of technologies in the context
of knowledge dissemination.
In the international context, the ISO Organization supports the definition of new
standards towards implementation in the use of products and services to an increas-
ingly diverse range of people. In this direction, the ISO/IEC Guide 71:2014 [32]
defines the main requirements and recommendations related to accessibility, starting
from the summary of the terminology in use for this topic, from the necessary objec-
tives for the identification of user needs and from the human skills and characteristics
to “address” these needs. Such aspects can be directly applied to the configuration
of new experiences of enjoyment and use.
ISO/TR 22411:2021 [33] is more recently established and it provides ergonomic
data regarding the effects of aging and the consequences of various types of sensory,
physical, and cognitive disabilities. These data can be used by standard developers in
applying ISO/IEC Guide 71:2014 [32] to understand user diversity and thus support
the development of accessible products, services, environments, and structures.
European standardization is advancing in a strategic way to harmonize national
legislation of EU member States concerning accessibility.
Several studies have been started within CEN, CENELEC and ETSI,1 leading to
the publication of a series of mandates on the subject in question. These provide for
the expansion of the fields of study and research starting from the paradigm shift
towards inclusive and shared approaches.

1 CEN: European Committee for Standardization, CENELEC: European Committee for Elec-
trotechnical Standardization and ETSI: European Telecommunications Standards Institute.
332 M. Buono et al.

Specifically, it refers to Mandate M/473 “Design for All” issued by the European
Commission in 2010 to address accessibility through the “Design for All” approach.
The aim is to develop specific accessibility “standardization initiatives” extending the
range of users by identifying their needs, characteristics, abilities and preferences and
their direct or indirect involvement in procedures and processes [54]. This reference
highlights the need to consider the different user characteristics from the beginning of
the process when designing new multisensory fruition paths for knowledge sharing
[15].
In the framework of European Union actions, the same “Design for All” approach
leads to the definition of new accessibility requirements with reference to the commu-
nication, perception and understanding characteristics of goods and services within
Directive 2019/882/EU [24]. In the same direction, the European Commission’s
“Strategy for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities 2021–2030” considers the need
to establish standards to «assist implementation in the physical environment and ICT
and to enable organizations to adopt a “design for all” approach» [22].
In line with the goals of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Devel-
opment [75] and, before that, with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of
Persons with Disabilities [74], the new Strategy pays particular attention to progress
in ensuring the same rights also to impaired people regardless of gender, race, reli-
gion, etc. Different difficulties, including physical, mental, intellectual or sensory
impairments need to be considered.
In this context, AccessibleEU [23] will be established, an EU initiative mainly
aiming to implement coherence in accessibility policies by facilitating “access
to knowledge”. National authorities—responsible for implementing and enforcing
accessibility standards—will be connected with experts and practitioners from the
“knowledge sector”.
Developments in the European regulatory framework bring to a new frontier of
“Design for All”, as defined by the UNI EN 17161: 2019 [73]. As a result of the
request of the European Commission to CEN, CENELEC and ETSI (M/473), the
document fosters accessibility applied to products and services by also considering
interaction with assistive technologies. Moreover, it provides the requirements to plan
and manage processes and to understand users’ needs and expectations for ensuring
greater inclusion.
This standard is complementary to the existing user-centred design methodologies
and it describes activities that ought to be performed as an “extension” of the accessi-
bility approach. These activities—divided into (I) identification of users and context
of use; (II) analysis and description of users’ needs, functionalities and characteris-
tics; (III) definition of solutions according to users’ requirements; (IV) evaluation of
solutions designed for the widest range of users—define the general framework of
the design “for all” process. In particular, the involvement of users—from the initial
steps and along the entire design chain—is an essential part of the process. As an
input for the improvement of future design processes, it also returns the performance
evaluations of products and services.
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 333

Within UNI EN 17161: 2019 [73], competitive advantage, inclusive public poli-
cies, innovation, sustainability and attention to human rights are the main expected
results for the design of easily accessible, understandable and usable products and
services.
From the identification and analysis of the above-mentioned regulations (see
Fig. 1), it emerged the need to keep advancing towards greater regulatory updates.
This can be achieved through synergy between the field of cultural heritage, the world
of research, and the overall system of standardization concerning accessibility—a key
element for achieving the objectives set out in the different action plans at European
and international levels.
It is necessary to define tools and norms that lead to the design of new products
and inclusive, multisensory spaces that focus on the real needs of the cultural expe-
rience final users [18]. This is possible through a multidisciplinary and intersectoral
approach.

Fig. 1 Schematization of the main “design for all” regulatory references

334 M. Buono et al.

3 Advanced Tools and Technologies to Amplify the User

Experience

To enable accessibility and inclusion of an extended range of users during fruition

experiences, several advanced tools and technologies have been identified. These can
multiply the levels of information and transfer knowledge through multiple sensory
channels.
People interact with the surrounding reality through senses, with which they are
able to receive inputs from the surrounding environment and produce them in turn in
order to engage users in the interaction experience. In this regard, the technological
devices used act as a filter between the external environment and the receptor organs
of the human body, to provide the user with a set of inputs as realistic as possible
compared to the stimuli coming from the physical environment.
The popularity of Virtual Reality [1] has grown exponentially only in the last
decade, with the marketing of high performance and affordable products, such as
headsets [30]. These had significant impact on the daily use of audiovisual content in
all social areas, from entertainment to industrial processes. The key word around
which VR devices gravitate is “immersiveness”: the virtual experience must be
engaging to the point of making indistinguishable for the user what is real from
what is virtual. The degree of immersiveness of a VR application is closely related
to how many senses are involved in the virtual interaction.
It is necessary to involve the user’s senses mostly affected by the reproduced
interaction, with the highest level of realism possible.
The virtual experience in its current significance involves the use of headsets
and hand-held controllers. Concerning interaction, this instrumentation acts both as
inputs and as outputs: the inputs for interaction are made up of real-time tracking of
the movements of the user’s head and hands. The output data are instead provided by
the headset, equipped with screens and headphones for the reproduction of audiovi-
sual content. The controllers are visible in the virtual scenario through 3D models,
which the individual can use to visualize the movements of his hands and interact
with virtual objects. This kind of interaction is limiting for the immersiveness of the
virtual application since the user can grab objects and move them in the scenario
but does not receive any kind of tactile feedback from the contacts. Haptic devices
for VR compensate for this deficiency. The most sophisticated haptic gloves allow
replicating the texture and weight of the grasped objects, through magnetic or pneu-
matic actuation systems; cheaper and simpler haptic solutions are characterized by
vibrotactile actuators that simulate contact with virtual objects through vibrations
imprinted on the affected parts of the hand [57].
The most recent VR headsets aim to increased performance and wearability. The
Varjo VR-3 [77] is capable of processing virtual environments at very high resolution.
It is equipped with eye tracking sensors, which allow putting the focus of the virtual
scene on what the user’s gaze is focused on, excluding from high quality rendering
the rest of the scenario. This saves computational power, boosting the device’s perfor-
mance; it also features built-in Ultraleap technology for accurate tracking of the user’s
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 335

hands. Other cutting-edge VR headsets are designed to improve wearability and user
comfort, such as the HTC Flow: a virtual reality headset optimized for entertainment
and wellness, with a compact and lightweight design.
The immersiveness of the VR audiovisual experience can be enhanced by the
creation of photorealistic virtual scenarios, in which the textures of each model are
generated from photographic captures of the real objects [60]. 3D reconstruction
techniques, such as photogrammetry or laser scanning, allow to derive data related
to the geometry and aesthetic characteristics of real objects with high accuracy and
with a very good realistic rendering.
Beyond the more common use of VR, a growing number of cutting-edge devices
populate research and prototyping fields with innovative solutions for producing
multisensory stimulations. Some prototypes have been developed in recent years for
the involvement of the user’s taste and sense of smell during VR experiences. This
is the case of the Feelreal device: a multisensory mask to be integrated with the VR
headset, capable of reproducing hundreds of smells by mixing the nine refillable
cartridges with which it is equipped. In VR, smells are associated with what the user
comes into contact with; the mask is able to generate airflows on the user’s face, for a
more dynamic exploration of environments and to improve comfort of the experience
[79]. From the studies of Narumi, “Metacookie” was prototyped, an Augmented
Reality system for manipulating taste and satiety sensation that does not alter the
chemical composition of what is ingested. The system involves printing a marker on
a cookie, this marker allows the AR instrumentation to associate an overlaid image
with the cookie to alter its appearance in the AR scenario; by chewing the cookie,
the user has the illusion that it tastes as recreated by the instrumentation [50].
An interesting study conducted by [65] proposes a reconnaissance of multisensory
devices (haptic, olfactory, gustatory) as well as a real manual to build multisensory
systems, called “mulsemedia environments”.
In addition to the involvement of the user’s senses, a significant increase in the
realism of the virtual scenario is brought by tracking body movements. The percep-
tion of own position in space is crucial for the awareness and safety of the movements
performed within the digital dimension. Commercially accessible solutions for accu-
rate tracking of user movements are available, i.e. Leap Motion [72], a device for
tracking hand movements in VR at a maximum distance of about 80 cm from the
optical sensor. The integration of Leap Motion allows users to interact with the VR
scenario through their usual gestures. Awareness of the user’s position in space can
be enhanced by the presence of a 3D avatar, which replicates the actual movements of
the user’s body. The avatar can reproduce the user’s movements in real time with high
accuracy, placing a limited number of small footprint tracking devices (e.g., HTC
Vive Tracker) and reconstructing the movements by combining direct and inverse
kinematics.
The advanced technologies analysed allow the configuration of immersive multi-
sensory experiences aiming to transfer multilevel knowledge through the interactive
engagement of users.
336 M. Buono et al.

4 Communicating Knowledge in Cultural Environments

The requirements of accessibility, in its various forms, and the advanced technolo-
gies, prove to be fundamental for sharing multilevel knowledge from the visible
to the invisible. It is therefore useful to find appropriate forms for communicating
knowledge through analogue and digital media to meet the needs of the extended
range of users. Traditionally, information that guides the paths of fruition used to
be provided through textual data, such as labels and descriptions, possibly enriched
by photographs or explanatory reconstructions. Nowadays, to foster user engage-
ment, the visualization of information takes place in different ways, such as through
infortainment, gamification, virtual and mixed reality [36].
According to [53], “affordance” [27] and the “implicit communication” [13] are
useful tools to support the individual while using an artefact. In fact, to communi-
cate knowledge, a design that makes content accessible and ensures usability during
interaction with objects and in the use of spaces, cannot be ignored. Therefore, in
order to propose performance spaces that can actively involve the user, the exhibi-
tion project must explore the relationship between space, technologies and narrative
structures [71] from the earliest design phases, through contemporary communicative
languages.
Communicating knowledge thus means designing and organizing relationships
with objects that allow users to understand the interpretative grid needed to decode
information [3].
Studies related to human–computer interaction have advanced significantly
aiming to bring the places intended for knowledge sharing closer to end users, through
innovative paradigms of interaction design and configuration of customized solutions
[59].
Designing interaction by improving access to contents and enhancing usability
allows to fully exploit information capacities, make better use of interfaces and,
finally, deliver content to users with the support of devices that explore virtual envi-
ronments by optimizing the relationship between “real space” and “virtual space”.
Aiming to create new ways of knowledge and communication for the definition of
personalized paths of fruition [59], some museums have placed increasing attention
towards the definition of multisensory experiences. In fact, the relationship between
users and digital devices can be established through multiple communication chan-
nels such as voice commands, gestures, virtual and augmented reality, neural and
human–machine interfaces.
It is therefore possible to consider virtual reality as an “experiential” interface, in
which the perceptual component merges with interactivity [64]. However, as a means
of communication, Augmented Reality (AR) is not yet a widespread technology,
but it offers numerous potentialities to enrich the experience of knowledge, which
becomes dynamic and multisensory. It also proves its capacity in disseminating
information, since the user is stimulated by his surroundings. In such reality, the
experience becomes multisensory, while natural-real and virtual-digital elements
coexist in the same space [81].
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 337

Fig. 2 Renaissance dreams installation by Refik Anadol at the MEET in Milan

According to Riva and Gaggioli [64], in the contemporary scenario, the progres-
sive integration of digital devices for the democratization of knowledge configures
“interreality” environments as hybrid physical-digital ecosystems characterized by
the continuous and bidirectional exchange of information and data between real and
virtual worlds.
The supports generated by digital tools can create awareness and facilitate intel-
lectual and sensory understanding. According to MiBAC’s “Piano Triennale per la
Digitalizzazione e l’Innovazione dei Musei” [20], such aspects represent the enabling
prerequisite for in-depth knowledge. In this context, interoperability between devices
and heritage increases the level of understanding and satisfaction of visitors. Fostering
physical interaction with digital tools for the use and knowledge of cultural heritage
in order to access contextual audio and video contents that provide insights, is among
the identified strategies.
An example of physical fruition of digitized heritage is the site-specific “Renais-
sance Dreams” [45] installation by Refik Anadol at the MEET international centre for
digital culture in Milan, inspired by the Italian Renaissance. The project addresses
topics related to painting, sculpture, literature and architecture, collecting around
one million images and open-source texts of works of art and architecture produced
between 1300 and 1600 (see Fig. 2). Data was processed by an artificial intelligence
using GAN2 algorithms, capable of identifying common features in the images and
texts and, from these, producing creations with dynamic multidimensional forms.
Thus, the installation becomes a sensory immersion in the history of the Italian
Renaissance.
Alternatively, the [Link] [37] platform can be considered an example of digital
fruition, allowing to visit exhibition spaces in virtual reality, defining a new experi-
ential, interactive and fruitive way of using places, where knowledge transfer plays
a fundamental role (see Fig. 3). In fact, in any location, users can interact with the
exhibition environment and with participants and event organizers in real time, using
VR headsets. This project uses innovative methods that allow and guarantee the user
access to places, experiences and information.

2 Generative Adversarial Network.

338 M. Buono et al.

Fig. 3 Leonardo da Vinci exhibition on [Link]

The use of digital technology allows users to enjoy innovative and engaging
experiences, as in the case of the HoloMuseum at Castel del Monte [47], where the
phygital mode becomes an opportunity to define new forms of using and sharing
knowledge. The path is integrated with Microsoft Cloud Computing, Artificial Intel-
ligence and Mixed Reality technologies that enhance and amplify the narrative and
expositive capacity of the exhibition. Thus, they offer the possibility of integrating
additional information and experiential levels compared to those provided by the
physical layout (see Fig. 4).

Fig. 4 Museum tour of Castel del Monte

Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 339

The widespread use of innovative tools applied to knowledge sharing processes

configures the user experience as a complex combination of new contents and interac-
tive modes of communication. Multisensory and “amplified” knowledge experiences
can involve users by overlapping real, virtual and multimedia environments. In this
scenario, the user superimposes elements and information to the reality with which
he interacts, moving from a static to a dynamic fruition. Dialogue and knowledge
sharing are encouraged through hybrid languages and customization of the user
experience in an emotional and multisensory path [28].

5 Multilevel Narratives to Transfer Visible and Invisible

Information

The separation between engaging, technology-mediated experiences and the actual

transfer of scientific and cultural knowledge to the public, places more attention on
the role of narrative as a tool capable of transforming complex processes and themes
into accessible products for users.
The plurality of the available communicative forms allows to amplify the levels
of the narrative [71], adapting them to visitors [15], in new models of fruition that
rewrite the user-space-object relationship.
The different narrative forms identified for the definition of multisensory and
inclusive cultural models [15] pave the way for the design of multidimensional narra-
tives as tools that enhance physical-digital connections with a strong emotional and
cognitive component on the one hand, and a technological one on the other [7].
Contemporary multilinear narrative forms foster user interaction with objects and
virtual environments by enhancing a participatory approach through the senses. This
activates new semantic and narrative levels within spaces where the multisensory
experience adapts to pre-existing itineraries.
To recreate physical and digital connections functional for knowledge transfer
within immersive spaces, narrative modes can be inserted to activate cognitive
processes, in a dimension that is also physical and that stimulates imagination through
signs and clues. These elements make significant every gesture and every movement,
in a process of layering actions and events that coagulate into microstories, narrative
cores, which are deposited in the memory stimulating users’ imagination [5].
Moving beyond induced behaviour, multidimensional storytelling introduces
unexpected outcomes for the user, in a learning process closely linked to the space
and time of the experience:
• The space where the user interacts with the physical dimension by following a
temporal narrative path marked by the provision of narrative clues as activators
of connections with the digital dimension;
• Time of the actions, guided by different interactive and sensory modes—and
adaptive with respect to the user—through which the visitor can unlock various
narrative levels.
340 M. Buono et al.

