Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Interviews
Hisao-Yun Chu
She is an experienced product design professor. I took her Product Design 2 class last semester. She provided me great feedbacks on my design from ideations to final product.
Professor Chu gave me great amount comments on my problem. She suggested looking into the problem in a great depth. She asked if the real problem is that people need a sink divider; or is the problem that it is too difficult to wash the dishes; or is the problem that people are lazy; or is the problem that people have too many dishes? She guided me to think of what the real problem and gave me another perspective of how I can think about the problem. Maybe it was not the problem the sink needed to be divided. Maybe it was just washing dishes was not a fun thing to do.
I agree with her that a sink divider will not solve the real problem but it will make the one who wants to wash their dishes easier to find their dishes in the sink. Given the time constraint, I also told her I have only one week to design and develop the product I was designing. She agreed with me a sink divider would decrease the problem when sharing a sink.
There will be aslo more advise she gave me in the chapter 3 as I develop my purposed solution to this research problem.
Haruki Eda
He works as a Resident assistant in the San Francisco State University dorm. By talking to him, I learned some information about students who share the dorm.
It's very common for students or young adults to share a house or an apartment, so sharing the kitchen must be common. There were many complaints about kitchen sharing, and they tend to be about cleaning the kitchen and doing the dishes, rather than 2 people having to cook at the same time. Kitchen issues were common in the dorm because the kitchen (and the bathroom) is most likely to get dirty most quickly. Some people are okay with the mess, but others aren't which led to arguments or upset between roommates.
In the dorm, they will fill out an "Apartment living agreement" in the first few weeks on the school year, so that the residents have clear understandings of expectations of each other. They are required to discuss and decide who's going to clean where, when and how often, in addition to discussing what "clean" and "messy/dirty" means in their apartment. And if this doesn't prevent the conflict during the semester, resident assistant would come to their room and have a mediation to help the residents negotiate their needs and compromises.
Too often, they have problems because they don't know how to communicate with their roommates; some are scared or awkward to tell the person to clean because it might offend them; some college students are young and have little communication skills necessary to share a living space, compared to older people.
His interview was extremely important to me for the reason that many of my assumptions were true according to him. It is a space issue as well as a respect and communication issue. In addition, when living with roommates, there has to be some kind of rules or agreement to reduce troubles (Hasell, Peatross & Bono, 1993).
Nai-Wei Hsiung
Nai-Wei is a experienced space designer who worked for almost 10 years in an international design firm.
He agreed with me some kind of dividing system would be helpful when people share a space. It would make space more clearly to people and it will reinforce people to use the space that belongs to them. The sink space is not divided so people have trouble to separate their items in the sink and also the sink is a very small space. By diving the space, people will be forced to use the part they were assigned to.
Adam Wu
He just graduated from UCSF with his doctor degree in Dental area. As a college student with a 10-year experience of sharing with roommates, he had a lot to give.
He told me it is important to communicate with roommates for any kind of problem. If you don’t say what you want or what you think is clean in the kitchen, people might assume that you don’t have a problem if they don’t wash their dishes or clean the kitchen. Therefore, a mutual agreement is very important when sharing. In addition, people should respect each other’s space, so it is essential to make sure each one in the houses knows which part belongs to them and which parts are ok to share.
In addition, he advised that if I design a divider for the sink, it was important to keep in mind that the divider should be adjustable to suit the needs of different numbers of roommates who share the same apartment. For instance, it should work for apartments with two roommates and also works for apartments with 3 or 4 roommates.
Personal Interviews
I interviewed many of my coworkers about how they think about the problem since most of them sharing houses or apartments with roommates. In addition, they also gave me comments on my solution. By talking to real people who might be the future audience for my product, it ensured me about what I was researching is important and they provide the most honest feedback. Sometimes as a designer, we might neglect how the audiences thought and just focused on what we wanted (Butler, 2010). Talking to them helped me stay focused on the problem and when I was solving the problem, it was not solving my problem. Instead of that, it was my target audience problem. In addition, they told me a lot about what they wants for the final solution and suggested me what might be useful to them. I was glad most of them saying that a divider for the sink will be helpful to them.
David Yung
David is an engineer who works in San Jose. He has great knowledge about software development.
After I told him about my research project, he suggested maybe a rewards program would help solve the problem. Even though he knows I have limited time for this research project, he still suggested me some future development on how to solve the key problem. David suggested with a reward program, by weighting how many dishes have been washed, students would be rewarded with financial benefit or household convenience with pre-consented guidelines by housemates. Since most college students are not rich, they might fall in love with the idea that they can actually get paid by washing their own dishes. However, this would be something for the future development. “A good designer will always design with a future in mind” (Conran & Fraser 2004)
She is an experienced product design professor. I took her Product Design 2 class last semester. She provided me great feedbacks on my design from ideations to final product.
Professor Chu gave me great amount comments on my problem. She suggested looking into the problem in a great depth. She asked if the real problem is that people need a sink divider; or is the problem that it is too difficult to wash the dishes; or is the problem that people are lazy; or is the problem that people have too many dishes? She guided me to think of what the real problem and gave me another perspective of how I can think about the problem. Maybe it was not the problem the sink needed to be divided. Maybe it was just washing dishes was not a fun thing to do.
I agree with her that a sink divider will not solve the real problem but it will make the one who wants to wash their dishes easier to find their dishes in the sink. Given the time constraint, I also told her I have only one week to design and develop the product I was designing. She agreed with me a sink divider would decrease the problem when sharing a sink.
There will be aslo more advise she gave me in the chapter 3 as I develop my purposed solution to this research problem.
