Software tools to be used by employees of large organizations rarely satisfy the end-user. They might be complex, difficult to use, not feasible in the actual work context or even worse adding to the workload of the users. This is however not that surprising, since designing for such complex organizational contexts can be challenging. Typically, such projects involve a large number of stakeholders and a diverse group of users, all with their own roles, backgrounds, wishes, needs and preferences. For large enterprises is is a challenge to create internal tools that fulfill their supporting role for the employees and at the same time take away few as possible resources from the core business. This paper reports on a research under the umbrella of the larger areas of CSCW and HCI. The project aimed at getting more insights into using a user-centered approach to the design and development of internal-tools within a large multinational corporation. Field observations from within the department were combined with design explorations in which new tools were prototyped. A model for thinking about the work setting is presented and recommendations for interaction designers aiming at applying a user-centered approach to design of internal tools are given.

Forskning och utveckling har hittills mestadels fokuserats på den rent tekniska utvecklingen av ’speech recognition’ för användningen av produkter med ’Voice user interface’ (VUI). Men det krävs mer för att skapa en bra upplevelse och frekvent användande av VUI. Detta examensarbete undersöker hur upplevelsen och värdet av VUI kan förbättrats för användaren.Genom intervjuer, observationer och frågeformulär riktade mot användare av VUI-produkter innehållande Google Assistant, Alexa eller Siri, identifierades de två största problemområdena – att VUI inte anpassar volymen på sina svar efter omgivningens ljudnivå, samt bristen på kunskap om vad VUI kan användas till i de olika produkterna.Resultatet från användartester av prototyperna visar att en nuvarande teknisk begränsning som volymanpassning kan genom vidareutveckling av tekniken öka användarvänligheten avsevärt. Testerna visar även att användarupplevelsen ökar om användaren blir medveten om vad som faktiskt kan göras med VUI, vilket leder till ytterligare förenklingar i vardagen.

The present study explores the use of interactions for a communicative purpose, when it comes to communicate banking brand values through a website. By establishing important banking values, trust, sincerity and transparency this study investigates how interaction can be used to communicate those values, through the theory of interaction attributes. Using interaction attributes to communicate emotions as well as brand values has been previously investigated. However, not in the setting of banking. Through designing and exploring interactions this study established some important qualities to consider when designing for banking, with the goal of communicating trust, sincerity and transparency. Attributes consistency, expectedness and apparent are favourable, whilst pliability is found to have a negative effect. In addition to these attributes established by previous work, the findings suggest the importance of a new quality, to design interactions that animate slowly over time, as a way to guide the user through the interaction.

This project investigates how interaction design can support handcrafting and foster well-being. The design process has been user-centered, focusing on people who handcraft during their leisure. Along the process, the focus was narrowed down to the practices of artistic handcrafting such as painting and sketching. The design project resulted in a concept with an associated digital prototype that supports users to handcraft personal artistic work by inspiring them to realize one's ideas or visions. The final concept supports a free and exploratory handcrafting process, proven by the design process to be important for people engaged in artistic handcrafting. This thesis further discusses the design process, the reasoning behind the prototype role, and its features. The outcome contributes knowledge to the field of Interaction Design regarding essential aspects of design that support the practice of handcrafting and fosters well-being.

This thesis focuses on the aesthetics of shared memories, specifically on how additional insights and infor-mation might trigger and alter our perception of a shared incident and experience. Delving deeper into the aesthetics of human recollections might help us gain a better understan-ding and appreciation for ourselves as well as for one another.Even though memory itself is somet-hing individual, most of it is shared (or at the very least linked) with others and is therefore dependent on exter-nal influences and how we interpret them. Our recollection fully relies on what we consciously and unconsci-ously choose to pay attention and at-tach value to. Even if we have shared the same moment, our memories may differ in terms of the facts we recall and how we interpret that information. To explore this topic further, I decided to focus on the aesthetics and mea-ning of shared memories and their ability to alter our perceptions. It was critical for me to maintain a poetic and experimental approach throug-hout the process to grasp the subject on a more abstract level and not lose sight of the aesthetics of memories and their interplay.My project is envisioned as an immer-sive experience that emphasises and includes embodied interaction in or-der to create an environment condu-cive to exploratory engagement and conversation by discussing shared memories. Through this approach, I intend to encourage the users to en-gage in more self-reflection and the-refore build stronger bonds between one another. At this point I would like to emphasise that, for the time being, the context is purely centred on recol-lecting and establishing an intimate moment between the users. Following the completion of my thesis, I intend to reflect on this project in order to determine how it might be expanded to further operate on a societal level in the future.

A new generation of feminist activists such as Amanda Gorman, educators like Lesley-Ann Noel and design researchers like Ece Canli are continuing to struggle facing resistance to change, due to patriarchal power dynamics and white supremacist attitudes. In the past years I have developed an understanding for feminist perspectives in design and am now wondering how to take this understanding with me into the professional design industry and design research, and how I can connect to people who are already there doing similar work. My entry point into this project is from a queer feminist point of view, for others it might be from a sustainability perspective. And even though we all come from different angles, we still all deal with questions of how discrimination in design can be dissolved. This project searches ways where to position oneself in the system as feminist designers, and where within design we can have an impact and how to expand this impact from an individual level to a systemic level. This project offers an exploration of how we can bring norm-critical conversations and anti-oppressive approaches to practise in the design industry. Through a decolonial queer feminist lens (Canli, 2017 and Vergès 2022) it is investigating issues of design‘s entanglement with systemic inequalities and values that are rooted in dominant cultural/societal perspectives and systems. All these oppressive systems are interconnected and intersectional (Crenshaw). They have in common that they privilege one group and make life harder for another group, based on specific characteristics. And then connect this to your perspective: With a feminist activist toolkit this project suggests one way of “staying with the trouble” and how to challenge binary regimes from within the design discipline. The activist toolkit is suggesting a form of practice to create connections which increase critical thinking on a reflective empowering journey to equity. It is one idea of how we can change design from margins to centre and develop feminist tactics for a more just design discipline. Furthermore, it assists dialogues to unfold concepts of how design embodies binaries in visuals, spatial, and other material practices and proposes a strengthening of allyship, to step by step bridging the gap between academia and industry, and between circular and linear thinkers.

This study approaches the question of how to use QR codes as a physical tool to attractconsumers to a digital platform. This is done by creating designs for three companies anddisplaying them publicly in different locations. In total, the designed QR codes were scanned15 times across all 11 locations and were affected by things such as location, design, andamount of displayed information. This was followed by a survey (N=51) which concluded thatthey rarely scan QR codes due to, as an example, lack of interest in the information. Despitethe low scan rates of the tested designs, the respondents of the survey view the tool assomething to make things accessible quickly and efficiently. Companies were also interviewed(N=5) and had a generally positive view on QR codes, some using them more than others.

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Keeping the audience engaged when presenting a topic in a conventional setting (a class presentation or a keynote in a conference) can be challenging. Often, presenta- tions tend to be linear and non-engaging. It was my intention to research how the ex- perience can be improved by using different methods to engage the audience.In this thesis the reader will find the results of my exploration and research on how to make presentations more engaging for the audience via interactive methods.After some background information, I go through the process of developing concepts that could improve the presenting experience. I describe different contexts where peo- ple deliver presentations and research about these environments to discuss the context of the thesis. I also discuss the concept of audience engagement.After selecting one of these concepts I describe the development of a prototype that il- lustrates the concept and discuss it after a series of user testing procedures.Finally some conclusions and comments are discussed in the final part of the docu- ment.