The narratives are activated by gestures and actions that the user performs, letting
himself be guided by experience to sensory explore the space and be surprised by
what his actions entail [5]. These aspects lead the user to the construction of a personal
“spatial discourse”, a flow that represents a new and personal narrative reading key
to the experience.
In this case, technology becomes an integral part of the exhibition, it is “invisible”
and it uses the person’s gestures to activate contents, pointing attention to details and
hidden aspects. In a hyper-mediated dimension [6] instead, the individual recog-
nizes the space of “narrative production” and uses technological tools to decode and
interpret it by crossing a perceptual and cultural threshold [71].
[71] identifies three main orientations to “augment” the narrative [43]:
• Exhibit devices between tangible and intangible dimensions where interfaces and
spatial and material qualities make the exhibit increasingly involving;
• Engaging spaces where the narrative infrastructure is the core element for a
multilevel fruition;
• New behavioural landscapes of users in performative spaces.
By combining the three orientations, it is possible to configure a multilevel narra-
tive space, where knowledge is made accessible in a layered way and conveyed
through narrative devices that stimulate all senses, in an immersive spatial dimension
for users.
In this direction, the “10D Experience” realized in Casa Batlló [12] proposes a
“journey” inside Gaudí’s mind through the use of advanced technologies (artificial
intelligence, augmented reality, immersive technologies) in multisensory rooms that
allow the user to explore new perceptual thresholds through sight, touch, hearing and
smell. Starting with the five senses, the narrative project immerses visitors in Gaudí’s
mind aiming to perceive reality through “the eyes” of the Catalan architect, through
the projection and perception of elements that inspired his works [58]. Gaudí’s digital
archive (files, photos, videos, drawings, 3D models and original manuscripts) is trans-
formed into a narrative experience accessible to the public that highlights otherwise
invisible details and features.
Narrative represents a “threshold” experience between real space and digital
dimension [48], mediated through physical experience—in a process of embodi-
ment—and a conduit to access reality represented in the digital. Within immersive
three-dimensional environments, “threshold objects” [48] become facilitators in the
transition from the real world to the imaginary one. These are physical devices
that appear both in the digital dimension and in the real world, facilitating the
user’s immersion in the story and his/her active participation at different levels of
interaction.
The story can immerse the user through narrative devices increasingly related to
perceptual-sensory exploration or it can be mediated through characters with a high
level of realistic rendering through the use of holograms or avatars [70]. Such tools
lead to hyper-realistic experiences with the overlapping of the real and virtual worlds,
allowing for these types of narrative approaches in ongoing storytelling.
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 341

Narrative activates inclusive processes of knowledge transfer. If configured in

an adaptive way with respect to the different visitor profiles, through declinations,
techniques, languages and storytelling methods intended for all target users [15], it
is capable of simultaneously involving heterogeneous audiences.
Within the phygital space, several narrative layers—temporal, spatial, thematic,
etc.—can be integrated to activate multidirectional paths. The design of multiple
narrative registers in the exhibit space allows therefore the diversification of
experiences, which become adaptive depending on the choices made by users.
Storytelling is thus transformed into a participatory tool for the user, especially
if through his actions he can activate new levels of narrative, take part, or change
the outcome. This type of participation provides the interlocutor with the pleasure of
actively engaging to play a role in the narrative and transform its outcome [17]. The
user becomes an actor in the progression of knowledge creation in participatory and
cognitive-emotional processes [67] and the “living” space within which new stories
come to life.
The integration of multilevel narrative forms within advanced technological
systems allows to explore and deepen the expressive and cognitive potentialities
in the human–machine relationship [5]. Storytelling becomes the medium to track
users’ experiences through stories able to emotionally engage them, in a research
space that explores new narrative dimensions.

6 Accessibility and Knowledge Sharing Between Physical

and Digital Space

In the current scenario, knowledge sharing assumes complex forms. Cognition is

shaped through the filter of advanced technological tools, communicative ways and
narrative forms, offering the possibility of returning sometimes inaccessible informa-
tion to users. Despite the potential of digitisation to enhance access to information by
all, there are still many limitations in bringing such experiences to life and involving
users in the process of advanced fruition. At times, advances in technology and digital
interaction perpetuate existing inequalities instead of reducing them [46, 51].
The relationship between real and digital becomes increasingly complex. The
two dimensions, apparently far from one another, are today caught in a continuous
dialogue, a process of contamination and redefinition.
The connection between cultural artefacts and users emerges through a new
perspective that can be mainly expressed through engineering and design disci-
plines, tending to introduce the correction of a humanizing image [26]. Thus, design
is increasingly involved in the representation of a digitized image interested in the
programmability of the functioning and animation of intelligent and interactive IT
objects and equipment, in the sense defined by Frateili as “pansensory”.
The real frontier of integration between the real and virtual dimensions probably
lies in breaking down barriers with physical reality and with the ambition to recover
342 M. Buono et al.

the sensory and bodily dimensions. One could envisage a physical world augmented
by shared multimodal information where the concept of “metaverse” described in
Neal Stephenson’s 1992 cyberpunk novel “Snow Crash” as an overlap between the
real world and the imaginary takes on a different connotation [9]. It can open us
up to the participatory horizons of augmented reality rather than isolating us from
the physical world. The metaverse will provide a presence in the physical world
interactively augmented by digitally shared multimodal information rather than a
virtual immersion [11]. Digital tools have a potential role in increasing access to large
amounts of information, with the possibility to adapt to different styles, interests and
needs [68]. In fact, they are perceived as tools able to multiply the perspectives of
the user experience, increasing its attractiveness [38] and providing various levels
of interpretation. An interactive and engaging experience is to be achieved, that can
contribute to learning and increase attention [25, 29, 55, 61, 78].
It is necessary to understand how to transfer multilevel knowledge beyond the
surface, providing the public with the opportunity to reach hidden layers and, at the
same time, satisfy users’ interests while searching for new forms for sharing. Knowl-
edge of artefacts can in fact become multisensory by amplifying the tactile, olfactory,
acoustic, spatial, and visual dimensions. They are not experienced from an estab-
lished perspective, but by moving in and around them, assembling and disassembling
them, using them as interfaces to explore the world [66].
Such conditions lead to an increasing trend towards the use of specific models
able to rebuild the space and to provide useful information to the user during the
tour. An interesting example is the case of Van Abbemuseum, which has applied a
model of advanced fruition in collaboration with the blind designer Simon Dogger
to support navigation within a space. The aim is to enhance the fruition experience
for people with visual impairments and for all users during the museum tour. The
new system recognizes the registered space, and it offers information under various
forms, visual, sound, tactile vibrations, fostering inclusion. The users-visitors are
therefore encouraged to discover the space, to interact with artworks and to access
visible and invisible information during the entire fruition itinerary [21, 76].
Man becomes the fulcrum around which the process of accessibility between
real and digital revolves, in order to design experience and guide the behavioural
dimensions through values, forms of digital representation and interpretation, and
strategies of signification. Thus, complexity and diversity of the human condition
are extended to every sphere of experience and knowledge [10].
Essential questions arise in designing physical, cognitive, and sensory accessi-
bility. They concern the individuals’ mode of use, their ability to interact, resolving
interface relationships on a pragmatic and psycho-perceptive level to “facilitate”
the user-artefact dialogue through an attractive effect, a stimulating appearance and
greater humanization [26].
Within the environment, visitors must perceive the overall situation in which
they find themselves acting, using conceptual models specific to their culture. It is
through action that cultural models will also be revised and modified, making use of
information dynamically provided by the context.
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 343

Aiming to explore the “repositories of knowledge”, the case of the Depot Boij-
mans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam, “the first publicly accessible art repository”, is
noteworthy. The architecture was designed ad-hoc as an “engine room” that reveals
the world behind storage and preservation of a high number of works of art and draw-
ings of considerable interest, which had not been previously exhibited in museums.
These artworks become accessible to the public being displayed to enable their
observation from all angles [31]. Opening up repositories and archives solicits inno-
vative collaborative models to enhance users’ accessibility, encouraging a hands-on
approach to knowledge and supporting open models that equate preservation with
the proliferation of information [10].
The context of action, therefore, is seen as a “scenario” that captures the sequence
of actions and interactions, becoming, above all, a context of meanings of possibly
shared social and cultural interactions.
Thus, the environment, where one or more users find themselves in, loses its
connotation as a stable supplier of information and it becomes a multi-componential
scenario where actions take place and information dynamically flows. The action
space becomes both physical and conceptual.

7 Tracking Behavioural and Emotional User Experiences

to Design Adaptive Itineraries

In designing fruition spaces, understanding emotions still has limitations when

considering the real complexity of the human experience [63]. Stimuli coming from
the external world are first to be processed by the sensory organs and afterwards by
the dedicated parts of the brain to produce significance and emotions [44]. It is the
collaborative, continuous and simultaneous activity of very different sensory areas
that provides significance to information that reaches the brain [8].
Since childhood, people perceive objects and the surrounding environments
due to physical characteristics (shape, colour, texture, etc.), as well as through
the dynamism, relationships and interactions taking place between them (contact,
contrasts, etc.) or between individuals and artefacts. Interaction with artefacts there-
fore depends on the one hand by information provided by the object itself and, on
the other hand, by the designer’s capacity to render its functioning clear and intu-
itive [8]. Currently, besides the five senses, the haptical, synaesthesic and kinaesthetic
systems are considered, being able to increase the complexity of the user-object-space
interaction.
To understand visitors’ emotional experience, an interesting study at St. Gallen
Fine Arts Museum investigated how artworks and the way they are placed have an
impact on experience and on the user’s behaviour. The project provides assessment on
physical interaction with real artworks, proving that the user’s emotional engagement
depends on his/her own characteristics and that the fruition experience has a higher
impact on the individual than it had previously been imagined [34].
344 M. Buono et al.

Interaction with the environment, the itineraries, the artefacts, is therefore influ-
enced by the ways how senses are stimulated, which requires particular attention
towards multisensoriality in the design process. It is necessary to intend the fruition
spaces where the user-object interaction takes place, as transformative, multisensory
spaces able to stimulate emotions. This is possible due to the adaptive use of mate-
rials, lights, colours and new technologies, going beyond their common application
[80]. Designers turn projects towards sensory multidimensionality, for the products,
services, and spaces to be able to reach a higher diversity of users, supporting all
of them in receiving information, exploring reality, experiencing emotions beyond
the individual sensory capacities [41]. In this direction, DeafSpace is a theory and
practice of design for people with hearing impairments that highlights the capacity
of sensory elements to contribute to the individual experience. Some principles of
sensory design have been put together based on deaf people’s instinct of adaptation,
since they constantly recreate their own environment in order to increase sensory
experience [40].
Nowadays users are interested in searching for multidimensional experiences
and for information available through multiple sensory channels, which requires the
reconsideration of fruition paths. There is an openness towards experimenting with
new forms of mediating experience through different contexts and with different
intentions. In the case of “The Blind Spot” exhibition, the perfumes, touch, sound,
integrate visual perception through the 4D reconstruction of works of art to encourage
augmented sensory experiences [14]. Other examples, such as the installations Tactile
Orchestra at the Cooper Hewitt Design Museum [42] and Dream Machine [4],
explore the possibility to “visualize”, “touch” or assimilate sound to specific perfumes
through unprecedented materials and experimentations. Elements which are thus
“orchestrated” as part of the scenography to share an experience, explore and reveal
new ideas, perceive beyond the surface.
The exploration of emotions has inspired the realization of a new experiential path
at The Museum of Feelings, New York [62], a space where users find themselves
immersed in an environment that transforms emotions into “live art”, codifying them
through colours with the support of biometrical technologies. The tour begins from
the outside, where the “live” façade is coloured in the “emotional state of the city”,
based on a real-time algorithm that extracts data on the context and on the commu-
nity’s prevailing feelings. Within the environment, the user is guided through various
spaces that stimulate emotions and generate interactions by tracking and reacting to
users’ movements and gestures through sound and light effects [62].
The new forms of exhibition between the physical and digital dimensions represent
places that promote learning through mutual exchange, through discovery mediated
by new sensory perceptions, rather than spaces that transfer a constant or complete
amount of knowledge. The space of enjoyment, use and experimentation is no
longer simply a means to represent the “known”, it rather becomes an opportunity
to learn new aspects about the “unknown”, opening up new perspectives through
multisensoriality.
The olfactory sense, for example, has a direct cognitive connection with areas
of the brain involved in managing emotions and memory (differently from the sight
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 345

and other senses). Therefore, it has the potential to become a real design tool within
fruition paths that stimulate users into hardly “forgettable” experiences. This is the
case of the “In Love with the world” exhibition at the Tate Modern Museum [69],
where arts and science meet, creating an olfactory scenery where advanced technolo-
gies play a fundamental role. Lightweight biomorphic robots move through air to
simulate live beings. Also, through specific sensors, they identify users’ body temper-
ature to understand the right moment when to get close to the person, as “intrigued”
by human life. The aim is to engage users in an experience that re-imagines artificial
intelligence and it encourages reflection on the impact of the olfactory scenery on
the physical, cognitive and emotional state, through the complex human–machine
relationship. Human beings and machines can be companions and relatives to one
another [2].
The potential of living a performative, scenographic and sensory experience of an
exhibition stands therefore in the ability to reveal something new on the relationship
with architecture and artefacts, something that stays in the user’s memory long after
the “time stamp” of the experience itself is gone [80]. The new technologies push us
to reconsider emotions and consequently to reshape the design of experiences. The
voice humanizes interactions, social robots accompany impaired people, augmented
reality invites us to deeply reflect on the quality of sensory information and on the
physical experience [56]. All these issues highlight the potential impact that the
analysis and understanding of emotions will have on design. At the same time, they
prove the need for such aspects not to be disregarded when designing the experience.
Thus, proper consideration needs to be provided to the stimulation of human emotions
and perceptions within the fruition itineraries.

8 “Multisensory hAll”

The analysis of the communicative approaches, narrative structures, interaction

and sensory stimulation technologies, as well as the inclusive and accessible
design principles, enabled the configuration of a multisensory phygital environment-
laboratory within design experimentations undertaken for the Museum of Contem-
porary Mediterranean Ceramics in Cava de’ Tirreni. This environment is an adaptive
knowledge-sharing space defined by an immersive and transformative architecture
with a dual function. On the one hand, it aims to make scientific knowledge accessible
through narrative experiences and augmented fruition to communicate science and
culture. On the other hand, it intends to test and track the experience by collecting
behavioural and psycho-physiological data of users immersed in augmented reality
spaces and subjected to neuro-audio-visual stimuli. Within the exhibition space,
the user regains the main role in the fruition process, in superimposition with the
researcher engaged in data acquisition, analysis and assessment for the constant
optimization of the experience.
346 M. Buono et al.

The Multisensory hAll project addresses an extended range of users and it engages
people with different physical, functional and cognitive characteristics in an inclu-
sive manner, designing various levels of accessibility that stimulate new sensory
dimensions and favour knowledge acquisition from different perspectives.
As defined in the design phase of this study, the characteristics of the layout
concerned first of all the user-space interaction, in the physical and digital dimen-
sions, guided by the need to favour adaptive orientation and guarantee accessibility
to a wider public. The presence of coordinated elements such as textual indications,
images, simplified diagrams, and schemes accompany the user along the itinerary and
through the different exhibition scenarios, while information is transferred through
multiple sensory channels, following the principles of design “for all”. Where infor-
mation sharing through visual modes is foreseen, these shall be associated with
at least one mode of operation that does not require sight [24]. Thus, the user is
guided within the environment through visual, sound and tactile information, using
analogical and digital tools that activate different sensory channels and provide the
possibility to enjoy the route according to one’s needs.
The space where the sensory engagement process takes place is enveloping, flex-
ible, adaptable, and it can change its function in relation to users’ and researchers’
needs, to accommodate multiple exhibitory, experiential and research scenarios,
and to open up to the digital dimension of multilevel narratives. It represents a
combination between the “white box” and the “black box” [35], a fluid environ-
ment between physical and digital space, capable to transfer knowledge through
multisensory interaction.
In line with the function of “immersing” the user in the multisensory experience,
the layout is configured with a suspended structure that hides the walls and ceiling
of the environment, redefining the space in a welcoming and all-encompassing way.
The architecture of the exhibition space aims to achieve maximum attention and
engagement of the user, who is completely immersed in the sensory experience from
the beginning of the itinerary. In fact, the structure “invades” the entrance, thus
becoming a representative sign that, with a “shell” shape, welcomes the user into the
environment (see Fig. 5). Such configuration is made possible by the presence of rear
projection canvases, particularly suitable for setting up immersive and augmented
experiences.
The digital experience amplifies the physical space and allows the user, from
the very first moments of exploration, to be fully immersed in a hybrid space, that
provides different opportunities for sensory interaction. With the support of techno-
logical tools, the elements of the physical space activate multilevel narratives in the
digital dimension in a continuous process, elaborating and transferring knowledge.
Technologies make the complex system of knowledge transfer accessible, conveyed
through different communication channels. These amplify users’ experience and acti-
vate narrative processes starting from gestures, actions, movements in the laboratory
environment.
Through a quick set of information, the user is matched to a person-profile that,
based on needs and preferences, triggers adaptive suggestions along the way, due
to the use of identifying codes. These are capable of orienting, tracking progress
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 347

Fig. 5 Multisensory hAll entrance. The “shell” structure returns an all-encompassing space
enabling complete immersiveness

in digital experiences, and evaluating experience at the stations of greatest interest

and in the ability to transfer information. The system is integrated into the physical
space, and it accompanies the user in a sensory exploration as well as in activating
contents through various physical elements scattered throughout the environment.
Through a sensory map, users can access from their own device the location of
the main augmented stations and basic information on the itinerary. All data are
made accessible through different modalities—such as visual information, sounds
and vibrations—in order to guide the user according to the needs identified in the
first phase of system activation. The map is also designed in a physical, embossed
format, to allow visual and tactile orientation [15].
Aiming to transfer multilevel knowledge from the visible to the invisible, it is
essential to equip the space with useful tools to increase the layers of information
activating multisensory perceptions at different levels of detail. Some suggestions
will be provided by the person-profile that can be used during the experience to
activate and deactivate guided exploratory moments and moments when to act freely
in the phygital environment. To stimulate its use, each assigned profile-person can
become a character in the digital story, under the form of a hologram or virtual avatar,
to guide the user and personalise experience.
To amplify the multisensory experience, the environment includes projectors,
“interactive eyes” and “pockets” for the enjoyment and use of the “invisible”. A first
“immersion” of the user in the physical space takes place through the rear projec-
tion of 4D videos that narrate the corresponding context, integrating a 3D sound
system to restore the three-dimensional soundscape of reference. Inside the space,
sensor-integrated scent diffusers are activated as visitors pass by, stimulating olfac-
tory interaction and sensory perceptions that enhance the memory of the immersive
348 M. Buono et al.