Haruki Eda
He works as a Resident assistant in the San Francisco State University dorm. By talking to him, I learned some information about students who share the dorm.
It's very common for students or young adults to share a house or an apartment, so sharing the kitchen must be common. There were many complaints about kitchen sharing, and they tend to be about cleaning the kitchen and doing the dishes, rather than 2 people having to cook at the same time. Kitchen issues were common in the dorm because the kitchen (and the bathroom) is most likely to get dirty most quickly. Some people are okay with the mess, but others aren't which led to arguments or upset between roommates.
In the dorm, they will fill out an "Apartment living agreement" in the first few weeks on the school year, so that the residents have clear understandings of expectations of each other. They are required to discuss and decide who's going to clean where, when and how often, in addition to discussing what "clean" and "messy/dirty" means in their apartment. And if this doesn't prevent the conflict during the semester, resident assistant would come to their room and have a mediation to help the residents negotiate their needs and compromises.
Too often, they have problems because they don't know how to communicate with their roommates; some are scared or awkward to tell the person to clean because it might offend them; some college students are young and have little communication skills necessary to share a living space, compared to older people.
His interview was extremely important to me for the reason that many of my assumptions were true according to him. It is a space issue as well as a respect and communication issue. In addition, when living with roommates, there has to be some kind of rules or agreement to reduce troubles (Hasell, Peatross & Bono, 1993).
Nai-Wei Hsiung
Nai-Wei is a experienced space designer who worked for almost 10 years in an international design firm.
He agreed with me some kind of dividing system would be helpful when people share a space. It would make space more clearly to people and it will reinforce people to use the space that belongs to them. The sink space is not divided so people have trouble to separate their items in the sink and also the sink is a very small space. By diving the space, people will be forced to use the part they were assigned to.
Adam Wu
He just graduated from UCSF with his doctor degree in Dental area. As a college student with a 10-year experience of sharing with roommates, he had a lot to give.
He told me it is important to communicate with roommates for any kind of problem. If you don’t say what you want or what you think is clean in the kitchen, people might assume that you don’t have a problem if they don’t wash their dishes or clean the kitchen. Therefore, a mutual agreement is very important when sharing. In addition, people should respect each other’s space, so it is essential to make sure each one in the houses knows which part belongs to them and which parts are ok to share.
In addition, he advised that if I design a divider for the sink, it was important to keep in mind that the divider should be adjustable to suit the needs of different numbers of roommates who share the same apartment. For instance, it should work for apartments with two roommates and also works for apartments with 3 or 4 roommates.
Personal Interviews
I interviewed many of my coworkers about how they think about the problem since most of them sharing houses or apartments with roommates. In addition, they also gave me comments on my solution. By talking to real people who might be the future audience for my product, it ensured me about what I was researching is important and they provide the most honest feedback. Sometimes as a designer, we might neglect how the audiences thought and just focused on what we wanted (Butler, 2010). Talking to them helped me stay focused on the problem and when I was solving the problem, it was not solving my problem. Instead of that, it was my target audience problem. In addition, they told me a lot about what they wants for the final solution and suggested me what might be useful to them. I was glad most of them saying that a divider for the sink will be helpful to them.
David Yung
David is an engineer who works in San Jose. He has great knowledge about software development.
After I told him about my research project, he suggested maybe a rewards program would help solve the problem. Even though he knows I have limited time for this research project, he still suggested me some future development on how to solve the key problem. David suggested with a reward program, by weighting how many dishes have been washed, students would be rewarded with financial benefit or household convenience with pre-consented guidelines by housemates. Since most college students are not rich, they might fall in love with the idea that they can actually get paid by washing their own dishes. However, this would be something for the future development. “A good designer will always design with a future in mind” (Conran & Fraser 2004)
Thursday, July 29, 2010
New more FOCUSED Problem Statements
Problem: College students who share an apartment in Park Merced find it difficult to share the sink space in the kitchen with their roommates.
Purpose: The Purpose of this study was to develop a system for students sharing a kitchen to separate their items in the sink.
Purpose: The Purpose of this study was to develop a system for students sharing a kitchen to separate their items in the sink.
My survey sample
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/CC8TBCF
1. Do you share an apartment/house?
Yes No
2. How many roommates do you have?
1 2 3 4 more
3. Do you find it is difficult to share the kitchen space?
Yes No
4. Do you share dishes with your roommates?
Yes No
5. Which part of the kitchen space do you find most difficult to share?
fridge stove sink dish rack counter space cabinets other
6. Why do you think it is difficult to share the one you choose in question 4? Don't need to be too long. Thanks
1. Do you share an apartment/house?
Yes No
2. How many roommates do you have?
1 2 3 4 more
3. Do you find it is difficult to share the kitchen space?
Yes No
4. Do you share dishes with your roommates?
Yes No
5. Which part of the kitchen space do you find most difficult to share?
fridge stove sink dish rack counter space cabinets other
6. Why do you think it is difficult to share the one you choose in question 4? Don't need to be too long. Thanks
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Panel of experts
Hsiao-Yun Chu
Professor in product design in SFSU.
Naiwei Huang
Senior landscape designer.
Adam Wu
UCSF Doctor. 10 year experience of sharing apartment/houses.
Haruki Eda
SFSU student, major in sociology. Working as a residential assistant in SFSU dorm for 2 years and a half.
Professor in product design in SFSU.
Naiwei Huang
Senior landscape designer.
Adam Wu
UCSF Doctor. 10 year experience of sharing apartment/houses.
Haruki Eda
SFSU student, major in sociology. Working as a residential assistant in SFSU dorm for 2 years and a half.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
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