Developing a Design Space for Supporting Interdependence Through Technology

: Exploring Community Inclusivity for Those Living with Dementia

Abstract

The human brain is a complex organ, thus unsurprisingly a neurodegenerative disease like dementia has no medical cure. However, when facing "wicked problems" that is when design and creativity flourish. This thesis takes a design approach to explore the complex social concept of interdependence and how it can shape technologies to support people living with dementia -- specifically looking at supporting social interactions in community spaces. To situate our design work we aimed to identify the structures around social programs for people living with dementia that occurred in community settings. To understand interdependence in the context of social programs we needed to expand the existing interdependence framework to incorporate contextual or organizational interdependencies. We then conducted a long-term community-based participatory design study with members of the dementia community in Bristol, UK. This process allowed us to identify the value of this methodology in discovering opportunities for designing in positive interdependencies. Furthermore, this research helped us to inform and filter the design space around developing technologies which could help support positive interdependencies. Through our filtered design space we provide a set of design requirements which we used to develop and test a prototype with members of the dementia community. This test was able to demonstrate the efficacy of our design space by facilitating participants to interdependently move around a community space. Finally, this thesis aims to highlight the current limitations of our understanding of interdependency as a concept and the further research needed.

Date of Award	18 Jun 2024
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of Bristol
Supervisor	Paul Marshall (Supervisor) & Oussama Metatla (Supervisor)