Fig. 6 Space organization with “interactive eyes” and adaptive “pockets” to enable facilitated
interaction and respond to the different physical-dimensional-behavioural needs

experience even after the visit. The route consists of several sensory stations (see
Fig. 6), arranged as “interactive eyes” on the “walls” of the structure, where users
can explore hidden parts and replicated artefacts through the senses. Alongside a
predominantly visual and audible interaction of the user who is “immersed” in the
cognitive process, there is tactile interaction in haptic stations. This provides the
possibility of amplifying the visual experience through augmented reality devices.
A third type of “interactive eyes” combines the different modes of interaction,
visual, sound, and tactile, allowing visitors to increase the layers of information
through a 4D experience. This makes it possible to experiment advanced technolo-
gies—useful for transferring the materiality of objects into the digital dimension,
such as the use of haptic gloves that amplify the user’s tactile exploration.
“Pockets” placed on the “walls” of the room allow exploration of hidden elements
to increase curiosity and awareness of the need to explore through senses other than
sight. Both the “interactive eyes” and the “pockets” are set at different heights to
allow adaptability to the different physical and dimensional characteristics of users,
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 349

in line with the principles of accessibility and inclusion that have guided all phases
of the design process.
To amplify the multisensory perception, an interactive vibrating floor is integrated
within the installation, reacting to the users’ actions and movements. The structure has
a dual function, firstly to orientate the individual by means of a ground surface lighting
system, and secondly as an activator for synergic and collaborative participation
between users. The spaces for individual and collective action are signalled through
the activation of light sensors, colours, textures, and vibrations in the flooring. In
addition, vibrating floor stimulations allow curators to set up dynamic and close-to-
reality augmented and virtual experiences.
Through the experimentation of new design scenarios and augmented experi-
ences, the phygital environment is configured as a laboratory of interactive processes,
where the user’s experience guides the design of contents, narratives and the tools to
seize them. The space becomes both container and engine of the experience through
modes of advanced fruition aimed at engaging the user-visitor and the researcher in
a participatory process of co-creation and transmission of knowledge (see Fig. 7).
The spatial configuration lends itself to the dual purpose of making scien-
tific knowledge accessible through multisensory narrative experiences (see Fig. 8)
and tracking the behavioural and psycho-physiological data of users immersed
in phygital experiences. Tracking is made possible by the integrated system
used through the identification codes, biometric technologies, Bluetooth proximity
sensors, eye-movement tracking, behaviour analysis.
Such technologies make it possible to track the user experience, such as emotions,
behaviour and choices made along the way, and thus obtain data useful for assessing
and optimising use. The role of individual, environmental and genetic factors on

Fig. 7 The immersive space encourages knowledge transfer

350 M. Buono et al.

Fig. 8 “Interactive eyes” stimulate multisensory narrative experiences

cognitive processes, on perceived environmental and psychological comfort, and on

social interactions in real and simulated environments (virtual and augmented reality)
is investigated. The results obtained after analysing data will lead to new solutions to
be tested in the laboratory environment through unprecedented experiments in which
researcher and user-visitor find opportunities for dialogue and interaction.

9 Conclusion

Through a critical-analytical reading of the factors concerning accessibility and the

definition of inclusive spaces, the illustrated proposal collects design experiments
for the new Museum of Contemporary Mediterranean Ceramics. These have led to
the identification of new ways of use and enjoyment, and to the configuration of a
multisensory phygital environment, as a place for sharing multilevel knowledge.
The Multisensory hAll aims to transfer knowledge through immersive and multi-
sensory experiences, and it is configured as a dynamic, customizable space for new
contents and narratives referred to different themes and contexts.
For cultural heritage fruition, the structure can integrate narrative elements and
replicated objects that are part of the exhibited collections or of the ones stored
in repositories. It can embrace performative moments or replicate digital artists’
artworks.
In fact, technologies and the various elements that integrate them lend themselves
to different kinds of immersive scenarios, while the exhibition structure adapts in
shape and size to the space that houses it. Thus, curators are given the possibility of
personalising narratives and content according to the exhibition environment.
Multisensory Fruition Between Cultural Heritage … 351

Multisensory hAll has been designed to engage a wider audience in an inclusive

view, defining various levels of accessibility to stimulate new sensory dimensions
and favour knowledge transfer between cultural places and research, where tangible
and intangible intersect beyond physical barriers.
The augmented fruition experience—mediated by multilevel narrative forms and
by advanced technologies able to activate sensory stimulation in an inclusive view—
the tracking of psycho-physiological data and of users’ behaviour, and the assessment
of user experience become an integral part of the immersive space able to transfer
knowledge to different accessibility levels.
The new phygital laboratory for inclusion and dialogue [16] represents a dynamic
place where knowledge finds “channels to circulate” [19] and tools to reach different
levels of users. An itinerary where each gesture and movement undertake significance
by revealing previously unknown cognitive and sensory potential within the user-
space-object relationship. The user’s role is not anymore limited to the “programmed”
interaction, instead it receives unexpected events to which he/she can react in an
unexpected manner [5] through a succession of actions trackable by researchers,
thus enhancing experience in the new demonstrative scenarios. The narrative layers
of the phygital space trigger as many sensory levels in paths capable of stimulating
all the senses in an adaptive way, activating cognitive perceptions that engage users
and make the space accessible and inclusive.
Its dual function of enjoyment and research is useful on the one hand to understand
the real potential of current tools, on the other hand it brings to an enhanced awareness
on the fruition process. This serves to configure increasingly engaging experiences
for users in a new phygital frame, where knowledge can be generated and transmitted.

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presentation
Mapping Ecosystems Through
Design—Reflections of the DesignOBS
Project

Nina Costa, Rui Costa, Afonso Borges, Vasco Branco, António Modesto,
Raul Cunca, and Ana Catarina Silva

Abstract This chapter explores the results obtained from the application of a partic-
ipatory process used to interpret databases about the Design discipline. This project
was undertaken within the project: For a Design Observatory in Portugal (Desig-
nOBS). The challenge focused on developing a one-page visualization about at least
one database focused on a vector of the design ecosystem (design companies, design
research, design education). In total, 41 works from 70 design students from two
different schools and 9 works from design professionals, with multiple backgrounds,
were collected. After a preliminary selection, the results were displayed in the first
exhibition of the DesignOBS project at the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Lisbon.
This chapter presents into the results obtained—it provides a description of the visual
projects and reflects on the potential contributions of using design as an approach to
support the mapping of ecosystems in Portugal and abroad.

Keywords Design visualization · Information design · Participatory approach ·

Design education

1 Context

More than ever, data is being produced and released by governments and other orga-
nizations to improve transparency, make better governing decisions, raise the quality

N. Costa (B) · R. Costa · A. Borges · V. Branco · A. Modesto · R. Cunca · A. C. Silva

Research Institute for Design, Media and Culture, Aveiro, Portugal
e-mail: ndc@[Link]
N. Costa · R. Costa · A. Borges · V. Branco · A. C. Silva
University of Aveiro, Aveiro, Portugal
A. Modesto
Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
R. Cunca
Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Lisbon, Lisboa, Portugal
Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave, Barcelos, Portugal

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 357
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
358 N. Costa et al.

of decision-making by giving citizens and consumers “adequate tools”. However,

considering the amount of available data, it has apparently minor consequences, as
very few players seem to be able to truly capture its value [1].
In the design context, there are already an increasing number of tools, methods and
workshops that aim to explore the role of data literacy to develop new products and
services [2, 3]; or materialize information that helps the public to navigate societal
issues and challenges [4, 5]. Considering design as an activity of cultural mediation
[6], we argue that these emerging capabilities could lever the development of better
public policies to mature the strategic importance of the discipline, especially when
there are no formal infrastructures to keep track of its evolution and status quo [7,
8]. By adopting a more active role in data collection, mapping and interpretation,
designers can champion more participatory discussions about Design and, ultimately,
enrich ecosystems, taking guided actions based on data.
Recent studies from the DesignOBS project (Towards a Design Observatory in
Portugal) aimed to tackle this issue by collecting, curating and sharing datasets about
the multiple vectors of the design ecosystem (education, research, designers, users,
etc.—[9], and map these indicators via a distributed observation approach with design
schools scattered around the country [10–12]. The latest work developed within the
project focused on infusing data literacy in design education and creating new visual
interpretations about Design [7]. The hands-on activities resulted in infographic
posters examining multiple variables of a dataset with numerical and textual informa-
tion about design companies in Portugal [8] that are available on the project website
([Link]). The application of this approach transformed the perspective
of young designers over their own roles in the data world and supported the design
of new mediating materials about the discipline. However, additional studies are
necessary to explore if and how the visual materials generated can drive the emer-
gence of new inquiries about design, improve its visibility, and, ultimately, support
the development of new public policies/actions for the discipline that enable a more
effective infusion and use in the Portuguese socio-economic fabric. Whereas Costa
et al. [7]. focused on students’ perceptions and limitations in dealing with databases
as a design source, already hinting at new inquiries based on data, this chapter focuses
on the results obtained when the expansion of this participatory approach includes
professional designers. Additionally, it reflects on the visual materials generated,
analyzing the potential of using information design as an instrument to interpret data
to enrich ecosystems mapping.

2 Approach

To explore if and how the application of a design approach can support the emer-
gence of new inquiries about design, the participatory and distributed approach devel-
oped in [7] was expanded to design schools and design professionals. The participa-
tion of multiple design stakeholders in data interpretation was beneficial to identify
differences and similarities between novice versus expert designers, to explore how
Mapping Ecosystems Through Design—Reflections … 359

different design competencies can be applied within data visualization (going beyond
graphic design), to multiply the interpretations of a single database, and to expand
the realm of interpretations to other vectors of the design ecosystem.
In total, 30 students from the Graphic Design and Editorial Projects master course
of the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto, plus 30 students from University
of Aveiro, in Representation and Knowledge course (year 2020 and 2021), were
involved in data interpretation during the period of one semester. An initial brief was
shared with the teams, followed by a formal presentation of the dataset they would
be working on. Students, under the guidance of the leading professors, were free
to add any information from other sources that they could find beneficial for their
exercise. They also had to follow the teaching program, with the mandatory use of
specific instruments and tools from the information design field.
Additionally, 9 design professionals were invited to participate in data interpreta-
tion. Their backgrounds included multiple disciplines from the design area, namely:
graphic design; illustration; cartoon editorial design; arts and crafts; and communi-
cation design. These authors were from different regions of the country, although
most of them are from Porto and Lisbon districts—where the highest percentage of
design companies are also established. Moreover, authors included male and female
representation to obtain a heterogeneous representation. The briefs were composed
by one database, combined with a proposal for a set of indicators to develop the work.
The choice of designers and themes was also based on their authorial nature—their
strong and recognizable languages supported the creation of a collection of objects
that, in turn, can contribute to the construction of the project’s memory. Table 1
shows the databases with a brief description. All the data used for this exercise is
currently available at the project’s website: [Link]/resources. Table 2
shows a sample of the resulting works.
In total, 41 infographics were designed via the application of the participatory
approach: 9 were from professional designers, 18 from Aveiro University (year 2020
and 2021); and 14 from the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto. A preliminary
selection process for the students’ work was undertaken by their professors, based
on the quality of the questions, information and visualizations. The team analyzed
each of the works selected, developing an overall analysis of their form and content.
Form included aspects such as materials, colors, shapes, icons and metaphors, used
amongst other aesthetic elements within the two-dimensional image. The content
included the analysis of information displayed versus the datasets that were shared
to develop the elements. The following sections present the projects, with a short
description of each. The next section delves into the contributions of these outputs
to inform the discipline. Moreover, it reflects on the potential of the participatory
approach to enrich the representation of the design ecosystem.
360 N. Costa et al.

Table 1 Databases and brief description

Database Short description
Design graduates in PT Has information about graduates in design courses in
PT (2002–2020), namely schools, geographical
location by NUT II, courses, disciplinary areas, and
number of graduates (M/F) per year
Design doctorates Aggregates information about the PhDs undertaken
in PT from 2001 to 2019. There are a total of 249
PhD theses, with information on the authors’ names,
school, work title, advisors, keywords and URL
repository
Design doctorates—bibliography Extraction of all the design PhD references—the list
contains 19,000 lines of information about the
authors, year of publication, typology of the
reference. It also identifies PT authors
Design faculty in PT Results from an inquiry to the design faculty of
design Schools. Contains sociodemographic
information, as well as the background of 196
professors
Design companies and graduates in Crosses information of the total number of graduates
PT—diachronic vision in design, and total number of design companies in
PT by NUT II

Table 2 Sample of resulting words—database, title, designers: professional designer (PRO and
their background) or design students (STU)
Name of database Title of work (background, if PRO) Code
Design graduates in PT Fabric of design education in Portugal (arts PRO1
and crafts) PRO2
Time forms the trunk (illustration)
Design doctorates Design doctorates (graphic design) PRO3
PhD machine (communication design) PRO4
Design doctorates—bibliography Tugboats (graphic design) PRO5
Design faculty in PT This is the last time I represent gender by PRO6
color (editorial design) PRO7
Design is not only design (illustration)
Design companies and graduates in Design puzzle (illustration/cartoon) PRO8
PT—diachronic vision Payment, employment and design PRO9
(miscellaneous) STU1
How much a designer is worth STU2
Design menu STU3
To the point of
Design companies (year 2018) Fish design STU4
Export on wheels STU5
Conquering design STU6
Mapping Ecosystems Through Design—Reflections … 361

3 Results

This section provides a description of the results obtained, comparing the information
design elements used across the two groups. Figure 1 presents the assemble of projects
developed by professional designers and design students respectively. A short and
more technical project description is provided in Tables 3 and 4. For each project, the
main “indicators” used for their creation are identified. The next section of this study
(reflection) provides a more interpretative analysis of the research results obtained,
looking at the elements, metaphors, colors, techniques and shapes used.

4 Reflections

Considering Design as an activity of cultural mediation developed through artefacts,

the application of Information Design as its specialization, has the potential to make
sets of data culturally accessible, adequate and relevant. These datasets, by their very
nature and/or volume, would be difficult to understand or systematize and, as such,
would be useless in the construction of a semantic layer to support properly informed
opinions, speculations, and consequently, decision-making.
As mentioned in the previous section, the work of students was selected based on
their quality (design and information criteria) by the teachers of the course. Aesthet-
ically speaking, the projects included in this analysis show a large diversity. In some
cases, design is used to convey certain information(s) (mostly observed in students’
cases), or to emphasize an interpretative view based on data (mostly observed in
professional cases).
The gradient of research results regarding interpretation can be explained not
only because of the evident gap in expertise between the two groups involved in the
exercise (students and professionals), but also because of the context within which
the projects were developed. On the one hand, design students had to analyze and
translate data via the application of multiple tools and methods from information
design, in a learning context, leading to more analytical and objective translation
of information into graphical elements and/or diagrams, in most cases. Professional
designers, on the other hand, have developed an authorial view of the data, adopting
a critical standpoint in most cases, and carefully choose elements, colors, shapes and
materials to convey a certain message about the dataset (or a specific indicator). PRO1
for instance has drawn a map of design education in Portugal by crossing stripes of
colored paper. The technique used alludes to the idea that education, as a system, is a
construction of connections—a weave. The photography authenticates the process:
we can observe a falsely two-dimensional map being held by the hand that conceived
it. In this technical process, craftsmanship is emphasized, over rigor, metrics, and
precision—perhaps alluding to the geographic distribution of schools with design
education that doesn’t seem to follow a specific strategy. Educational institutions are
mostly located near the coastline—whereas the interior and southern parts (Alentejo)
362 N. Costa et al.

