Yes / This Case Study paper presents the first exploration of Speculative Design as a participatory democracy method for navigating the future of ageing in Malaysia. Speculative Design in the context of Global South is emerging, but without much data on how it is applied within different socio-economic conditions from the Global North countries. This Case Study considers the challenges and opportunities of employing Speculative Design as policy identification and development method from the context of Malaysia, a Global South country with its own unique characteristics. The paper concludes by suggesting that the novelty of Speculative Design as a policy-design approach in Global South countries, such as in Malaysia, requires the right selection of provocations and culturally familiar content to ease introduction of the methodology. Also, the efficacy of this approach as a participatory design application would require further enculturation within targeted communities, as well as sustained engagement through Champions. / This work was supported by the UKRI Arts and Humanities Research Council [grant number: AH/S005684/1].

Statistics show the prevalence of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), a developmental delay disorder, is now 1 in 110 children in the United States (Rice, 2009), nearing 1% of the population. Therefore, this study looked at ways modern technology could assist these children and their families. One deficit in ASD is the inability to respond to gaze referencing (i.e. follow the eye gaze of another adult/child/etc), a correlate of the responding to joint attention (RJA) process. This not only affects the way they appear to society, but it also affects social development, communication skills, and play skills later in life (Whalen & Schreibman, 2003), making early intervention of RJA is an integral part of a successful social skills program. This study developed design guidelines, as well as offered and evaluated a design framework, adding to the limited literature regarding technology and ASD intervention. The game was developed within behavior analytic framework, undergoing several iterations, developing a functional prototype that was analyzed in three parts. The first part identified which elements needed redesign in light of the study population. Second, a collaborative prototyping participatory design group was formed in which the elements from the previous part of the study were assigned guidelines. The final part of the study included an evaluation by those with ABA experience, evaluating if the game correctly encompassed and mirrored traditional face-to-face ABA interventions. The study's contributions were the finalized design guidelines and design framework, as well as additional research on harnessing technology in ASD interventions. / Master of Science

This thesis explores the design of a community center tailored for autistic adults, aiming to foster inclusivity and blur boundaries between neurodiverse and non-neurodiverse individuals. Through interdisciplinary approaches, it investigates spatial and sensory elements to create an immersive experience where everyone can perceive the world through an autistic person's perspective. By prioritizing sensory inclusivity and participatory design, the center aims to provide a supportive environment for exploration and interaction. Additionally, it explores how immersive experiences can cultivate empathy, bridging gaps and fostering genuine connections. Ultimately, this thesis advocates for a paradigm shift in community space design, celebrating neurodiversity and promoting unity. / Master of Architecture / This thesis explores the design of a community center tailored for autistic adults, aiming to foster inclusivity and blur boundaries between neurodiverse and non-neurodiverse individuals. Through interdisciplinary approaches, it investigates spatial and sensory elements to create an immersive experience where everyone can perceive the world through an autistic person's perspective. By prioritizing sensory inclusivity and participatory design, the center aims to provide a supportive environment for exploration and interaction. Additionally, it explores how immersive experiences can cultivate empathy, bridging gaps and fostering genuine connections. Ultimately, this thesis advocates for a paradigm shift in community space design, celebrating neurodiversity and promoting unity.

No

This thesis investigates the Out-of-Box Experience (OoBE) of interactive consumer products for older adults, with a view to improve the User Experience (UX) of a product by manipulating factors of the OoBE. This research emerges in the context of current demographic trends, which see people living longer and in better health, and the increasing ubiquity of technology in modern life. The OoBE describes the very first stages of interaction with a new product, including acquisition, unpacking and setup. This crucial initial experience has the potential to influence product acceptance and therefore determine its future use. Creating a positive OoBE requires an empathic understanding of the intended users, as well as contextual knowledge about current practices. A review of the literature revealed that many of the difficulties older adults experience with technology concern elements of the OoBE, such as complicated documentation, technical jargon and inadequate support for inexperienced users. However, the absence of research on how to engage older adults during the OoBE of new technology reinforced the need for further research. To this end, two user studies were conducted with older people, followed by a design study with designers. The first study explored older adults relationship with technology and their current practices of the OoBE, using the Technology Biography method. The second study used cultural probes to investigate the social side of UX and its effect on personal feelings of independence. Data from these two studies were used to create four personas, which were used in the design study. This third and final study focused on whether the construct of social benefits could be operationalised within the OoBE of new technology. Collectively, the findings indicated that the involvement of other people during the OoBE can be a strong motivator for older people to take up and use technology. Far from impinging on individual perceptions of independence, some older people actively manipulate the OoBE in order to derive social benefits. This research thus contributes to the discussion of how Inclusive Design can evolve through the incorporation of social benefits, in order to generate desirable and successful future products.

