User research enabled by makerspaces: bringing functionality to classical experience prototypes

Matilde Bisballe Jensen,Martin Steinert

doi:10.1017/s089006042000013x

Abstract

AbstractThis paper sheds light on the new possibilities for user research activities facilitated by access to makerspaces. We present four case studies of user research conducted in two university-based makerspaces as examples of makerspace-driven user research. Further, by comparing the cases to three classical user research activities, namely observation, prototyping, and user journey mapping, we highlight the main aspects of this new context of user research. We find that accessibility to makerspaces enables user researchers to build low-fidelity yet high-functionality prototypes for exploring users’ preferences and motivations in controlled and repeatable ways. These prototypes fall into the category of experience prototypes, but they have greater functionality than the prototypes previously used in this field. Thus, a user researcher can explore a topic more systematically and in a more hypothesis-driven manner. In summary, this study encourages stakeholders in the early stages of product development to consider a makerspace as a resource for user-related requirement elicitation rather than for only specific product iteration.

Highlights

Owing to the development of rapid prototyping tools and low-cost sensor technology, makerspaces and maker communities are expected to facilitate advancements in active business strategies for companies aiming to achieve greater agility in the early stage of engineering design, which is known as the fuzzy front end (FFE) (Böhmer et al, 2015)
This paper mainly focuses on the activity of user research in an industrial context and with the intent of identifying user insights in the FFE, which is in contrast to more academic studies that focus on specific investigations of human behavior
This paper encourages user researchers to learn from makerspaces and cultivate the mentality that anything can be built

Summary

Introduction

Owing to the development of rapid prototyping tools and low-cost sensor technology, makerspaces and maker communities are expected to facilitate advancements in active business strategies for companies aiming to achieve greater agility in the early stage of engineering design, which is known as the fuzzy front end (FFE) (Böhmer et al, 2015). When an in-house makerspace is regarded as a strategy in a company’s overall multidisciplinary FFE work, the question arises as to how user research and user-related requirement elicitation could benefit from the in-house makerspace. Through four practical case studies, this paper seeks to answer the following research question: How can the activity of user research in the FFE benefit from access to a makerspace?. By describing the insights elicited using the prototypes built in the four case studies, we provide a vision for how future user research can be conducted through access to a makerspace. Such accessibility allows experimental, functional, and explorative user research with quantitative, controlled, and repeatable setups

Methods

Results

Conclusion