PRO1 PRO2 PRO3 PRO4

PRO5 PRO6 PRO7 PRO8

PRO9 STU1 STU2 STU3

STU4 STU5 STU6

Fig. 1 Results from the professional designers (PRO) and design students (STU),
authors/designers: PRO1: ItemZero; PRO2: André da Loba; PRO3: Marta Madureira; PRO4:
Inês Nepomuceno; PRO5 Gonçalo Falcão; PRO6: Oupas!Design; PRO7: João Faria, PRO8:
SilvaDesigners, PRO9: Cristina Sampaio; STU1: Inês Venâncio, Margarida Silva, Raquel
Clemente; STU2: Inês Francisco, Maria Santos; STU3: Gabriela Sousa, Joana Teixeira, Miguel
Gomes, STU1-3: under the guidance of prof. Marta Fernandes; STU4: Catarina Matos, Nuno
Vinhas, Sofia Nogueiro, STU5: Beatriz Gonçalo, Claúdia Ribeiro, Inês Silva, STU6: Joana
Rodrigues, Laura Santos, Sofia Palhinha, STU4-6: under the guidance of professors Rui Costa and
Donato Ricci
Table 3 Short technical description of the projects made by professional designers
Project Short description Indicators used
Fabric of design education [PRO1] The project uses paper to represent the distribution of Number of public and private schools, geographical
design schools throughout the territory. The proportion of location
the crosses varies according to the number of graduates
within the region. In the cosmopolitan areas, such as
Lisbon and Porto, the crosses become smaller, not due to
the number of graduates, but because of the density and
variety of schools
–
Link for poster: [Link]
Time forms the tree trunk [PRO2] The designer presents via a tree-like shape, the Design graduates, design courses, design areas
foundations and evolution of the CNAEF areas of design
(national classification of education and training areas).
The middle, with strong, tick lines (high number of
graduates) represent the basis of design education. An
abrupt change of color occurs in 2014–15, when CNAEF
classifications for design change. The sides of the image
Mapping Ecosystems Through Design—Reflections …

are composed by thinner lines of information that

represent masters and doctorate graduates, with variations
of a design area (e.g. industrial design, equipment design)
–
Link for poster: [Link]
(continued)
363
Table 3 (continued)
364

Project Short description Indicators used

Design doctorates [PRO3] The project is based on the analysis of the design PhDs PhD keywords
keywords completed between 2001 and 2019. It lists all
the keywords ever used within design doctorates, putting
them forward, blindly, with no hierarchy. Each doctorate
is identified through a number that is hardly recognized
–
Link for poster: [Link]
PhD machine [PRO4] The project emphasizes the relationship between PhD Supervisors, PhD students
production and supervision work. The designer uses a
graphical organization and specific hierarchy, with
multiple types of boutons with various dimensions that
detect and reflect on an asymmetry (monumental buttons
and small switches)
–
Link for poster: [Link]
Tugboats [PRO5] The project uses boats as a metaphor to represent the PhD references, summary of citations
authors mentioned in the PhD theses. The boats enable a
rapid identification of who is on the lead. However, it
does not provide the specific profile of the racers. The
designer considers the count of the number of PhDs for
each author but does not use this information to
distinguish the volume of the boats—it seems to privilege
the idea of teamwork
–
Link for poster: [Link]
(continued)
N. Costa et al.
Table 3 (continued)
Project Short description Indicators used
This is the last time I represent gender by color The project is interesting due to the contradictions Gender
[PRO6] contained. The use of color—pink for girls, blue for
boys—is used and rejected at the same time (in the title).
The designer uses an easy language to convey an idea,
however, the title mentions a rejection of the same
formula. Although it reduced the data to a bare minimum,
the project works with data and interpretation in a
balanced way, a formal simplicity: a color gradient
–
Link for poster: [Link]
Design is not only design [PRO7] It is an elaborate complex puzzle, a body composed of Teachers’ background (areas)
multiple elements, some modular, others irregular, others
three-dimensional, which illustrate the different
dimensions of teachers’ training in Portugal—an area
which is multidisciplinary by nature
–
Mapping Ecosystems Through Design—Reflections …

Link for poster: [Link]

(continued)
365
Table 3 (continued)
366

Project Short description Indicators used

Design puzzle [PRO8] The project seems to convey a message of confusion—an –
incomplete puzzle, hard to codify, with missing pieces.
The author seems to emphasize that it is hard to connect
the indicators of design graduates and design companies
(here represented with people that have and do not have
diplomas) because there is no information about the
design graduates that integrate those companies. The
content is diverse (with people from different ethnicities,
gender etc.) and the visual clues, miscellaneous. Despite
the drawings within each puzzle piece (nodes connected
to each other)—few links can truly be established
–
Link for poster: [Link]
Payment, employment and design [PRO9] The project explores several indicators related with Number of companies, number of employees, costs
companies, by NUT II regions (North, Center, Alentejo, with employees, geographical location
Algarve and islands). The top part is focused on turnover
variation across regions. For instance, the highest
turnover in the last year was generated in the North and
followed by Algarve. The middle part of the project
focuses mostly on the evolution of average salary per
company. There are some intersections and a high
increase of average cost per employee in Madeira Island
(year 2019). The bottom part focuses mostly on medium
salaries and their evolution through time. These
indicators are compared with the average salary and
minimum salary practiced in Portugal
–
Link for poster: [Link]
N. Costa et al.
Table 4 Short technical description of the projects made by design students. All posters are available for download here: [Link]
5383
Project Short description Indicators used
How much a designer is worth The students choose different elements to draw a narrative—each Number of employees, costs with employees, turnover, years
[STU1] layer of information is autonomous, while also complementary. (2010–19), geographical location
On the one hand, the round shape emphasizes the diachronic view
and evolution of the average salary of employees working in
design companies in the regions, through time. Portugal’s shape
and color are used to inform about the number of companies per
region; and another element provides the example of the
extremes: the lowest and highest number of companies and
employees per region (Açores and North, respectively). There are
some aspects that make global reading difficult. For example,
there is a syntax problem in the first graph. By choosing a circular
diagram, the students suggest an idea of time cycles which is not
the best choice because 2019 cannot go back to 2010. Even the
sudden change of scale creates the illusion that there was a
substantial increase in the remuneration value—which is not the
case
Mapping Ecosystems Through Design—Reflections …

(continued)
367
Table 4 (continued)
368

Project Short description Indicators used

Design Menu The project analyses the different regions in Portugal using Geographical location, year 2019, costs with employees,
[STU2] regional fish-based dishes to provide a geographical reference. purchasing power
They compare the job offers (employees in design companies) to
the number of design graduates in 2019, to convey a narrative
about the purchasing power of designers throughout the region.
The stars are used to classify the “level of effort”, related with the
purchasing power. This, however, can be a bit misleading since “5
stars”, usually associated with quality, is in this case, used as the
worst-case scenario (e.g. Alentejo and Açores require higher
efforts because the purchasing power of designers, based on the
average salary, is low). Graphically, the regions are distributed as
a list, likewise the shape of Portugal (North to South and Islands)
To the point of This project is composed of different shapes and elements that Design area, number of companies, number of graduates, type of
[STU3] emphasize the distribution of companies per design area, namely teaching subsystem, geographical location
graphic design, interior design, product design and fashion
design. A smaller scale of Portugal appears in the right corner of
the page, looking at a very distinct distribution of the number of
graduates in the country. The project uses color to emphasize the
different regions, demonstrating an evident asymmetric
distribution between the two indicators. The use of a black
background triggers another interpretation—one that shows a
different country, with an almost non-existing eastern frontier
(continued)
N. Costa et al.
Table 4 (continued)
Project Short description Indicators used
Fish Design The project features an ocean, with multiple aquatic animals, Operational results, size of company, exports per company,
[STU4] from different sizes and shapes that allude to the constitution of number of employees, design area
the Portuguese design industry—a marine ecosystem, where most
companies are micro-sized. It incorporates multiple data on
design companies to represent a fish ecosystem, namely,
operational results in a scatterplot, that distributes the fish.
Turnover volume per design area (e.g., communication, graphic,
industrial design) is determined by the size and color of the coral.
Students choose to separate companies with and without “design”
in their name, showing two (almost identical) scenarios
Export on wheels The project uses the geographical disposition of the territory to Exports, number of companies, geographical location
[STU5] represent exports by region, highlighting the importance of a
large urban center for the area. The trucks show the cities’ colors
and symbols; the load represents the number of companies per
size; whereas the front and back wheels are used as a symbol to
show a proportion between employees that work in companies
Mapping Ecosystems Through Design—Reflections …

that export, versus the total of employees. Road signs

demonstrate how good or poor certain cities and/or regions are in
terms of exports
Conquering design The project looks at design companies from the Northern region Design area, number of employees, geographical location
[STU6] of Portugal and emphasizes the importance of two urban centers:
Porto and Braga, where most companies are allocated. They use
“trojan horses” in the design arena to refer to companies that
adopt the code of design activity (74.10) but whose products and
services do not fit into design (e.g. reprographic/printing
companies). The colors in the flags show up to nine different
categories for design areas, thus making overall conclusions of
the landscape a bit hard. Additionally, the symbol of the men is
not entirely objective when allocated to bigger groups
369
370 N. Costa et al.

of the country continue still with large empty spots. PRO1 and STU1 intersect similar
information, being complementary. “To the point of” (STU3) uses an organized,
linear, and precise language, defined by the geographical indicator. The visual work
intersects graduates and companies, demonstrating through the addition of color
on a black background, two different countries, with asymmetrical distributions of
resources (design graduates and design companies). A depletion of economic activity
associated with design, from the interior of the country, portrayed in the first image
(larger scale) is almost directly proportional to the number of educational institutions
that teach design courses in mainland Portugal (smaller scale). In this project, a more
thorough analysis of the relationship between the two observations could be explored,
proposing a more critical reading of the data.
Within the realistic technique, a photographic representation used in PRO4,
summons buttons from machines of the past to compose the history of design doctor-
ates and establish connections between universities, supervisors and doctorates.
Connections between the elements are composed by what truly “connects”—on/off
buttons, alluding to a system out of its time. What the designer seems to think of this
asymmetry is stated in the choice of language—a machine that produces doctorates
as numbers, with no regard for their content. The very character of the machine is
informative, with elements that remind us of late, rigorous, and outdated modernism.
In a similar topic (design doctorates), PRO3 could be categorized as something quite
far from the territory of information design, and with a greater weight of authorial
interpretation—an illustration! The density of information, cloudiness, and lack of
clarity of each data line, seem to refer to the same-like feeling of the dataset that
gave rise to the project: difficult to segment. It’s heavy, dense, but at the same time,
poetic. The listing of the keywords is there, but put forward blindly, with no levels
or hierarchy, diffused, dark—quite like a programming language.
Additionally, the use of vectors—a rational drawing technique—alludes to a
precise placement of the elements, communicating a formal message. PRO5 for
example, uses this technique to inform about the most cited authors in doctoral work
undertaken in Portugal, in the design area. The representation provides names and
countries of origin, enabling readers to identify the authors that are present on more
PhDs and even some of the very few Portuguese authors on the race (e.g. Francisco
Providência, José Augusto França, António Damásio). The absence of color (except
in the names/countries) and the dispersion of the boats (authors), randomly placed,
yet paddling in the same direction, reminds the importance of teamwork, indepen-
dent of nationalities or their times. This metaphor is similar to a system, one that can
go even further, with new layers of information—the shape and of the boats could
suggest different areas of Knowledge (History, Philosophy, Psychology, the different
Design fields, etc.); their colors, another dimension, and the size of the paddles, the
type or rowers. Also using vectors, PRO2 (time forms the trunk) uses color to guide
the author in the diachronic view of design education in Portugal, comparing it with a
tree or plant, with its irregular distribution of growth. For example, showing an impor-
tant change occurred in 2014–15, with most graduates shifting from communication
to industrial design. The numbers and smaller annotations (e.g. design areas) are
present but yet, are not very informative given their micro scale. In the same sense,
Mapping Ecosystems Through Design—Reflections … 371

however, with the annulation of technique PRO6 and sole of color (a chromatic
carpet) confirms what we suspected about the gender imbalance in the composition
of the teaching staff that ensures education in Design in higher education in Portugal.
In the options guided by aesthetic coding, the authors illustrate the data as much
as themselves—“on the unknowns that the currently available data throw on the
professional territory of design” (as mentioned by PRO8) or on the “construction of
the training path of design teachers” (as mentioned by PRO9)—with images that are
tangentially (or essentially) inspired by the data provided. In these two cases (PRO8
and PRO9) the descriptive texts and the titles proposed by the authors (“Design
Puzzle” and “Design is not just design”) act as a reinforcement of the clues inscribed
in their visual discourse to guide their decoding, without, however, guaranteeing it.
PRO9 could be an imitation of letterpress—an informal representation of data. A body
composed of multiple elements—some modular, others irregular, some flat, others
three-dimensional—illustrating the complexity and dimensions of design teachers’
training in Portugal, an area made of multiple contributions and different scien-
tific areas. The four senses represented in this illustration underline the urgency to
be attentive and sensitive to cultural, social, political, and economic changes. This
illustrates the flexibility of those who not only accumulate, but also add and relate
experiences, forming a solid but not sealed block of knowledge.
Also, the logical coding shown by the PRO7 and STU1 emphasizes objectivity—
they are almost monosemic of the quantification of the designers’ payment versus the
turnover made by design companies. STU1 and PRO7 denounce the fragile situation
in terms of income from work that the Design activity, a scenario which has been
maintained or even deepened throughout the last decade in Portugal.
Despite having a more functional purpose, the work of students also presents
graphic variety in the structures and diagrams, chromatic and iconic codes, as well
as the use of some metaphors to communicate data. For instance, STU4 uses a fish
ecosystem to represent a dataset about design companies in 2018. Most of them are
micro companies (sardines, in the poster), some with their names for a higher level
of information. Some are at the top (with most exports) and many at the bottom
(with no exports). STU2, STU5 and ST6 reflect with greater or lesser recourse to
a metaphorical language—the numerical and georeferenced nature of the databases
that are at their origin. In this set, individual techniques begin to be subjugated to a
process of collective discourse, as in a choir—there is no one that stands out so much
(group work).
Overall, this project manifests the use of multiple design approaches and tech-
niques. Whereas some designers choose to use partial parts of the dataset to communi-
cate an idea, others give detailed views of the data, crossing multiple indicators. Each
author/designer carefully applied his/her perspective and competencies to translate
an idea into a bidimensional image, using a solid and crafted visual language. The
authorial/professional projects—mostly interpretative—have less use of dense data
analysis, when compared to students’ projects, almost always sticking to a broader
idea. Their diversity of responses remains a central point, with a wide difference in
language, precision of information and messages.
372 N. Costa et al.

5 Conclusions

As noted by Alberto Cairo [13], information design projects seem to develop in layers
that can comprise a more general interpretation (usually emphasized through a visual
language); followed by general information and, finally, specific details. Fifteen
visual projects are presented in this chapter, translating the graphic interpretations
proposed by designers about the characteristics they considered most relevant in
the data collected and curated by the [Link] project, concerning different
dimensions of the Portuguese Design ecosystem. The visual works collected from
the application of a distributed and participatory approach to analyze and interpret
databases are the result of an unusual exercise—having designers look and interpret
their landscape, and themselves indirectly. From this point of view, it is a truly
original set of representations and one that is expected to encourage other reflections
and productions capable of maintaining a dynamic portrait of the design discipline
in Portugal.
This study also has limitations, which in turn, indicates directions for future
work. First, the interpretations of the visual works above presented were restricted
to the members of the DesignOBS project (authors and co-authors of this chapter).
The team members have diverse backgrounds that include graphic design, indus-
trial/equipment design, editorial design, as well as engineering design and program-
ming—this enables a broad analysis of the form/content of each work, however,
next steps should capture how other design stakeholders, with other backgrounds
(with or without design knowledge) and no previous knowledge about the datasets,
make their own interpretations of these information design projects. Capturing their
different interpretations, could improve the robustness of this study, to validate and
expand design knowledge.
Second, due to time restrictions, the professional designers and design students’
thinking process and intent for each design decision was not included in this work.
A set of interviews is being undertaken to follow-up the multiple challenges that
have emerged from working with data. A partial view of these results was already
captured in Costa et al. [7] with design students. However, additional data collection
is needed to explore how professional designers addressed the challenges of working
with data, as a source.
Third, each work presented in this chapter has been developed based on one
database which focuses either on design education, design research or design (related)
companies through its economic activity code. Future research should increase the
spectrum of interpretations to other vectors of the ecosystem (promotion, actors, users
etc.). Additionally, it should also explore if and how design, as a leading approach
to map ecosystems, can be used at the macro level, to analyze, interpret and map the
multiple vectors; as well as delving into the main differences and benefits of using
this approach to support informed decision making.
Finally, we believe this study constitutes an important step to mature a distributed
and participatory observation approach that has been developed within the Design
OBS project. It presents projects that use design as the leading approach to map
Mapping Ecosystems Through Design—Reflections … 373

data about the vectors of the design ecosystem in Portugal, focusing on education,
research, and industry. The study contributes to design research, providing an empir-
ical application that can be used to develop future research at the intersection of
design, information and data.

