TU/e Academic Awards 2009 - Technische Universiteit Eindhoven

Industrial Design
dr.ir. P. Ross
Philip Ross conducted his technological design PhD at Industrial Design,
supervised by prof.dr. C.J. Overbeeke (first promotor), prof.dr.ir. L.M.G. Feijs
(second promotor) and dr.ir. S.A.G. Wensveen (co-promotor). It received a
cum laude distinction. Ross is currently Assistant Professor at the
Designing Quality in Interaction group at Industrial Design.
Ethics and aesthetics in intelligent product and system
design
Figure 1:
Intelligent reading lamp prototype. In the depicted behavioural
mode, the direction of the light beam can be influenced
directly using the hand. In other modes, the lamp portrays
pro-active behaviour like autonomously following the reading
material. These different behavioural modes are used to invite
specific human behaviours in interaction.
Figure 2:
The Perspectives on Behaviour in Interaction framework
supports the design of intelligent product and system
behaviour. Such design work entails decision making on
multiple, mutually dependent levels, which the framework
helps distinguish. These levels include the mapping of sensor
data to actuator control (sensory-motor activity), social
implications of behaviour, and dynamic form.
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The products we use transform the way we behave and the way we experience the
world. See, for example, how mobile phone use has changed the way people
manage their social relations. Every technology in use invites specific behaviours
and concurrently inhibits others, as Verbeek explicates in his Technological
Mediation framework. New technological developments pave the way for new
kinds of transformations of human behaviour and experience. Visions like
Ambient Intelligence sketch a world in which an ever-greater part of everyday life
is mediated, and thus transformed, by intelligent technologies. Design in this new
technological context needs to consider how to give the social transformations,
inherent to any technology in use, a desirable direction. What kind of human
behaviours should our products and systems invite or inhibit? This question
brings an ethical dimension of intelligent system design to the fore.
This thesis investigates how to take this ethical dimension into account in design
of intelligent products and systems, using intelligent lighting as design carrier.
The research combines three main topics. Firstly, the emerging design layer of
system behaviour is identified and explored. Secondly, human value theory is
employed to operationalise ethics for experimental study and to specify what
kind of human behaviours a system should invite. Examples of human values are
creativity, politeness and helpfulness. Thirdly, an aesthetics based design
approach is developed for inviting specific human behaviours in interaction with a
system. This approach relies on invitation and attraction rather than coercion and
persuasion. The general research question is formulated as follows: How can
we design intelligent products or systems that invite human behaviours that
correspond to specific human values? For example, how can we design an
intelligent lighting system that invites creative, polite or helpful behaviours?
Design knowledge is developed through systematic reflection on actual design
activity.
This ‘research-through-design’ process involves development of several design
concepts, two fully-functioning intelligent lamps and empirical studies to evaluate
the designs. The frameworks and design techniques developed in this research
support incorporation of ethics through aesthetics in intelligent product and
system design.