Co-design with People Living with Dementia

The Problem

Participation of PLwD in the design of robots from the early stages of the process can promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in robotics. Past studies suggested co-design methods to engage potential end-users in robot development, but they has rarely try with only PLwD.

Research methods

Co-design the robot that is suitable for PLwD.
Storyboard to let the participants visualize the story that they have created.
Interview to understand their view of what the robot could do.
Drawing to let the PLwD visualize their robot design.

Research outcome

Methods to conduct co-design sessions with PLwD

Key Insights

When co-design with PLwD, it is essential to:

Create a safe space
Adapt to their capabilities
Bring multiple sensory modalities into the interaction
Accept different robot designs and purposes even if they diverge from initial expectations

Collaborators

Dr. Selma Sabanovic (supervisor), Swapna Joshi, Natasha Randall, Katherine M. Tsui, and Abhijeet Agnihotri

Roles

Workshop lead, designer, and writer

Skills

UX Research, UX Design, Wizard of Oz, Survey, Interview, Co-design

Reflection

This is the first project I lead in IU and working with PLwD. It was a journey of many challenges, especially in the communication and getting the ideas out from PLwD. The experience has taught me methods and pushed me on conducting more future co-design workshops with PLwD.