Acknowledgements This work is developed within the project: Design Obs. Towards a Design
Observatory: models, instruments, representations and strategies. Supported by the Lisbon Regional
Operational Programme (Lisboa 2020) and the Competitiveness and Internationalisation Oper-
ational Programme (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-032445), under the PORTUGAL 2020 Partnership
Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and FCT—Foundation for
Science and Technology. We thank the designers and students who have lively participated in the
creation of the poster, hence making this work possible, namely, Item Zero, André da Loba, Inês
Nepomuceno, Gonçalo Falcão, Oupas! Design, João Faria, Silva Designers, Cristina Sampaio, Inês
Venâncio, Margarida Silva, Raquel Clement, Inês Francisco, Maria Santos, Gabriela Sousa, Joana
Teiceira, Miguel Gomes, Marta Madureira, Catarina Matos, Nuno Vinhas, Sofia Nogueiro, Beatriz
Gonçalo, Claúdia Ribeiro, Inês Silva, Joana Rodrigues, Laura Santos, Sofia Palinha.

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United States: Pearson Education
Growing Knowledge Across Boundaries:
Lessons from a Multi-Actor Design
Project

Alison Burrows , Filipe Lima , Ricardo Pessoa , Rui José ,

and Paula Trigueiros

Abstract It is widely acknowledged that projects that seek to address complex socio-
technical problems benefit from a deliberate mix of individuals, whose complemen-
tary expertise and skills can be leveraged in service of the project goals. Three ways
through which this team diversity can be achieved are through industry-academia
collaborations, through combining various disciplines, and through the inclusion of
individuals with different levels of proficiency in their field. This chapter takes a
critical retrospective look at a recently concluded collaborative project, which inte-
grated these dimensions of interest. Ostensibly, that project aimed to design devices
for smart and connected cycling. However, in this chapter, it is taken as a case study
for a post-project review by its team members. We provide a detailed description of
this multi-actor team, the design brief, work process and outputs, alongside the find-
ings from a reflective questionnaire. In doing so, we aim to contribute to informing
best practices for future heterogeneous collaborative projects through the lessons we
learned here.

Keywords Design for smart mobility · Industry-academia collaboration ·

Interdisciplinary design project · Knowledge boundaries

A. Burrows (B) · P. Trigueiros

Lab2PT—Landscapes, Heritage and Territory Laboratory, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
P. Trigueiros
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
A. Burrows · F. Lima · P. Trigueiros
School of Architecture, Art and Design, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
R. Pessoa
Bosch Car Multimedia, Braga, Portugal
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
R. José
Algoritmi Research Center, University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
e-mail: rui@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 375
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
376 A. Burrows et al.

1 Introduction: Complexity, Collaboration, and Crossing

Boundaries

Design deals in complexity and messiness. Alongside societal and technological

advancements that have added layers of complexity to design problems over time,
the scope and reach of design have also grown [1]. It is in responding to increasing
complexity, diversity, and uncertainty that design finds its vocation as a driver of inno-
vation. The prevalence of fuzzy and seemingly unsolvable problems, often described
as ‘wicked problems’ [2], has helped forge design as a discipline that is uniquely
placed to address them [3]. Design, in turn, has evolved to challenge increasing
complexity. One particularly helpful model for conceptualizing this evolution is
provided by Jones [4], who sees the discipline as moving away from Traditional
Design (phase 1.0), through Product and Service Design (phase 2.0) and Orga-
nizational Transformation Design (phase 3.0), and towards Social Transformation
Design (phase 4.0). That author argues that to advance in these design phases—and
consequently to broaden design’s real-world impact—demands different mindsets,
value propositions, disciplinary composition, and skills. Indeed, many have made this
call for purposeful collaborations across organizations such as Industry-Academia
Collaborations (IACs) [5], across disciplines [6, 7], and across levels of expertise
[8, 9].
The collective knowledge of such heterogeneous teams is widely expected to
yield various benefits, including but not limited to expanding the range of ideas and
informing more creative solutions [10–13]. Yet these broad teams are not without
their own complexity and there are inherent challenges to their effectiveness. This
is because knowledge is situated [14], which means that it is generated and used by
communities of practice, characterized by their own historical, cultural, linguistic,
and value context. As an example, the particular knowledge held by designers has
been termed “designerly ways of knowing” [15]. The notion of knowledge boundaries
is intrinsically tied up with this specialized knowledge, which is not always smoothly
accommodated by other practices. Carlile [16] describes three principal types of
knowledge boundary. First, a syntactic knowledge boundary happens when there is
no shared syntax, thus fostering concern that information is not properly processed
across a given boundary. Second, a semantic knowledge boundary happens when,
even though there is a common syntax, differing interpretations of the common
syntax make communication and collaboration difficult. Third, pragmatic knowledge
boundary happens when actors are resistant to transforming their existing knowledge
and skills to achieve a common goal.
But knowledge boundaries are not unsurmountable. The concepts of boundary
crossing objects [17, 18] and individuals [19] have been explored as ways to negotiate
these knowledge boundaries. These constitute artifacts or people that are flexible
enough to allow different groups to work together without consensus, but also robust
enough to maintain a common identity across different contexts [18]. Boundary
objects need not be tangible and may include figures of speech or renaming a concrete
phenomenon in a metaphorical manner, especially in the sharing of tacit knowledge
Growing Knowledge Across Boundaries: Lessons … 377

and understanding between people [20]. More recently, it has been noted that a design
approach itself can serve as an interactive boundary object, as it facilitates interactions
across disciplines [21]. These are concepts that we use in this chapter to reflect back
on a recently concluded project that was purposely devised in three core respects: (i)
it brought together industry and academia capabilities in the form of an established
technology development organization and a university; (ii) it combined individuals
from diverse engineering and design backgrounds; (iii) it leveraged novice-expert
interactions through the inclusion of individuals at differing levels in their career.
The research team was therefore uniquely placed to critically review the project after
its conclusion.
Successes and even mistakes are worthwhile when one can learn from them—and
share those lessons with the broader scientific community. With that in mind, we
conducted a mid-term project review, from which we derived five recommendations
for similar projects in the future [22]. The current chapter builds on that work through
a more in-depth post-project review, which is detailed and discussed in Sect. 3. In
Sect. 4, we present the lessons we learned from this process and briefly discuss them
in Sect. 5. In the following section, we begin with an in-depth description of the
collaborative project, its diverse actors, opportunity, design brief and outputs.

2 Case Study: Designing for Smart and Connected Cycling

2.1 Actors and Context

This case study involved one academic and one industry partner—University of
Minho and Bosch Car Multimedia, respectively. The undergraduate degree in Product
Design at the University of Minho has actively promoted collaboration between
academia and industry since it was established 10 years ago, with the first integrated
industry placements commencing in the 2014/2015 academic year when the initial
lot of students reached their final year. The final semester of the six-semester Product
Design syllabus comprises this work placement, which is largely embedded within
a local partner industry. The project described in this case study involved two final-
year Product Design students who were undertaking a work placement at Bosch
Car Multimedia. During their industry placements, these students’ work was over-
seen by a senior academic tutor (Design) and an industry tutor (Engineering). This
work placement was set within an existing co-promotion programme between the
University of Minho and Bosch Car Multimedia called Easy Ride, which afforded
the addition of two postdoctoral design researchers. The team included a further two
senior academics (Engineering), who were involved as project manager and company
representative. Table 1 summarizes and highlights the diversity of this eight-person
team as an interdisciplinary IAC, involving people with varying levels of experience.
378 A. Burrows et al.

Table 1 Summary of team

Institutional affiliation No. of team members
composition
Academia 4
Industry 2
Academia-industry internship 2
Disciplinary background No. of team members
Design 5
Engineering 3
Number of years’ experience No. of team members
0–3 years 2
4–9 years 3
10 or more years 3

The purpose of Easy Ride was to advance the state-of-the-art in smart sensors,
human–machine interfaces, and vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communication infras-
tructures, with a view to developing innovative solutions for future smart mobility.
Within this broad programme, the work described herein fell under the Connected
2Wheelers workstream that aimed to develop new technology-enabled services for
urban mobility on two wheels, in this case focused on urban cycling. The duration
of this particular collaboration was relatively short—it lasted just over nine months
overall, with the students’ work placement lasting 15 weeks. In addition to a small
but heterogenous team and the short timeframe, it is worth noting that this collab-
oration happened under unprecedented circumstances. Having taken place in 2021,
amidst the global Covid-19 pandemic, the work process was constrained by the
public health measures in force such as lockdowns and recommendations to work
from home whenever possible.

2.2 Design Brief

Each student worked on a discrete design project. The development of the design
brief for each project preceded the broader collaboration described here, although
the two students were involved throughout. In the academic semester prior to their
work placement, in a taught module called Innovation and Quality, the entire final
year class worked in groups to explore the smart and connected cycling problem
space. Eight design concepts emerged from this group work, which were presented
to Bosch Car Multimedia. Of these, two design concepts were chosen by Bosch Car
Multimedia for further development during the student work placements.
The Bike LEDs project aimed to develop low-cost and low-resolution LED
displays to attach to the bicycle, which could work autonomously as well as in
connection with a smartphone and other smart cycling devices. It was envisaged that
they should be programmable via smartphone and could therefore be a fairly simple
Growing Knowledge Across Boundaries: Lessons … 379

interface. Alongside the design of the actual display, this project contemplated the
exploration of low-resolution LED-based visualizations of information relevant to
urban cycling.
The Sensor Box project aimed to seamlessly integrate a combination of sensors
onto the bicycle, to enhance the cycling experience and collect data to support smart
mobility more broadly. The number and type of sensors to be included would be
determined in function of acceptable and desirable functions for cyclists. Preference
was given to a device that could be retrofitted onto existing bicycles rather than
incorporated into a new bicycle design, as this would help keep the device costs
down and reach a wider audience.

2.3 Design Process and Outputs

The Double Diamond model, developed by the Design Council in 2004, offers a
tried and tested process for engaging diverse stakeholders—both designers and non-
designers—in design and innovation. This model comprises two conjoined diamonds,
the first of which aims to comprehensively understand the problem and the second
aims to identify a meaningful solution. Each of these diamonds begins with a diver-
gent, opening up phase and is followed by a convergent, narrowing in phase. This
model served as the basis for our work process, which has been described in detail
elsewhere [22]. Table 2 provides a summary of what was involved and what was
developed in each phase.
Meetings were held frequently, although not always with the involvement of all
team members. Importantly, everyone participated in the project kick-off meeting,
which was key for discussing project aims, for outlining the project coordination

Table 2 Summary of design process based on the Double Diamond model

Phase Type of thinking Methods and techniques Outputs
Discover Divergent Competitive market analysis Internal report on findings
Brainstorming
Mental maps
Affinity diagram
User survey
Define Convergent Personas Four personas
Participatory problem definition Requirements
(pros and cons) Final design brief
Develop Divergent Ideation sketches Multiple design concepts
Rapid prototyping
Deliver Convergent Prototyping Technical drawings
Rapid testing Prototypes
3D rendering Storyboards
Final report
380 A. Burrows et al.

approach, and for agreeing on the overall design process. There were three subsequent
project progress meetings, which involved all team members. These were held at the
end of the Define phase when the problem had been robustly defined, at the end
of the Develop phase to critically discuss the array of solutions, and finally at the
end of the Deliver phase when the refined design concepts were presented. These
meetings provided the amplest occasion for knowledge transfer between industry
and academia, across the various disciplines involved, and among the various levels
of expertise. On a weekly basis, there were meetings involving the student interns
(Design), their industry tutor (Engineering), and a postdoctoral researcher (Design),
and meetings between the student interns and their academic tutor (Design), with
the occasional involvement of a postdoctoral researcher and the University of Minho
coordinator (Engineering). Other synchronous meetings were held as appropriate
and in response to arising needs experienced within the team.
Most of the meetings were conducted online, owing to the constraints of the
pandemic and related public health guidelines. However, the student interns were
able to visit Bosch Car Multimedia on several occasions and liaise directly with
their industry tutor as well as other Bosch Car Multimedia employees, who were
then able to showcase their work first-hand. Remote collaboration among the
various team members was ensured through the use of various digital tools, such
as video-conferencing software, shared written documents, and online collaborative
whiteboards.

2.4 Design Concepts

Two final design concepts were developed. Although the purpose of this chapter is
not to evaluate the final design concepts per se, they cannot be dissociated from the
process through which they were generated. After an exploration of device form
and interaction modalities (Fig. 1), Bike LEDs resulted in an interface to be used
primarily for navigation and road safety.
The low resolution of the envisaged LED displays necessitated a study of
minimum perceptible information, organized on a LED matrix, as well as the use of
colour and light position to aid communication (Fig. 2).

Fig. 1 Preliminary Bike LEDs design concepts

Growing Knowledge Across Boundaries: Lessons … 381

Fig. 2 Study of minimum perceptible information on an LED matrix, on the left, and use of colour
and light position, on the right

The final Bike LEDs prototype was robust enough for rapid user testing of bicycle
installation and use while cycling, namely of warning lights (Fig. 3). However, device
programming and full information visualization were not feasible within the project
timeline.
Sensor Box went through multiple iterations until it reached its final form as a
device to be attached to the back of the seat post. Initial explorations investigated
the possibility of incorporating the sensors into the seat or elsewhere within the
bicycle frame, but eventually a separate box was deemed a better solution as it
would enable easy transfer of the device from one bicycle to another. This was a
user requirement that emerged from the research undertaken in the Discover phase,
as survey respondents mentioned bike sharing practices as well as having different
bikes for use in different contexts. The final housing for the sensors was a polyhedron
(Fig. 4), incorporating a warning light for better visibility on the road.
The size and shape of Sensor Box were to some extent constrained by the sensors
to be included in the device. An additional concern was sustainable and low-cost

Fig. 3 Final bike LEDs

prototype in use
382 A. Burrows et al.

Fig. 4 Construction of the Sensor Box housing prototype

energy supply for Sensor Box, which motivated the study of smart materials for
energy harvesting. It was envisaged that smart textiles could be incorporated into a
seat cover, with a view to powering Sensor Box while the bicycle was in use (Fig. 5).
We make no substantive claims as to the quality and maturity of these design
concepts. The short duration of the project as well as the student-interns’ commit-
ment to meeting the academic deadlines of their course naturally impacted on the
refinement of the final concepts. Instead, we offer these here as examples of design
artefacts that facilitated the articulation and communication of knowledge within this
heterogenous team. The presentation of the design concepts at their various stages of
development to all team members, along with other outputs summarized in Table 2,
provided tangible mediums through which to interpret, internalise, and understand
unfamiliar or emergent issues. These are therefore a selection of the many boundary
crossing objects [17, 18] that were developed and used during the course of the
project, but more importantly they demonstrate that design has a significant role in
this domain [20, 21].

Fig. 5 Sensor Box

prototype with energy
harvesting seat cover
Growing Knowledge Across Boundaries: Lessons … 383

3 Post-project Review

3.1 Rationale

There are many approaches to critically reflecting on a finished project, to distil the
lessons learned into information that will benefit future projects. Disterer [23] noted
a significant trend in the literature towards seizing the conclusion of a project as a
key opportunity for identifying new knowledge and for preparing such knowledge
for transfer to other projects. The same author lists in excess of fifteen terms used to
describe various forms of post-project assessment, including experience retention,
project post-mortem review, and debriefing. They differ fundamentally in terms of
their focus, with some approaches looking at process, others at outcomes, and others
still at real world use or impact. Heeding Disterer’s advice that ‘lessons learned’
provide a particularly valuable approach to uncovering implicit knowledge, the work
described here positions itself as a post-project review. This approach, which endeav-
ours to capture process knowledge, is one of the most structured and widely applicable
ways of generating a legacy of experience from one project to the next [24].
However, despite a general acceptance of the value of post-project reviews for
competence building and for increasing competitive advantage, they are seldom
carried out in a meaningful way. Factors that typically impede this process include a
lack of time, interest, and ability, particularly as there are no established guidelines
on how to effectively conduct such reviews [24]. As a result, when they do occur,
they tend to be undertaken for larger projects and often on an ad hoc basis. Others
have discussed the importance of achieving a balance between the speed and the
trustworthiness of reviews [25]—while a quick turnaround is necessary to ensure
knowledge is appropriately transferred to a new context, achieving this should not
compromise the credibility and usefulness of the findings. It is therefore essential to
conduct such reviews in a conscientious, systematic, and consistent manner.