Today's challenge for workforce management lies in providing a healthy, safe and productive working culture where people are valued, empowered and respected. Workforce diversity is becoming an essential aspect of the global workforce, and ageing is the most prominent and significant factor in this regard. Diversity brings many opportunities and challenges, as workers with different backgrounds, cultures, working attitudes, behaviours and age work together, and in future, the key to organizational effectiveness and sustainability will heavily depend on developing and sustaining inclusive work environments where people with their differences can co-exist safely and productively. Manufacturing organizations expect the highest levels of productivity and quality, but unfortunately the manufacturing system design process does not take into account human variability issues caused by age, skill, experience, attitude towards work etc. This thesis focuses on proposing an inclusive design methodology to address the design needs of a broader range of the population. However, the promotion and implementation of an inclusive design method is challenging due to the lack of relevant data and lack of relevant tools and methods to help designers. This research aims to support the inclusive design process by providing relevant data and developing new design methodologies. The inclusive design methodology suggested in this thesis is a three step approach for achieving a safe and sustainable work environment for workers, with special concern for older workers. The methodology is based on the provision of relevant human capabilities data, the capture and analysis of difference in human behaviour and the use of this knowledge in a digital human modelling tool. The research is focused on manual assembly through a case study in the furniture manufacturing industry and joint mobility data from a wide-ranging population has been analysed and the task performing strategies and behaviours of workers with different levels of skills have been recorded and analysed. It has been shown that joint mobility significantly decreases with age and disability and that skilful workers are likely to adopt safer and more productive working strategies. A digital human modelling based inclusive design strategy was found to be useful in addressing the design needs of older workers performing manufacturing assembly activities. This strategy validates the concept of using human capabilities data for assessing the level of acceptability of any adopted strategy for older workers, and suggests that the strategies adopted by skilful workers are more likely to be equally acceptable for older and younger workers keeping in view differences in their joint mobility. The overall purpose of this thesis is to present a road map towards the promotion and implementation of the inclusive design method for addressing workforce challenges and in future the same strategies might be implemented within a variety of other industrial applications. The proposed three step inclusive design methodology and getting a reasonable understanding of human variability issues along with the use of human capabilities data (joint mobility in this case) in a human modelling system for design assessment at a pre-design stage can be considered as the major contributions of this research.

There is a growing population of older people around the world and the population of older drivers is increasing in parallel. UK government figures in 2012 reported that there were more than 15 million people with a driving license aged over 60; more than 1 million of these were over 80. The aim of this thesis is to determine the requirements of older users for an improved driving experience leading to recommendations for the automotive industry. Initially it was necessary to understand some of the key issues concerning the driving experiences of older drivers; therefore a questionnaire survey of drivers of all ages (n=903) was conducted supplemented by interviews with drivers aged ≥ 65 years (n=15). Areas covered included: musculoskeletal symptoms, the vehicle seat, driving performance and driving behaviour. Respondents reported that they were dissatisfied with adjusting specific seat features, for example the head rest height and distance from the head; females reported more difficulty than males. Reaching and pulling the boot door down to close was difficult for 12% of older females. Older males and females also reported more difficulties with parallel parking and driving on a foggy day than younger drivers (p < 0.01). Nearly half of the sample (47%) reported that other drivers lights restrict their vision when driving at night. An in depth study was conducted to compare participants own vehicle (familiar) and a test vehicle (unfamiliar) to understand how design of the vehicle cab impacts on posture, comfort, health and wellbeing in older drivers (n=47, ≥ 50 years). The study involved functional performance assessments, seat set-up process evaluation (observations and postural analysis), ergonomics and emotional design based evaluations of car seat controls. Many issues were identified related to the seat controls such as operating, accessing, reaching and finding, particularly for the head rest height and lumbar support adjustments. Approximately 40% of the participants had difficulty turning their head and body around to adjust the head rest height, and the majority of these were over 80. This led to a series of workshops (including a participatory design exercise) with 18 participants (4 groups, ≥ 65 years).The aim was to explore the optimum positioning and operation of controls for older drivers. This research has provided foundational data and makes design recommendations for the automotive industry with a focus on making seat controls more inclusive (operation, location, type, size, colour and materials) and meet the requirements of older drivers.

