... ...

Letting people express their feelings better in an international context` Design & Research Report by Bob Smit, 1528882 Coaches Sanne Kistemaker & Ingrid Mulder Project Exploring Interactions, TU Delft October 2012 Letting people express their feelings better in an international context` Design & Research Report by Bob Smit, 1528882 Coaches Sanne Kistemaker & Ingrid Mulder Project Exploring Interactions, TU Delft October 2012

D&R Goal
Making it easier for people with di erent languages and culture to communicate with each other Letting people express their feelings better in an international context

D&R Exploration

Questionnaire
Fundamentals

Global Language

Initial Questions

Observations

Emotions

Underlying Notions

Interviews

Literature

New Questions
Context Mapping

Current Interaction

:D

Hello?

Interaction View
Harmonious & Flourishing
A ballet lift

Intuitive Snap

Concept Direction & Initial Design Ideas

Learning language better / faster Let people help each other Use language di culties as an advantage Boost communication with other tools Surprise, make each other more interested

Design & Research Goal

Letting people express their feelings better in an international context
My design & research goal was transformed from a broad one making it easier to communicate to a more speci c one that mostly focuses on peoples feelings. Within this also interests, opinions, values and styles can be taken into account, because I think there are some touch points between these di erent aspects. I wanted to focus on understanding and communicating feelings instead of the actual content, because I believe its harder to achieve this and there are opportunities to design for. I want to focus on both period stayers (people who stay in Holland for half till two years, e.g. exchange students) and also long stayers (who stay 3 till years, e.g. expats, postdocs, immigrants) because both these groups (a part of the period stayers) have the same problem, which is getting into the Dutch culture with the help of language and to see truly what everything is all about. These people usually are interested in not only persons but his/her culture and country, but they also like to communicate like they would in their native language where they can express their feelings and experiences best. Therefore, I also need to research about when and how certain feelings may want to be shared and how external factors in uence that. So, next to knowing how the actual communication works I need to know the internal and external factors that can play a role in communicating feelings. I started o with research questions for my former design goal though (which set me on course). Below that you can nd my new research questions.

Design & Research Activities

To answer my questions I used three methods. First I did some pilot interviews to get a better grip on the subject and to come up with more questions. Then I used my new questions for in my explorative questionnaire in which I could get a better overview where to focus on. I also did an observation study in which I got additional ndings to shine a light from a di erent perspective. And all the time throughout, I did more interviews with di erent people and groups to come to a clearer and more corresponding result.

Initial main research questions

How are people communicating? What kind of di culties do you experience relating to communicating? What kind of way of communicating would you like?
Interviews

Questionnaire

Observations

Interviews

New main research questions

When do people want to share feelings? How do they like to share feelings? When are people interested in / aware for feelings? What is the e ect of showing di erent feelings on others? How do internal factors (education, lifestyle, attitude, character) and external factors (culture, environment, circumstances and specialties) in uence these questions?

Design & Research Activities Design & Research Activities

Interviews
I did nine interviews with di erent amounts of people, in di erent settings and di erent time durations. This was mostly out of time issues (for me and participants), but also proved to be interesting to see which settings worked better (for now) to get more insightful answers (although I think that mostly is in uenced by the person you interview and approaching them). The one-on-one interviews and the ones that I could do in private areas proved to be the most fruitful in getting insights, because people could talk freely and open and also had time to answer all my di cult questions. I also mostly based my plans and reformed my design directions by these. The 2-on-1 interviews (interviewing 2 people) and the ones in public spaces (with other people), were nice to get interesting stories and smart solutions (maybe because if you are with two people, someone always has something to say and can encourage the other one). I still use some of the stories I heard to enforce my design directions. The group interview in the end yielded the least results. Maybe because I already had a lot of information and I mostly got con rms of my ndings. Also, group interviews are a lot more di cult to handle since a lot of people are there and want to say something. Then the topic can easily go o -topic (which can also be interesting), so a lot of control is needed if you dont have a lot time. But, of course there are more people and that means more experiences shared by many and a lot of strong stories. In this interview, my strategy was to just let people talk and only steer when the topic takes o too far which resulted in enthusiastically speaking people sharing with each other.

Observations
I used observations to get a better insight into a direction I wanted to pursue: talking. I wanted to know what the advantages and disadvantages were and where this communication way could be used best (for designers, at that time my target group), because it is so inherent with language (I still think its an interesting direction). To do this, I made two design tests (at the Interaction Prototype workshop) in which 5 participants would get a design brief and had 15 minutes to come up with a reasonable (theoretically working) concept. In the rst test the participants were not allowed to talk though and they had to nd a way to share ideas, set boundaries, show their opinion and make decisions with each other in other ways. I provided large sheets of paper, pencils, markers, pens, post-its, a laptop with internet, magazines and a green-card (a kind of interpreter card, which they could use to whisper something to me and I could whisper it to someone else). It was really interesting and fun to see what creative ways designers came up with (e.g. adding a +1 like post-it to vote for a certain concept). They looked into the magazines, but didnt use the green card and laptop though because they were too busy with the post-its which already worked for their designerly skills (they liked to draw a lot). The second test was the other way around, so here participants could talk freely, but were not allowed to use any other way of communicating (so no drawing or any kind of visualization). What I didnt take into account however, was that they still could use body language which also is a large part of the communication. I wanted to do this test again (as suggested by a team member) with 5 people but now with everyone back to each other so no one could see each other. I still can do it within the feelings subject.