3.2 Method and Procedure

A questionnaire was developed for the purpose of conducting the post-project review.
After a team discussion, a questionnaire was deemed the most appropriate method
because it would provide some degree of anonymity to respondents and thus allow all
opinions to be heard equally. This questionnaire encouraged respondents to reflect
on the lessons learned during the course of the project and was structured according
to the three significant characteristics of the team, elaborated on elsewhere [22].
Specifically, the questionnaire probed what individual lessons had been learned from
working in a team comprising (i) an industry-academia collaboration, (ii) multiple
disciplines, and (iii) different levels of proficiency. Respondents were also asked
to provide examples that illustrated their experiences in these three domains. An
384 A. Burrows et al.

additional fourth section allowed respondents to give any other feedback regarding
the project and the questionnaire itself.
The questionnaire was piloted externally, and minor modifications were made to
improve its clarity. The final version of the questionnaire was circulated via email
to all team members, one month after the conclusion of Easy Ride. The compressed
timeline of this post-project review means that it can be classified as rapid [26].

3.3 Ethical Considerations

Conducting this type of critical self-reflection is not without its unique set of ethical
challenges. Others have noted that participant identification is a significant risk when
conducting research within a small community and that taking the usual steps to
safeguard participants’ identity, such as pseudonymization, may not be sufficient to
maximize anonymity [27]. A fear of being identified or identifiable may, in turn,
inhibit candour when sharing feedback and even discourage participation altogether.
Moreover, it has been observed that the direct involvement of top management in
post-project reviews might inhibit open and frank discussions of any challenges faced
[24]. For this reason, only two post-doctoral researchers were directly involved in data
collection and analysis. Directly identifiable information, such as names and emails,
were not collected. However, institutional affiliation, disciplinary background, and
level of experience were recorded and could make recognition possible. Therefore,
the decision was made to omit such information when reporting the findings, unless
deemed particularly relevant to the purpose of this chapter. The questionnaire was
voluntary and respondents were informed that they could withdraw at any time,
without giving a reason, and without repercussions to themselves. Additionally, to
avoid any perceived coercion, project members were invited to respond to the ques-
tionnaire only once via email and no follow-up reminders were sent to those who
did not respond.

4 Lessons Learned

Six of the eight team members responded to the post-project review questionnaire.
While this number does not represent the entire team, there was at least one respon-
dent from each of the categories of interest to this chapter: industry and academia;
both disciplines involved; all levels of expertise. We therefore argue that these
responses are sufficiently representative of the team’s perspectives and experiences
within this collaboration.
Growing Knowledge Across Boundaries: Lessons … 385

4.1 As an Industry-Academia Collaboration

It was evident that industry and academia operate according to different (but often
complementary) objectives and under different constraints. This was experienced as
seemingly discrepant expectations and priorities. One of these differences was time
allocation for certain activities. For example, although research was acknowledged
as important for both partners, for some of the academic team members it was
envisaged as a primary activity to be sustained throughout the project. One of the
respondents mentioned that efficiency was a key concern for the industry partner,
namely regarding human resource management to support the student-interns within
the company. In this context, time was used more purposefully and tasks were more
rigorously planned. There was also a sense that academic responsibilities were well
defined from the start, whereas the industry partner had to navigate the more ill-
defined aim of promoting proximity with the professional world. The lesson for
similar collaborations in the future is to determine a cohesive strategy from the
outset that represents the shared goals that originated the collaboration, which should
likewise be objective and assertive enough to prevail over the individual agendas of
each of the institutions involved.
Communication worked fairly well between the industry and academia partners.
This was, in part, due to the frequency of meetings—weekly at first, and then fort-
nightly. One respondent described this as challenging and stimulating. The meet-
ings benefitted from having clear objectives and were seen as especially effective
when they involved the tutors from both industry and academia, because informa-
tion could be articulated and clarified at point of contact rather than filtered through
relay processes. Synchronous meetings were described as an opportunity for mutual
learning and expedited decision making. In terms of mode of meeting, opinions
were divided but there was consensus that online and in-person meetings were not
the same. On the one hand, it was acknowledged that the online format could be more
tiring, it potentially involved adaptation or learning of new tools and processes, and
hindered informal and spontaneous interactions. Online formats also did not work
so well for fully experiencing tangible artefacts such as materials and prototypes.
On the other hand, this kind of remote but real-time contact was seen as an impor-
tant enabler of inclusivity because it allowed people who might otherwise not be
able to work together to do so. From here we can conclude that communication is
effective when it is frequent and focused, when it is conducted in real-time, when it
involves team members that represent different institutional interests, and when it is
sufficiently flexible to accommodate in-person as well as remote participation.
Interestingly, when asked about differences between industry and academia work
practices, two team members felt that this was not the most significant difference
they experienced during this collaboration. Indeed, some team members already
had considerable experience in this area. These respondents felt that disciplinary
differences between design and engineering had a greater impact, especially in
terms of notions about products and solutions, and the role of designers within this
386 A. Burrows et al.

process. Nevertheless, these differences were considered meaningful opportunities

for exploration and potential innovation.

4.2 As an Interdisciplinary Team

This collaboration had a strong focus on product development. This naturally

emphasized various (arguably not unfamiliar) differences between the disciplines
involved. In the words of one team member, “the disciplinary differences—
design/engineering—in this project were felt as they always are in other projects.”
Engineering was perceived as being driven by a technology push (“What can we
do with this technology?”), whereas design sought to understand and respond to
real-world needs (“What can technology do for people?”). This was evident in state-
ments made about design concepts having been constrained by available technology.
A typical approach described for engineering would be to list a number of product
design alternatives and identify how they could be evaluated against a set of desirable
criteria, which would then reveal one or more optimal solutions for specific usage
scenarios. Engineering was described as effective, but perhaps to the detriment of
elements conducive to a positive user experience. Design was perceived as having a
holistic role in innovation, beyond merely solving (technological) problems, but this
kind of approach takes time. As a result, there was a sense that expectations needed
to be managed in terms of what could be considered outputs of the design process
and when they might be produced.
The design tools and techniques proved to be instrumental in bridging the gap
between disciplines. It was acknowledged that using the Double Diamond model had
galvanized the interdisciplinary collaboration, because it set out a clear and action-
able structure for the work to be developed. The use of the Double Diamond, in
conjunction with the work of the dedicated postdoctoral design researchers, was an
innovation in relation to other Product Design work placements, which had predomi-
nantly focused on achieving pedagogical and academic objectives. This very chapter
and the post-project review that informed it are fruits of the design research that has
continued beyond the project completion. But other outputs generated during the
course of the collaboration, such as the questionnaire results and the personas (Table
2), also served an important purpose in terms of overcoming disciplinary misgivings
and provided a concrete medium for sharing knowledge, for stimulating discussion,
and for informing team decisions.
In addition to these objects, there were boundary crossing individuals within
this collaboration. Most notably, the student-interns (Design) played an important
boundary crossing role. This occurred organically as they were more directly involved
with the company. In fact, Bosch Car Multimedia made a concerted effort to iden-
tify its key engineering specialists to liaise with the student-interns, namely in the
areas of mechanics, materials, hardware, and software. Through these interactions,
the student-interns were able to obtain the technical knowledge directly from these
specialists, which they then integrated into their work. However, there was a sense
Growing Knowledge Across Boundaries: Lessons … 387

that the student-interns may not have been the most appropriate individuals to under-
take this role—at least not in such an unstructured way. They occasionally got caught
between seemingly contrary views and, as the most junior team members, struggled
to unpack the knowledge from the noise. The power structure of the team may also
have undermined the student-interns’ authority to fully take on the responsibilities
of boundary crossing individuals. Even the postdoctoral researchers (Design), who
were more experienced and therefore better equipped to deal with this role, did so
more in a responsive rather than systematic manner. This suggests a need for careful
planning around this type of role in future projects, including who is best placed
within the team to take it on. This kind of forethought might enable the creation of
clearer pathways for communication and knowledge growth.

4.3 As a Heterogeneously Skilled Team

Perhaps unsurprisingly, this was the more familiar type of team diversity, with one
team member noting that “this combination is common in my experience—so it is
not easy to separate what happened in Easy Ride from other projects.” Neverthe-
less, this dimension also brought salient lessons that are worth sharing here. More
senior team members were perceived as contributing their established expertise and
thus grounding the work in the real world. On the other hand, the relative lack of
real-world experience of the more junior team members was seen as contributing to
a greater openness to new idea generation, as they were not burdened by technical or
business constraints. In the words of one team member, the combination of various
skill and experience levels within the project was viewed as an effective way to either
“discard presented proposals, or support them more robustly.” Another respondent
felt that, despite more senior team members having a broader and more consoli-
dated knowledge, the junior team members benefitted from having a more dedicated
focus within the project (i.e., free from other professional demands of more senior
team members) and were therefore more engaged in their own knowledge creation.
For example, the student-interns benefitted from direct contact with (non-academic)
professionals within Bosch Car Multimedia, who readily shared their knowledge and
other resources. The student-interns then shared this knowledge with the rest of the
team orally in meetings or through other outputs (Table 2), which incorporated and
translated the knowledge into meaningful mediums.
It was noted that this type of diversity within the team could be a source of conflict.
While less experienced team members tended to seek certainty and validation for
their work, more experienced team members were prone to critically questioning
things—not necessarily reflecting bad work, but as a way to assess alternatives and
therefore reach an optimal solution. This process could be a source of anxiety for
more junior team members, if they did not receive some form of “confirmation that
they are on the right track.” On this matter, one of the respondents reflected on the
inherent challenges of encouraging novices to freely explore the problem space and
to take ownership of decisions that move the project forward, when they are primarily
388 A. Burrows et al.

concerned with fulfilling “what is expected of them.” This was particularly true in this
case because of the short timeframe of the collaboration and the different interests
of the actors involved. One possible solution, identified by a junior team member,
would be to include more structured learning opportunities to complement learning-
by-doing. This was in line with the views of another respondent who observed that the
technical training provided by the Bosch Car Multimedia team had not only brought
new knowledge to the student-interns, but also helped to build their confidence.
Overall, the different skill and proficiency levels of the team afforded an appro-
priate allocation of resources to the planning, management, and monitoring of the
work, as well as to responding to the design brief and overarching objectives of
the collaboration. This was a novel aspect of this edition of the University of
Minho’s Product Design industry placement, facilitated by the inclusion of dedi-
cated post-doctoral design researchers. Various respondents mentioned that being
a part of project management activities, having the opportunity to contribute to a
peer-reviewed paper (published and presented earlier), and then reflecting on their
experiences after the project’s conclusion were particularly noteworthy examples of
skills development for students at this level. The integration of team members with
varying levels of proficiency and the specific approach to promoting collaboration
amongst them meant that they were able to learn from each other and to grow their
knowledge base.

5 Discussion

This work aimed to capture the lessons learned from a recently concluded collabo-
rative project, which sought to develop new technology-enabled services for urban
cycling, through the retrospective reflections of its team members. This project is
taken as a case study that incorporates three dimensions of interest, which we argue
have the potential to bring together the different mindsets, value propositions, disci-
plinary composition, and skills in what Jones [4] has deemed a fundamental step
to broadening design’s real-world impact. Specifically, this case study illustrates
an Industry-Academia Collaboration [5], a collaboration across disciplines [6, 7]
and across levels of expertise [8, 9]. Given the multitude of approaches to critically
reflecting on finished projects, we agree with the recommendation of Disterer [23]
that ‘lessons learned’ offers a valuable approach to uncovering implicit knowledge
and we therefore adopted a post-project review approach in this work. Our lessons
learned, organised thematically according to the three aforementioned dimensions
of interest, demonstrate how knowledge grows across boundaries in a multi-actor
design project.
Some strengths and limitations need to be considered when interpreting our work.
The post-project review was identified as particularly suitable because of its struc-
tured approach to capturing process knowledge and because of its wide applicability
in generating a legacy of experience from one project to the next [24]. The decision
Growing Knowledge Across Boundaries: Lessons … 389

to use a questionnaire to collect such reflections was not made without first care-
fully considering other options, namely individual semi-structured interviews. Ulti-
mately, we felt that the questionnaire provided the best balance between providing
some degree of anonymity, encouraging candour in the responses, and obtaining
interesting insights into the experiences of the team members. It also permitted
a relatively rapid turnaround [26], thus overcoming one of the known barriers to
undertaking such reviews [24, 25]. Six of the eight team members responded to this
questionnaire, with at least one respondent from each of the following categories
represented: industry and academia; both disciplines involved; all levels of exper-
tise. We therefore argue that these responses are sufficiently representative of the
team’s perspectives and experiences within this collaboration.
In conclusion, this work demonstrates the feasibility of conducting a system-
atic and timely post-project review on a small-scale design project. Here, we have
provided a detailed description of the collaborative project, as well as the post-
project review process and lessons learned. This post-project review was conducted
in a relatively short timeframe with a view to enabling knowledge to be appropri-
ately transferred to a new context, but it also observed recommendations to follow
a conscientious and methodical approach so as not to compromise the credibility
and usefulness of the findings [25]. We believe that this work makes a significant
step in overcoming the lack of established guidelines on how to effectively conduct
such reviews [24]. While it is too early to comment on its value for competence
building and for increasing competitive advantage, we are encouraged by the fact
that the team members who participated in this process reported having gained new
knowledge that they would take forward into future collaborative projects. We see
great potential to build on this work, including teasing out the limits and criticalities
of the heterogeneous dimensions that guided this project.

Acknowledgements This work was primarily supported by the European Structural and Investment
Funds in the FEDER component, through the Operational Competitiveness and Internationalization
Programme (COMPETE 2020) [Project n° 039334; Funding Reference: POCI-01–0247-FEDER-
039334]. This work had additional financial support from Project Lab2PT—Landscapes, Heritage
and Territory laboratory - AUR/04509, with financial support from FCT/MCTES through national
funds (PIDDAC) and co-financing from the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER) POCI-
01–0145-FEDER-007528, in line with the new partnership agreement PT2020 through COMPETE
2020—Competitiveness and Internationalization Operational Program (POCI). We would also like
to acknowledge the valuable contributions of Lídia Lemos and Priscila Lucena, the student interns
whose work was central to this collaboration.

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Design in a Post-pandemic Era

Francisco Paiva

Abstract This paper reflects on some of the civilizational challenges enlivened by

the post-pandemic context, thus playing a role in understanding the current crisis
though other key moments in recent history that restrained design at the theoretical
and operative levels, having an impact on several social domains. It draws a parallel
between how the increasing digitalization changed both the profession and how
research is performed though a change in the perception of society and the designers
themselves regarding their sphere of activity—be it through spreading design to areas
that once were out of reach or through an increasing emphasis on the performance
of communication and interaction devices that were shaped and projected by the
design industry to strive for a future. This future deploys aesthetics together with
environmental and ecosystemic ethics, while adapting the policies of body and space,
both private and public, but also of the spirit, thus transforming the perception of
temporality itself. Lastly, this article sets out to reflect upon design, using as a starting
point the energetic issue and the consequences thereof on creativity and geographical,
biophysical, climate, and physiological processes, to appeal to a certain heterodoxy,
which can lead to a counter-hegemonic transition that will have a relevant impact on
the planetary system.