Thailand has been extremely successful in promoting itself as a cultural country, with tourism being the country's primary source of income. However, cultural tourism for Thai people is considered to be a niche market, and little attention has been paid to the topic, compared to mass tourism. Moreover, Thai visitors have little motivation to visit actual historical sites and read the story displayed as part of exhibitions. This research aims to create, detail and evaluate a framework for inclusive digital storytelling to increase diversity and motivation for cultural tourism in Thailand. To broaden and increase the potential tourism market, this PhD research applies inclusive design principles as 'understanding and designing for diversity' by identifying potential Thai customers into five diverse groups (youth, older adults, disabled people, non-cultural tourists, and cultural tourists), and presents reports regarding the barriers and drivers for achieving this. To increase the motivation of Thai tourists, this PhD research adopts digital storytelling as 'the guideline for creating storytelling' to increase motivation among the five diverse groups, and illustrates how this was done in the second study. However, an issue arises if Thai people (particularly older adults and disabled people) cannot access or understand how to use this type of digital technology. These problems can in turn create opportunities for applying inclusive designs to digital technology in an effort to understand users' behavioural needs; this is presented in the third study. Finally, the fourth study evaluates the framework detailed from the previous three studies in order to answer the primary research question: "How could inclusive design and digital storytelling principles be applied to facilitate cultural tourism in Thailand?" This PhD research can suggest and establish links between three key areas and devise and detail a new framework to increase diversity and motivation for cultural tourism for Thai visitors in Thailand which is original and interdisciplinary.

Den här studien undersöker tillgänglighet till mensskydd, utifrån ett universal design-perspektiv, vid ett urval gym- nasieskolor i Sundsvall februari och mars månad 2019 samt hur eleverna upplever tillgängligheten. En kvalitativ inter- vjustudie, bestående av intervjuer med skolsköterskor och elever vid skolorna, genomfördes utifrån en noga formule- rad intervjumanual, där resultatet sedan sammanställdes. Resultatet beskrevs, tolkades och analyserades sedan innan slutsatser kunde dras. Resultatet visar på att tillgänglighet till mensskydd, vid ett urval av gymnasieskolor i Sundsvall under februari och mars månad 2019, utifrån ett universal design-perspektiv, är bristfällig.

Ett utvecklingsarbete av en miljövänlig färdigmatsförpackning, lätt att öppna för reumatiker, har utförts i samarbete med CC Pack i Tibro. Förpackningen är tänkt för bruk inom äldrevårdens hemtjänst. Utvecklingsarbetet utfördes genom främst fokusgruppsundersökningar och tester av funktionsmodeller. En livscykelanalys med referens i dagens plasttråg som används på hemtjänsten i Skövde har utförts för att ta reda på vilket av de två slutkoncepten som var mest miljövänlig. Tydligt vid intervjuer och studiebesök var att en rundare och mer färgglad förpackning önskades. Ett enkelt ovalt tråg med en hård kartongflik löste problemet med de svåröppnade förpackningarna både genom själva placeringen av den hårda fliken och också ihop med en avlång form. / A development of an environmentally friendly, ready meals packaging, that is easy to open for people suffering from rheumatoid arthritis, has been performed in cooperation with CC Pack in Tibro. The package is intended for use in elderly care home services. The development work was mainly done by focus group surveys and tests of function models. A life cycle analysis with reference in the current plastic trays used in home care in Skövde was conducted to find out which of the two final concepts was the most eco-friendly. Evident in interviews and site visits was that a rounder and more colorful packaging was desired. A simple oval tray with a hard cardboard flap solved the problem of opening difficulties, both by the position of the hard flap and also with an elongated shape.