Explorative Questionnaire This explorative questionnaire was done to orientate more on the subject of language and culture and in which areas people nd problems with that. 24 people made the test of which 19 were students. Nationalities varied from Dutch, Chinese, Persian and Greek of which the Dutch were the largest representing group. The questionnaire was done online via Facebook and was in English (see Shareworks). In the questionnaire, I often asked the participants to mark the situations which they recognized themselves in and could relate to the option. Where I could, I left place to ll in their own answer by giving the option other. The other answers where people werent obliged to answer the other box, interesting answers came out. If you force people to think however, you will get half nice answers. Not only the answers where they could type their own option in other were insightful, a lot of bar charts made me see where the problems in communicating truly are which I was quite happy with. Although its maybe obvious, I could now for example prove that people have more problems with talking instead of understanding, reading and writing.

Results
Below are combined all results from the di erent research methods into clusters.

Results
Language
Speaking is the most di cult part of communicating. People talk more o ine with natives than with foreigners. Talking facilitates higher level discussions. With talking, everyone in the conversation focuses more on one thing. When youre not using speech, it is hard to set a basic understanding to build further upon. You need a kind of playground (with rules and boundaries) to easily get on the same page as other. When not using speech, overall opinions and likes could be showed more objectively and fair.

People
If you dont know the language that well youre mostly struggling with the content and the underlying implications that come with it. If you do know the language (but only your dialect/accent) a bit, its still hard to understand content (because of di erent pronunciations, tonalities). Also, its hard to use nuances (sometimes you dont want to say something really sucks or is truly delicious). If you know the language better, its often still hard to express your experiences and feelings you have, because often they are culturally bound. Also you still may not know when / if its appropriate to express yourself. People form language groups when they have trouble talking in another language. Also when there is an overrepresentation of a nationality it will be bound to take on its language. People have a lot of patience when explaining something important, but not with trivial issues. People are careful when approaching someone. They can appreciate others and are more interested when they understand others better. People are more happy when they get the others message if its not through talking / if its challenging. Easy games could become more interesting. More people have trouble making themselves understandable instead of understanding others. Its hard to integrate and they want to feel included. People are more open when they do not talk /communicate in other ways.

Situation
If you dont know the language that well its hard to cope on the following points: o Making contact with others (also in uenced by manners), making friends, and so you learn the language less. o Environment and products. You may sometimes not know where to go or what that can with green pickles is in the supermarket. There are some issues that also make it hard to talk with others (but could also become a help): o Language tools. Foreign language speakers use other commu nication tools (e.g. only Whatsapp) o Interests / Topics. If you are not familiar with the topic, language is really hard to keep up with (talking about soccer or TV programs) o Culture. E.g. Dutch people like to go home on Friday afternoon, because its weekend, so building relationships outside of school and work can be done but needs some help. o Environment. When youre in loud places like parties and pubs, it will even be more di cult to understand each other and sometimes you just want to make fun and dont have to make e orts. (Only for long stayers: Dutch people are pretty thoughtful and quickly talk English if they hear someone struggle. However, its di cult to practice Dutch if youre foreign and want to learn it.)

Results
Consequences
A lot of people who cannot express themselves or understand others may feel: o Secluded o Incapable o Frustrated o Like they cant have fun o Flustered o Dependent o Not involved o Like you dont belong here Peoples minds and thinking can slow down due to translation processes Making friends is harder and now depends more on someones character and good-will. You actually depend a lot on the good will of others (its nice if they help you, but its not guaranteed).

Conclusion
Having a common language is great, if everyone speaks it well and can express their selves how they want. At the moment we use English, but maybe thats not enough to really share our deeper experiences and feeling or sometimes even understand our actions. Gestures help conveying a message but have a limit to really get to know someone else (unless you use sign language). Common interests like shared experiences, likes, opinions, styles, feelings are perceived but also told. To unfold this tacit knowledge, we need to nd a way people can express themselves easily and make the e ort worthwhile. Of course a lot of aspects need to be taken into account, such as peoples wants, their privacy (what people want to share), rules of engagement (culturally acceptable), interpretation (culture/religion/education/social), the amount of people communicating, the bene ts of talking and other means and the di erence between o ine and online communication.

Solutions
Being more social and talk English more Do activities with other language users: o Sports o Classes (cooking, dance) o Games o Parties o Pubs

English is an option, but its still hard to express deeper feelings. It should free so that quick chit-chats are made possible. People want to know the rules of engagement so they can engage in a good way while respecting others. It should be worthwhile because explaining takes e ort. It should be easy and fun so people like to use it and can use it how they want and how far they want. Keep it online and o ine, since some ways of communications t better in certain situations. Let everyone feel included.

People like to have feedback if their message was received and if its correct (to improve their language).

Needed
Respect to others Knowledge about manners (body language) Getting on the same conversation level Making people con dent Ice breaker Stimulating people (patience, charitable, word knowledge)