Keyword Design for transition · Post-pandemic crisis · Design driven innovation ·

Digital services

1 Crisis

The magnitude of the challenges that humanity faces in the aftermath of the pandemic
that still ravages us, together with society’s expectation of design’s performance in
the 21st century in improving the quality of life and social innovation, imposes on
designers an approach to multiple and diverse scales, an unprecedented zooming
ability, coupled with the ability to establish analogies between problems, processes,

F. Paiva (B)
Labcom, University of Beira Interior, Covilhã, Portugal
e-mail: fpaiva@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 393
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
394 F. Paiva

and disciplinary fields that are progressively hybrid and complex. Contemporary
Design is expected to be able to deal not only with complexity and contradiction, as
Venturi and Scott Brown proposed in their time, but essentially with “ambiguity”,
says Stephen Anderson in “The Future of design” [1], appealing to the non-linear
and rhizomatic sense of cultural processes.
Society, economy, industry, communication, and culture have all changed, due
to increasing digitalization, the restrictions imposed by the SARS CoV-2 pandemic
and, recently, with the whole set of perplexities (and deaths) generated by the Russian
invasion of Ukraine, which is very much in the domain of the dispute of the imaginary,
the symbolic, content, and communication, progressively dependent on the design
of multimedia interfaces, which has also become a crucial battlefield.
In this context of catastrophe, design needs a growing capacity to deepen critical
thinking in the face of new programs and to develop new operative skills that rein-
force the relevance of its field of activity, beyond the traditional market dimension.
The progressive digitalization of life, makes the ability to act and interact within
the parameterized spectrum of HCI (Human Computer Interaction) technological
devices, their metrics, databases, UI (User Interface) models and UX (User Experi-
ence) interaction patterns, realizing the interference of AI (Artificial Intelligence) in
the algorithmic configuration, combinatorial and progressively more sophisticated
parameters that govern and condition the information, beyond the simple graphic
and visual aspects, enriching the lexicon, but also the centrality of design in the field
of responsiveness and understanding, not only “how to do it” but if “we can do it”
and “at what cost?” Design 3.0 is concerned with the system behind the scenes, how
different aspects relate to each other, and lastly, the very structures and services of
facilitation.
This whole new syntax and paradigm shift was accelerated by the pandemic,
which had repercussions in changing patterns of action and brought into play visions
and mental models that altered social routines, professional practice, production,
themes and processes of research and education in and through design—starting
from (self) imposed lockdowns and the necessary observance of other norms of
social relationship.
There is a correlation between times of crisis, creativity, and change in ways of
life. This interdependence inspired in the past some premonitory manifesto-texts,
of which Design For The Real World [2] by Papanek is a paradigmatic example, in
its indexation of obsolescence, the social responsibility of design, and its inevitable
ecological implication. A concern that became very clear with the multiple reactions
to the 1973 oil crisis, whose dynamics finds parallels in other key moments later
on, such as the cultural and social transformations that occurred in the first quarter
of the 21st century, thinking specifically of the subprime financial crisis of 2007–
2010, which changed many life and investment priorities, the climate crises, which
raised awareness of the impending ecological catastrophe, and the consequent spread
of theories and activism around the Anthropocene Epoch, making designers more
aware of the irreversible impacts of the productive, cultural, and social dynamics of
which they are a part. It has also brought to light the side effects of climate change on
migrations on a global scale, widening the potential spectrum of design’s action. In
Design in a Post-pandemic Era 395

fact, the perception of massive transformation has increased critical consciousness

and promoted the intersection between culture, humanities, arts, and environment,
thus changing the logics of visuality and the politics of representation and the very
ecology of media [3].

2 Digitalization

With the assumption of software as the central tool of design processes, there is a
universalization of cultural phenomena, affecting the capacity to store, to commu-
nicate, and even to imagine, changing the very notion of “media”, which becomes
almost synonymous of software [4]. However, if this aspect tends to harmonize proce-
dures, it also shifts the designer’s action from the strict context of the specialist and
liberal service provider to the demands of facilitation, programmatic coordination,
and art direction.
Digitization has extended to all domains, from mass manufacturing to DIY (Do
it yourself) practices, from the creation of the intangible to the cartography and
heritage preservation of memory, increasingly converted into data containing infinite
information potential. This omnipresence has modified our perception of reality but
has also had repercussions on the way design has come to create realities, dependent
on the permanent negotiation between the realms of the virtual and the material, which
alters the physical limits of the real, of which the progressive volatility conditions
the operation and programming of our own perception. Augmented Reality (AR),
according to the social media platform company Snapchat, goes far beyond a camera
and glasses that record or reproduce—it is a device that enhances the experience of
communication, posing the challenge of designing and creating native products for
AR, as advocated by Lieberman [5], and already follows some luxury brands, which
move from viewing products, to the involvement of the customer throughout a holistic
narrative and interactive process. This integration causes the diffusion of boundaries
between the visual, spatial, and material domains of design itself, leading companies
like ARtillery Intelligence: Metaverse Research and Insights [6] to develop integrated
solutions.
All these transformations are dependent on technological vertigo and occur at a
progressively accelerated pace, emphasizing the curve of humanity’s “evolution” at
an unprecedented rate. This is a process that Virilio [7] calls “dromology”, resulting
from the progressive instantaneity of “Real Time” as a process strongly dependent
on technological mediation, which erases the present and retracts the presence of the
human. Virilio [8] had well recognized that speed is political—it implies a change
in the logistics of perception, a suppression of distances, an almost denial of space
and the imposition, as a rule, of the permanent state of urgency.
Questions arising from the reflection on the models of mass production, proposed
by Archigram and Archizoom or Superstudio and tutti quanti, brought design closer
to science-fiction, to which the artistic institutions themselves, led by MoMA, from
1972 on, gave prominence. The implication of these dynamics in political economy
396 F. Paiva

(Baudrillard, Dorfles), urban symbolism, and social movements (Castells), shifted

the focus of design to the non-visual space (Lefebvre). In MoMA’s strategy, this estab-
lishment posing as utopia assimilated objections, although it succeeded in changing
the notion of domesticity, or, in Emilio Ambasz’s [9] words, establishing a new
“domestic landscape.”
The idea of “landscape” applied to design refers to the context of existence, to
the scenographic environment of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey and all
utopias and its own technological poetics, with its program and radical exaggeration
[10]—of which, even in the apparent technical reduction of culture, design would be
a privileged instrument.

3 Future

In “The Future of the Humanity” [11], Kaku establishes a direct correspondence

between transhumanism and technology, whether through the use of cybernetics and
its devices, or through the enhancement of humans from genetic and bio-medical
alterations that give them more and new powers, skills, and abilities. This topic is
controversial, given its ethical implications. However, Dolly the sheep brought us
closer to Pygmalion’s dream. Given the ascendancy of devices and interfaces over
experience, we live what Jünger [12] called a “total mobilization”—of bodies, of
public and domestic space, of our time, of the field of perception, and even a certain
sudden mobilization of the illusion of the world. In this planetary-scale awareness,
design and its innovative purpose appear as keys to the future.
Since 2021, the London Design Biennale has sought to situate design in a time of
crisis from some thematic axes, involving in each edition more than 500 designers
from all over the world, with the aim of finding radical design solutions to deal with
today’s critical issues, from health to the environment, from society to work [13].
The changes in digital interfaces, visual and multimodal languages, but also the
evolution of programming and coding, with the tightening of relationships between
the fields of communication and interaction design, has brought to light inter and
trans mediation strategies that place design at the center of new civilizational narra-
tives [14]. These narratives are increasingly based on: information hierarchy; space-
time non-linearity; longevity, the persistence in the present time; (un)predictability;
hypertextual interactivity, moving from the interpretive to the appropriative dimen-
sion; and synchronicity, referring to the alignment between the time of narrative
creation (design time) and the time of narrative reception (use time). In this dynamic
framework, design assumes a change in its field of action and the new issues related
to contemporary supports, platforms, processes, and methods of production and
experimentation.
As a project, design is since its origin related to the idea of “changing life,”
embodying an emancipatory and even revolutionary power, which brings it closer
to the vanguards that led to modernity, first by the industrial legacy that indelibly
changed the material environment and the inhabited space, but above all by the
Design in a Post-pandemic Era 397

progressive expansion and dematerialization of its field, of which the cultural inter-
ference extends to the whole myriad of devices and interfaces that shape and condition
the collective imagination, whether from models of interaction or critical references
that amplify the issues of the new (trans)humanism and ecology.
In this framework, contemporary design struggles and opposes design itself.
Radical design opposes the other design, seen as a physical device of hygienist
bio-power, moving its field from the strict project practice to assume itself as a polit-
ical, social, and even existential practice of liberation of man and culture, facing the
ever more emerging environmental and public health issues, which force a permanent
assessment of the place of existence. This is a process that can ultimately be devoid
of objects, leading to disappearance, in which the only possible design is that of life
itself.
Focused on the power of the collective imagination, design foreshadows utopia,
materializes speculation, and gives critical shape to the future and to possible alter-
natives. In this sense, Formia [15] establishes a chronology and even an affiliation
of the main issues that impact survival, in an exercise that seeks to understand how
the future has been projected from the past and, on the other hand, centered in the
Italian context, how “temporality” is present and conditions the culture of project.
The perception of continuities and ruptures provides clues from which one can make
this future archeology, greatly facilitated by the progressive dematerialization and
by the centrality of the narrative processes themselves, with their own temporalities,
rules, and discourses. Thus, just as museums were “spaces for time” the organiza-
tional structure, the classification of objects, and design activism are based on fluid
and organic temporalities, progressively hybrid, in which the material domain and the
digital spectrums continue and complement each other, making any categorization
of “visions” more complex.
The computer is not the end of the gap between representation and reality [16],
but design mitigates the distance between the physical and the intellectual world,
establishing a balance between materiality and abstraction, absolutely necessary to
establish new links, interconnections between creativity and the matter of the world,
which we see as increasingly dependent on coding processes, which affect both static
forms and the flows we want to generate and the energy they need.

4 Energy

The reflection around the relationship between energy and design will be susceptible
to alter the course of history of design—this was achieved not only through pragmatic
processes of production, representation, and meaning, but also from the impacts
of creativity on geographical processes, bio-physical, climatic, and physiological
processes, analogously to what García-German proposes [17] from energy, entropy,
cycles, and pacts, an attitude that assumes deviating from classical mechanics and
the hegemonic design culture, in favor of thermodynamics, ecology, and politics.
398 F. Paiva

Precisely in 2014, Andrea Branzi, posed the question, in regard to the crisis of glob-
alization, if design had not also become an issue of energy. A very complex one, but of
the utmost relevance. It concerns mobility, the finiteness of the planet’s resources, and
even the dominance and risks of hegemonies and monocultures, including cultural
ones, on a global scale.
The recent editorial by PAD—Pages on Arts and Design, entitled “The Value
of Design in the Mediterranean” [18], underlines the contrast between Northern
Europe, where industrialization was and is so deeply rooted, and the development
model characteristic of the South, where the very discourse of transition moves away
from the paradigm of the so-called Global North, centered on post-industrial ideas
of degrowth, post-capitalism and post-humanism, while the South refocuses design
according to the humanistic tradition.
In the same article, investigating the correlation between times of crisis, creativity,
and new forms of cultural and social life, the growing relevance and impact of
the crisis is highlighted “to determine unexpected cultural and social transforma-
tions,” from two scenarios: the diaspora caused by the economic and financial crisis
and the pandemic that shook the cultural and creative sectors, concluding from the
case studies the potential of designers to adapt to difficult social circumstances, to
become agents of knowledge transfer and strong catalysts of social innovation and
co-creation.
Taking a step back from energy centrality, we can almost rewrite the history and
theory of design, especially given the centrality of environmental aspects. McHarg
[19] not only captured the zeitgeist of the 1960s, condemning modern civilization
for environmental degradation, but proposed a practical method to react to it from a
biocentric sense that harmonizes with the powerful forces and flows of the natural
world. This premonitory character is more pressing today in the face of the unpre-
dictable consequences of global warming, species extinction, and resource depletion,
which reverse the perspective of the great progress registered from the eminent end
of humanity. A process that entails great injustice, insofar as the great beneficiaries
of this developmentalist paradigm are a tiny part of living beings and of humanity,
which will also be affected in a very asymmetrical way.

5 Transition

Today, designers are asked to have that prospective sense, in line with the four dimen-
sions of design for innovation as set forth by Stilgoe and Guston [20]: Anticipation,
Reflexivity, Inclusion, and Responsiveness. These dimensions converge with the
Great Transition Initiative’s program [21], which makes a vehement appeal to the
change in mentality, posture, and way of projecting in the so-called Anthropocene
Epoch, as contentious as this expression may be.
Going over this controversy and the contradictions of this Epoch, Fuad-Luke
[22], commissioner-general of the Porto Design Biennale’21, proposes an attitude
of “Designing towards the Sympoiecene”, considering human diversity, visible in
Design in a Post-pandemic Era 399

language and culture, but also the non-human biological diversity, seeing this time
as an event of traumatic extinction because of the massive depletion of resources
imposed by the capitalist model. Beyond this aspect, to some extent Arcadian, Fuad-
Luke puts the emphasis of design on the relationship and on sharing, whether on a
social, environmental, multi-species or co-creation level, advocating a non-extractive
sense of community empowerment for Design, one that opens the field to the urgency
of counter-hegemonic heterodoxy and restores, as beautifully put by Maldonado [23],
a projectual hope.

References

1. Anderson SP (2022) Homepage. [Link] Last accessed 21 Feb

2022
2. Papanek V (1971) Design for the real world. Thames & Hudson, London
3. Demos TJ (2017) Against the Anthropocene. Visual Culture and Environment Today. Sternberg
Press, Berlin
4. Manovich L (2013) Software takes command. Bloomsbury Academic, New York
5. ARtillery Intelligence (2022) Homepage. [Link] Last accessed 21 Feb 2022
6. Lieberman Z (2022) Hompage. [Link] Last accessed 21 Feb 2022
7. Virilio P (1995) La Vitesse De Libération. Galilée, Paris
8. Virilio P (1977) Vitesse et Politique. Galilée, Paris
9. Ambasz E (ed) (1972) Italy: the new domestic landscape. achievements and problems of Italian
design. MOMA, New York and Centro Di, Florence
10. Branzi A (2014) Una generazione esagerata. Dai radical italiani alla crisi della globalizzazione.
Baldin i& Castoldi, Milano
11. Kaku M (2018) The future of the humanity. Transforming mars, interstelar travel, immortality
and our destiny beyond earth. Penguin Books, London. 206–224
12. Jünger E (1990) L’État Universel suivi de La Mobilisation Totale. Gallimard, Paris
13. Mitola A (2021) Design in an age of crisis, an open call to imagine the future. In: Domus,
Milano
14. Lelis C, Kreutz E (2019) Narrative dimensions for the design of contemporary visual identities.
In: International association of societies of design research conference (IASDR), Manchester
School of Art, 2–5 September 2019, Manchester
15. Formia E (2017) Storie di Futuri e Design. Anticipazione e sostenibilità nella cultura italiana
del progetto. Maggioli Editore, Milano
16. Picon A (2009) La arquitectura y lo virtual. Hacia una nueva materialidad. In: Ortega L (ed)
La digitalización toma el mando. Gustavo Gili, Barcelona, 67-84
17. García-German J (ed) De lo mecánico a lo termodinámico. Por una definición energética de la
arquitectura y del territorio. Gustavo Gili, Barcelona (2010).
18. Vai E, Mehmeti L (2021) The impact of crisis and diaspora on design culture and events. In:
Ferrara, M (Ed) PAD—pages on arts and design. Aiap Edizioni, Milano. 210–234 (December,
2021).
19. McHarg IL (1969) Design with nature. Doubleday/Natural History Press, American Museum
of Natural History, New York
20. Stilgoe S, Guston DH (2017) Responsible research and innovation. The handbook of science
and technology studies. MIT Press, Cambridge
400 F. Paiva

21. Great Transition Initiative (2022) homepage. [Link] Last accessed 21 Fen
2022
22. Fuad-Luke A (2021) Designing towards a Sympoiecene. In: Alter-realities. Esad-Idea, Porto
(2021).
23. Maldonado T (1970) La Speranza Progettuale: Ambiente e Società. Einaudi, Torino
Mediated Authorships: The Designer
as the Instructor of Machines

Luis Ortega and Julia Capomaggi

Abstract The implementation and use of artificial intelligence (AI), and automatic
learning in particular, are ushering in a methodological and conceptual updating
of creative practices and their associated theory. The roots of these changes lie in
disciplinary traditions associated with research into automatism promoted in the
1960s, with the introduction of cybernetics and computational sciences. This article
focuses on the spread of the notion of authorship in architecture in the digitalization
process and takes the discussion of systematic automatism in home design as a case
study. For doing so it revises the main theoretical references, particularly the work
by Gordon Pask, unfolds projects from the 60 s to post the main questions raised by
AI today in the Design Field in respect to Authorship. While Gordon Pask suggested
the transformation of the architect into a systems designer, now we can state that
this is an environment in which the architect is transformed into an educator and a
critic, an educator in the sense that they have to design the datasets, or conditions of
possibility of learning; they have to instruct the generative and discriminative neural
networks through numerous groups of “examples” and guide this learning through
weighted assessment protocols.

Keywords Machine learning · Authorship · Domestic space

1 Automatism and Mediated Authorship

One of the most heated controversies stemming from the introduction of digital
technology into architecture is the hypothetical dissolution or diminishment of the
role of authorship in the new and highly automated processes. This debate has become
even more heated with the implementation and use of AI in design processes.

L. Ortega (B)
Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]
J. Capomaggi
Universitat de Girona, Girona, Spain
e-mail: [Link]@[Link]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 401
N. Martins et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Design and Digital Communication III,
Springer Series in Design and Innovation 24,
[Link]
402 L. Ortega and J. Capomaggi

Three positions can be made out within this controversy [1] The first would
claim that there is no change from the modern mechanical model: the computer is
viewed as a mere instrument that conditions some factors that affect the course of
projects—design speed, management of a vast amount of information, etc.—yet does
not substantially change the practice. The second claims that computers will make
the former figure of the architect vanish to instead be replaced by a new figure within
a model where the medium affects the design process to such an extent that it even
casts doubt on its authorship.
However, this text is based on a third view, in which the architect who operates
within digital logic is no longer doing so as an alternative that is incompatible with the
model of the modern architect who worked from the mechanical perspective but from
an expansive turn in their abilities and conceptual frameworks. In the case at hand,
the impact of the use of automatic learning processes in home design in Italy in the
1960s, for example, can be aligned with traditions and sensibilities from outside the
discipline in the mechanical era, with periods in which the design of automatisms—
such as clocks and the first automata—focused the discussion and efforts of scientific
and artistic communities equally. Arguments associated with mechanically mediated
creativity and the emergence of order from autonomous machines were bandied in
these debates, and an imaginary and terminology were developed that conditioned
both mechanized and more artisanal creative practices. The questions that have arisen
in recent years on the ability to establish autonomous processes of design, projects,
data management, and creativity in general through the use of algorithms is a deeply
rooted line of research, yet until now they have never been considered as urgently
or with a tone that is so threatening to many designers. In almost all cases, this
anxiety is spurred by the lack of appropriate categories and resources to harness the
opportunities and new modalities of projects brought about by automatic learning
processes.

