Can Design Rationale Help? An Exploration of Service Designers’ Information Behaviour and Design Support Tools Lin, Yu-Tzu Publication date: 2020 Document version Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Document license: CC BY-NC-ND Citation for published version (APA): Lin, Y-T. (2020). Can Design Rationale Help? An Exploration of Service Designers’ Information Behaviour and Design Support Tools. Det Humanistiske Fakultet, Københavns Universitet. Download date: 03. okt.. 2021 UNIVERSITY OF COPENH AGEN DEPARTMENT OF COMMUN ICATION PhD Thesis Yu-Tzu Lin Can Design Rationale Help? An Exploration of Service Designers’ Information Behaviour and Design Support Tools Supervisor: Morten Hertzum Submitted on: 3 August 2020 Name of department: Department of Communication Author(s): Yu-Tzu Lin Title and subtitle: Can Design Rationale Help? An Exploration of Service Designers’ Information Behaviour and Design Support Tools Cover picture: Healthcare service scenario created by Ko-Pu Lin. Photo taken by Yu- Tzu Lin. Supervisor: Morten Hertzum Submitted on: 3 August 2020 Number of characters: 55,280 words in the introductory text and 28,489 words in Appendix. Abstract With user experience being front and centre of service design, designers within this field need to adapt a holistic design approach to ensure successful use and implementation. Service designers need to align their design concept with the needs of stakeholders and users when considering service strategy, system, process, and touch-points. Within research literature design rationales have so far been discussed as beneficial for designers, but empirical studies show that they are not explicitly stated when designers account for their designs. Although researchers have developed several design rationale systems, most design rationale research does not sufficiently emphasise practitioners’ needs. This study builds on and adds to previous studies that suggest for an integrated design rationale to produce several benefits for service designers in managing complicated design processes. For example, service designers can gain a clearer overview of stakeholder needs, easily evaluate design alternatives, and reuse design rationale across projects. This article-based PhD dissertation explores how mapping the information behaviour of service designers and the current digital service design support tools developed in the field of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) might assist service design in theory and in practice. This exploration answers two overarching research questions: 1. How does service designers’ information behaviour currently constrain the intended benefits of their design rationale? 2. How can service design support tools provide the intended benefits of design rationale for service designers concerning their information behaviour? This exploration applies a multimethod approach and combines findings from semi-structured interviews and field observations with a systematic review of digital service design support tools. The first question is answered through a set of investigations of service designers’ use of information sources and channels, their decision-making process and their use and creation of documentation. By combining the research results of service designers’ information behaviour from three different angles, this study identifies how some of the intended benefits of design rationale are constrained. The second question is answered through a systematic review of research literature concerning the features and evaluation outcomes of digital service design support tools. By combining insights about service designers’ information behaviour with the digital support tools available, the study aims to discuss the intended benefits of design rationale in an attempt to create tools more aligned with current information needs and practices. Service designers’ information behaviour constrains the benefits of design rationale in design documentation, reflection, evaluation and reuse for three reasons. First, service designers focus on documenting and designing for here and now. The processes of documenting and collaborative sensemaking are important for service designers. Documenting is a means for designers to reflect upon their designs, arrive at a coherent understanding of available information, and make the understanding salient to them. Collaborative sensemaking focuses on designing for here and now in a way that designers need to understand their team members’ concerns as well as the state and the goal of the teams in order to design collaboratively. The focus of designing for here and now results in that the created design documents might not be the most optimal and reusable. Second, service designers tend to apply mental models such as personal experience and common sense theories instead of seeking information for making design decisions. Third, service designers seldom compare multiple design alternatives at a time. Based on the three reasons, it is questionable whether service designers will look for additional design rationale in order to reflect upon their designs, make design decisions and evaluate multiple design alternatives. This study suggests three directions for designing service design support tools that cater to some of the currently unmet information needs. First, design support tools can help novice designers to experience different design features as solutions to certain design problems. In doing so, designers can expand their experience base and apply it for future design decision-making. Second, as collaborative sensemaking plays an important role in the process of service design, taking into account the concerns of other team members will allow service designers to provide design solutions more in tune with the information needs and practices of the users and the teams. Third, providing tools that stimulate explorative approaches to service design allow designers to yield more comprehensive design rationale. Ultimately, the study suggests that supporting immersion into design activities and collaborative sensemaking will consequentially support the use of design rationale by increasing the quality of the design rationale designers possess. Resumé Denne artikelbaserede afhandling kombinerer centrale aspekter fra informationsadfærds og Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) som grundlag for en mere holistisk tilgang til designbegrundelse. Gennem en afdækning, evaluering og diskussion af de underliggende rationaler bag eksisterende design praksis, vil afhandlingen afslutningsvis introducere tre indsatsområder på service design området. Servicedesignere er nødt til at tilpasse deres designkoncept, så det i højere grad imødekommer deres brugere og interessenters behov i udviklingen af servicestrategi, -system, -proces og - interaktion. Inden for forskningslitteratur er rationaler anerkendt som fordelagtige, men empiriske studier viser, at disse underliggende rationaler ikke ekspliciteres, når designere bliver bedt om at redegøre for deres designproces. Ydermere vil det blive understreget, hvorledes forskningslitteraturens primært teoretiske tilgang til design-rationaler ikke tilstrækkeligt anerkender den praktiske kontekst i hvilken de indgår. Gennem interviews og undersøgelser med designere omkring deres informationsadfærd vil afhandlingen bidrager til den eksisterende forskningslitteratur i sin diskussion af, hvorledes en integreret designbegrundelse giver flere fordele for servicedesignere i styring af komplicerede designprocesser. For eksempel kan servicedesignere få et klarere overblik over interessenternes behov, let evaluere designalternativer og genbruge designrationalitet på tværs af projekter. Denne artikelbaserede ph.d.-afhandling undersøger således, hvordan kortlægning af informationsadfærd af servicedesignere og de nuværende hjælpeværktøjer til digital service design udviklet inden for HCI kan hjælpe service design i teori og i praksis. Afhandlingen besvarer således to overordnede forskningsspørgsmål: 1. Hvordan begrænser servicedesigneres aktuelle informationsadfærd tilsigtede fordele ved deres designtilgang? 2. Hvordan kan hjælpeværktøjer til service-design give de tilsigtede fordele ved designtilgang for servicedesignere vedrørende deres informationsadfærd? Afhandlingen anvender en multimetodisk tilgang og kombinerer pointer fra semistrukturerede interviews med feltobservation og en systematisk gennemgang af digitale hjælpeværktøjer. Det første spørgsmål angribes gennem et sæt undersøgelser af tjenestedesigneres brug af informationskilder og kanaler, deres beslutningsproces samt deres brug og oprettelse af dokumentation. Således diskuteres informationsadfærd fra forskellige vinkler, der tilsammen understreger, hvorledes et uovervejet designrationale hæmmer dets anvendelse i praksis. Det andet spørgsmål besvares gennem en systematisk gennemgang af videnskabelig litteratur ang. funktionerne og evalueringsresultaterne af digitale hjælpeværktøjer. På baggrund af indblikket i servicedesigneres informationsadfærd og de tilgængelige digitale supportværktøjer, bidrager afhandlingen til en gennemgang og diskussion af de tilsigtede fordele ved forskellige designrationaler i et forsøg på at skabe værktøjer, der i højere grad er tilpasset servicedesigneres aktuelle informationsbehov og -praksis. Disse designeres informationsadfærd begrænser rationalernes fordele inden for design- dokumentation, -refleksion, -evaluering og -genanvendelse af tre grunde. For det første fokuserer servicedesignere på at dokumentere og designe til her og nu.