People Centred Design and Capability Theme

People Centred Design and Capability Building Theme

The purpose of this research cluster is to:

• build on and develop methodologies that help to understand and capture people’s requirements for information services and products
• explore how this knowledge can be used to develop people-centred information and knowledge based solutions;
• develop methodologies that will help to understand the knowledge, skills and attitudes that people need to be able to exploit the information and knowledge around them and how to foster these capabilities
• share knowledge and work collaboratively with other in related fields, as well as, encouraging PhD students who want to explore these areas.

People Centred Design

Terms, such as, user-centred design and inclusive design have been used to imply people-centred design. We are only concerned with information services and products. These may be face to face, paper based or electronic. The purpose of these services or products is to enable people to become informed.
We are particularly interested in the methodologies and techniques that can be used to help understand information needs and people’s requirements. Of special interest are:

• Participative design and iterative design
• Participative Action Research
• Participative research and learning
• Qualitative approaches such as ethnographic, phenomenographical and grounded theory.
• Techniques, such as, the ‘micro-time line’ (sense-making) interviews that help elicit information needs.
• Quantitative approaches, such as questionnaires or usage surveys e.g. log analysis and eye tracking.

Previous projects have included studying the information needs of: informal carers; people with Multiple Sclerosis; hospital social workers. These projects have led to better information provision to these communities. A current PhD student is researching participative design in relation to the development of public library services. A previous PHD student investigated ways to deliver personalised information based on dynamic profiles.

Capability building

Understanding people’s information behaviour, how they use information; their information needs etc. as indicated above leads to an awareness of the knowledge, skills and attitudes required by people to access and use information. Much emphasis has been placed in the past on technological solutions to information problems and little thought has been given to people’s capabilities. A lack of capability can mean that people are unable to use information effectively even when information tools are available.
We are therefore interested in exploring:

•  methods that help to understand the knowledge , skills and attitudes that underpin effective knowledge, data and information management
• ways to foster and inculcate knowledge, data and information management attitudes and skills, drawing on learning theories and change management.

Projects have included: developing blended approaches to enhance information literacy of tertiary students; developing a methodology to transfer information literacy training capabilities in Tanzanian tertiary education; understanding information literacy in the workplace; modelling information service provision for distance learners in Saudi Arabia. Fundamental research has included an investigation of ‘young people’s perception of information’.  A current project, involving Leicestershire County Council is investigating the knowledge, data and information capabilities that are needed and how to develop a knowledge and information management culture in the organisation.