2 The Emergence of the Systematic: Computation,

Cybernetics, the Architect as a Systematizer

The epistemological turn introduced by computation can only be understood if it is

tackled from a perspective that goes beyond the merely instrumental. The theoretician
Gordon Pask claimed that the true impact of cybernetics in architecture was metathe-
oretical. Just like the linguistic turn in philosophy, which shifted the focus of study,
the digital philosophical turn shaped a new language to address and develop the disci-
pline. In his article “The Architectural Relevance of Cybernetics,”[2] Gordon Pask
outlined cybernetics’ potential in architecture by upholding the effects of architecture
not only as an instrumental phenomenon but also as a new theoretical framework
for thinking about and designing cybernetics. The new architect is presented as a
designer of systems with interests honing in on the organizational properties of the
systems of development, communication and control. Pask viewed cybernetics as a
Mediated Authorships: The Designer as the Instructor of Machines 403

metalanguage that enabled the role of the new architect to be addressed critically.
Computers’ ability to act as mediators between the designer and the design turned the
former into the controller of controls, a catalyst, a meta-systematizer. The positivistic
ingenuousness of early cybernetics and its ensuing architectural proposals reduced
computational power to an instrumental problem of optimization. They somehow
reflected the model of paradigm shift that aspired to resolve anomalies thanks to
the power provided by digital technology and the new science that came with it.
However, Pask’s vision was much subtler and more powerful in the middle and long
term. Indeed, when Pask stressed the role of cybernetics as a metalanguage, he was
nonetheless calling for a linguistic revision of architecture to establish it as theory.
This new theory reflects the figure of a new author. Two episodes are usually
recognized as the most significant in the inception of the notion of author of archi-
tecture: first, the construction of the dome in Santa Maria dei Fiore cathedral in
Florence by Filippo Brunelleschi, and secondly the theory outlined by Leon Battista
Alberti—which he set forth in the first, second and ninth books of De re aedifica-
toria—on the identification of the project as the priority goal of the architect’s output
and its distinction from the built work, the latter a reproduction of the model defined
by document-based representation [3].
Brunelleschi represents the autographic model, in which the built work is a direct
result of the author, while Alberti believes that the true designed object is the project,
while the built object is merely its copy. This distinction has important implications.
The first of them is purely disciplinary. While in Brunelleschi’s model the author
is constituted by authority, holding the information and transmitting it directly or
via scale models that represent the object to be built, in Alberti’s model there is a
mediator between the author and the built work: systems of representation. Alberti
believes that the drawing as a document representing the object is the true work of
the architect, because other people actually build it.
Conversely, Brunelleschi needed to be at the construction site to guarantee that
the building was constructed following his instructions and that he was recognized as
its author, which included carefully meting out the information in each stage in order
to avoid being excluded from the process. In an era when the author was not a recog-
nized figure, oversight of construction entailed an entire series of operations directly
targeted at ensuring the author’s control and recognition, and this necessarily entailed
managing the information. On the other hand, Alberti poured all his efforts into the
notational and representational system in order to guarantee that the documentation
that reached the construction site enabled the project to be faithfully reproduced the
way the author had envisioned it. All of Alberti’s effort and ingenuity were funneled
into accurately representing his project so that it could be reproduced in an era when
the printing press did not yet exist. Aware of the shortcomings entailed in reproducing
an image faithfully with a hand-drawn reproduction, Alberti’s inventions were aimed
at alphanumerically coding the images.
The effort to describe or alphanumerically codify in pre-typographic culture was
immediately surpassed by the visual culture that Sebastiano Serlio set forth in his trea-
tise with the graphic reproduction of the orders. Typographic architecture reached its
404 L. Ortega and J. Capomaggi

apogee with the advent of the printing press thanks to a new technology that concen-
trated all the narrative power of the old theory in the transmission of images for the first
time. The effort to achieve descriptive precision which stimulated Alberti’s experi-
ments to guarantee a faithful reproduction of the original was suddenly interrupted
with the advent of a much more appropriate and effective technology: typographic
reproduction.
Each of the different technological stages has different conceptual frameworks
and definitions of authorship. In the crafts, works are recognized by similarity. The
craftsman may produce similar works, but the author operates with a recognition
pattern that is not based on his output being identical. Authorship in pre-mechanical
culture has nothing to do with the idea of identity but instead with similarity. A
craftsman was recognized as an author because he produced similar or comparable—
though not identical—works. This recognition of authorship was more diffuse than
what developed in the mechanical age. The notion of similarity is more complex
than identicalness in that the variations may be important and yet the objects are still
recognized as belonging to the same author.
This entire conceptual framework shifted radically in the age of technical repro-
duction. The parameters that governed the framework of visual culture during the
typographic era were identicalness and copy. An author was recognized as the author
of the original, yet also as the “intellectual author” of the copies that were mechan-
ically reproduced. In many cases, a design was associated with the representa-
tion that allowed it to be both produced and mechanically reproduced. Given the
logics and restrictions of production, all mechanically produced objects are iden-
tical, thus signaling a shift from an artisan culture which recognized authorship via
soft parameters like similarity to a culture which refers to identicalness.
However, with the introduction of the digital media, the idea of variability and
series has been revived, even though they are closer to the culture prior to the printing
press than to the Western typographic culture. Studies like the book on the figure
of the craftsman by Richard Sennett hold up this figure associated with effort and
detached from technique or technology [4]. From this standpoint, a carpenter, a
surgeon, or a computer programmer would be a craftsman based on the mere fact of
being associated with work as an end in itself and focusing their efforts on material
perfection through stringent control of the techniques needed to do so. Sennett has
even quantified this effort: 10,000 h of practice are needed to achieve sufficient skill.
Therefore, from the standpoint of production, the artisan era stands out for variability,
which is, in turn, limited by the craftsman’s capacity, while mechanical serial produc-
tion is limited by repetition. In turn, digital production revives variability yet without
quantitative limitations. The latter may have enormous potential depending on how
you look at it yet also poses a major challenge for our visual culture. From an order of
values built upon limited references—limited similarity in the case of the craftsman
or repetition in mechanical production—it is difficult to address the comprehension
and legibility of such an open framework that ultimately requires a redefinition of
the conceptual and aesthetic categories with which we operate, a reformulation that
also directly affects the traditional modern conception of authorship on which the
disciplinary ontology is grounded.
Mediated Authorships: The Designer as the Instructor of Machines 405

Another of the usual assertions about digitalization is that the computer is a tech-
nical mediator between the designer and the designed object: the software used condi-
tions the project and facilitates or promotes a certain type of geometries and shapes.
Although this observation is accurate, it does denote an excessively instrumental
approach to computation. The impact of this logic is unquestionably important, but
digitalization has much more important effects that require a different type of anal-
ysis. The use of the computer introduces variability and non-standard seriation as a
new frame of work, a change that fundamentally distinguishes the digital age from
the mechanical age (and its associated repetition-based culture based).
The difference between design and production on which mechanical culture was
based dissolves in the digital age. Thus, there is a shift from a model of author based
on control of the representation, with the project as the designer’s main object, to
a model in which the author(s) require not representation but modelling to build.
On the other hand, parametric systems mean that the designer is more a designer of
algorithms than objects. There is a move from the model of the designer who is the
author of objects to the designer who is the author of objectiles.

3 Domesticity in Italy in the 1960s as a Setting Where

Antagonistic Logics Unfolded: Two Cases
of Programming

In the 1960s, the domestic space turned into a field of experimentation where seri-
ation, automatic mechanisms, and prefabricated elements had to grapple with the
sphere of individual expression and manifestation and consequently had a greater
need for variation. Some proposals tackle the problem by reproducing the orga-
nizational structure at smaller scales, while others do so by amplifying certain
objects’ capacity until turning them into automated pieces where the individual
space is concentrated in the space between mechanical artefacts and architecture,
often generic containers with low architectural quality. Other works focus on new
methodologies. This scenario became the forerunner of some of the challenges posed
today by the use of machine learning in residential architectural projects.
In his essay, “Whatever Happened to Total Design?” [5] Mark Wigley claims
that projects with more flexible ambitions seek an inflexible aesthetic agenda. Total
design, design totally controlled by the architect where the user’s degree of freedom
is limited to superficial alterations, often contrasts with models whose goal is the
quest for flexibility.
Even though rigid structures can absorb variation, multiplicity, and heterogeneity
with the goal of developing uniqueness, experiments like the one led by Enzo Mari
and Bruno Morassuti, entitled “Arte programmata e prefabbricazzione,” [6] are based
on integrating unmeasurable individual needs and organizational spatial structures
in a programming system which becomes a design methodology.
406 L. Ortega and J. Capomaggi

The proposal is presented via a table, which is also the elevation of the proposal.
The table-elevation “indicates a sequence of the displacement of each cell in depth.
The sequence is regular, ascending, and descending: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 2,
3, 4, 5, 6, 5. The sequence begins with three rows, and with continuous movement it
tends to occupy all the available space according to a square spiral movement. After
three rows, an internal row, a middle row, and an outside row emerge with respect
to the center of the spiral, such that in its development a dissonance is created that
tends to shift in each turn. In fact, the sides of the spiral are reduced on the outside
and vary in relation to the length of the side and the length of the numerical scale.
Finally, the composition, the tendency of the spiral, remains as a scheme-guide of a
sequence of thematic variations in all directions (such as: 2, 2, 3, 4, 2, 1, 2, 4, 56, 4,
5, 3, 4, 5, 1, etc.)” [7].
Mari’s project is based on the quest for utility introduced in prefabrication in
urban planning, architecture, and furniture, via “visual programming,” a topic that
Mari had been developing since 1954 via thematic variation, the treatment of color,
volume, kinetics, and prefabrication.
The “analogical software” is an experiment to measure the potentiality of this
type of process. Mari and Morassuti warned that the danger of prefabrication and
programming is that they detract value from the architect’s expressive possibilities,
and in order to counter this they sought a design model that would become an instru-
ment capable of overcoming the arbitrariness of the unique for those aspects the go
beyond the purely technical. The structure of the organism’s internal demands and
the choice of the type of visual programming had been integrated since the original
schemes. The programming was based on a modular, numerical sequence in which
“large zones can be structured: from urban dimensions to a home interior” [7]. The
structure can be changed and arranged according to physical variables (orientation,
noise, wind, etc.) and psychological variables (color, shape, etc.), while the interpre-
tation of the numerical sequence would be mutating and unstable to the displacement
of the spectator and the movement of the shade during the daytime hours. Six types
of cells are proposed, some of them with a double façade and others with a single
one, along with five types of residential cells of differing sizes, which are unified
in a module of variation of 1.20 m, the minimum, indivisible size of the inhabitable
module in the proposal. Mari and Morassutti’s method emerged from the gestation
of a theorem comprised of systems, the incorporation of intangible data, and their
translation into rituals capable of informing industry and incorporating creativity
into mass manufacturing.
Another study in a similar vein was conducted by Claudio Salocchi as part of the
exhibition Eurodomus 4 (1972) [8]. Salocchi conducted a study in which he used the
house as a field to measure the functional and psychological needs that are common
to all users; he then assigned them different values, where zero means a minimal
solution. His proposal sought to reinvent the room, and he believed that in order to
change the conditions it was essential to rethink the underlying structure.
Salocchi presents a double-entry table which weighs variables like kitsch, glob-
alization, new family, colonization of the space, sleep, symbol, city, politics, distinct
space, space of integration, space of rehabilitation and hygiene, space of movement,
Mediated Authorships: The Designer as the Instructor of Machines 407

functional-work-study space, functional-free time space, modulation, flexibility,

centralization, functionality, self-structuring, valance, evasion, decoding, sensibility,
simultaneity, paper, and associative process with values of 0 and 1, and he claimed
to have created a useful means to measure the role of individuality in the domestic
space.
The final proposal consisted in a standard-sized module (12.90 × 9 × 2.40 m)
with a grid that extends onto its walls and floors, where the room begins to be
colonized with circulation, communication, hygiene, and eating. The photographs
showed some environments in which each room was independently defined from the
other spaces. The house became a set of “à la carte” rooms.

4 Machine Learning: The Authorial Expansion Towards

a Digital Muse

Research into the use of automated learning in architectural design has accelerated
in recent years. Processes based on unsupervised learning via databases and the use
of neural networks seek to replicate human behavior in different spheres. But what
happens when what we are trying to replicate are creative processes such as those
involved in home design? What is the role of the new architect? Is creativity possible?
If it is possible, what does it consist of?
While authors designed objects in the predigital era and systems in the early digital
era, now we are confronting a hybrid process in which the computer autonomously
processes much of the generative project. The challenge of these situations is that
in many AI environments, the procedures are designed for optimization, while
in an architectural project, as Mari and Morassuti noted, antagonistic and often
irreconcilable logics are superimposed upon each other.
The use of GAN (Generative Adversarial Network) [9] has emerged as an inter-
esting platform for experimenting in this field. Generative and discriminative neural
networks establish a zero-sum game in which the process learns autonomously.
Somehow the computer not only generates but also critiques. Without entering into
the technical details of this type of procedure, we can say that it is an environment in
which the machine is a highly powerful generative prosthetic. Without a doubt, the
challenge shifts to the discussion of the quality of what is generated and authorship
procedures in such technologically mediated environments.
While Gordon Pask suggested the transformation of the architect into a systems
designer, now we can state that this is an environment in which the architect is trans-
formed into an educator and a critic, an educator in the sense that they have to design
the datasets, or conditions of possibility of learning; they have to instruct the gener-
ative and discriminative neural networks through numerous groups of “examples”
and guide this learning through weighted assessment protocols.
While in the 1960s, we witnessed similar protocols that sought to systematically
integrate quantifiable objective procedures with processes of qualitative intangible
408 L. Ortega and J. Capomaggi

assessment, today this same challenge is arising once again with the implementation
of computerized autonomous learning.
On the other hand, at the other end of the process the architect in the AI age has
to be a critic who is competently able to read what the machine has produced and
based on that build the feedback procedures on instructional processes. This is a loop
with three stages: instruction based on datasets designed to build a learning field,
automated generation based on generative and discriminative networks, and evalua-
tion procedures that enable the initial instructions to be reconsidered. The architect
as teacher and critic captures opportunities on the fly in an environment of accel-
erated automated production, where the machine produces and learns. Production,
originality, and creativity are funneled in processes of learning and deviation from
architectural primitives which were generated by learning from creative networks
and their interaction with discriminative networks.
The dynamic established in this creative process also has an effect on the architect.
In order to instruct the networks and effectively critique what it generates, everything
has to be done systematically. The categories, procedures, techniques, and languages
developed since the implementation of cybernetics come to the aid of the expanded
author, giving them a conceptual framework in which they are able to communicate
with autonomous processes in a casual, cultural way without surrendering to the
optimizing system. The computer is not an instrument but instead becomes a digital
muse.

References

1. Parts of this argument are introduced in the book by Lluís Ortega, El diseñador total: autoría en la
época posdigital, Puente editores, Barcelona, 2017 (English version: Total designer: authorship
in architecture in the postdigital age, Actar publishers, Barcelona, 2017)
2. Pask G (1969) The architectural relevance of cybernetics. Architectural Design, vol 7, no 6, pp
494–496, New York, (Spanish version: “La significación arquitectónica de la cibernètica”, In:
Ortega, Lluís (ed) La digitalización toma el mando, Editorial Gustavo Gili, Barcelona
3. See Carpo M (2011) The alphabet and the algorithm. The MIT Press, Cambridge (Mass)/London
4. Sennett R (2009) The craftsman, Yale University Press, New Haven/London (2009) Spanish
version: El artesano. Anagrama, Barcelona
5. Wigley M (1998) Whatever happened to total design? Harvard Des Magazine 5:5, Cambridge,
Massachusetts
6. Mari E, Morassuti B (1963) Arte programmata e prefabbricazzione. Domus 428:13–15
7. Ibid
8. Salocchi C (1972) Eurodomus 4. Domus 512:134–135
9. Created in 2014 by Goodfellow I, Pouget-Abadie J, Mirza M, Xu B, Warde-Farley D, Ozair S,
Courville A, Bengio Y (2014)