Design Ethnography – (M.Sc.)

Contents

The course provides a rich grounding in design ethnography and user experience / usability research. The course is delivered jointly by the Schools of Design and Computing, and the teaching team embraces the full range of professionals graduates would be likely to encounter in industry; from engineers and usability experts, through design managers, user researchers, designers and design ethnographers. Their rich and varied research activities inform the course and provide access to the very latest advances in the fields that contribute to design ethnography and user research.

You will study three modules in each of the first two semesters (Sept- May), at which point you can if you wish graduate with a Postgradate Diploma. If you are taking the masters degree, you would complete your studies with a self directed major field study project (June-Sept). The project can be undertaken anywhere in the world and supported and assessed electronically where necessary

Semester 1 * Strategic Design and Innovation - Explores the design lifecycle and the latest methods for design innovation through hand-on projects.
* Design Research Methods - Introduces you to various methods for generating useful research insight for design.
* Experience Research 1 - Experience Research 1 Immerses you further in the key tools and methods needed to undertake interview and observation based fieldwork, and introduces the challenges of a) understanding what your client or company needs to know and b) turning field data into actionable insights and information.

Semester 2 * Strategic Information Design - Uncovering actionable insights from user research is useless unless you can communicate the results of that research effectively. This module provides you with an introduction to issues involved in strategically managing information design in business and design settings.
* HCI and Usability Engineering - When you have finished the module you will have a broad understanding of: design criteria for good human-computer interfaces, choice and evaluation of interface technology, physical, sensory and cognitive human capabilities, interactive computing and usability engineering methods, and human-computer interface testing.
* Experience Research 2 - This module considers the issues and difficulties inherent in translating ethnographic insights into useful 'material' for design from the perspective of the various stakeholders.

Semester 3 * Hothouse Summer - The aim of this module is to give students experience of developing, conducting and presenting a real-world user research project. The project can be conducted anywhere in the world, and managed and assessed remotely if necessary. Students will be guided in the production of a project brief, and supported through the course of their field study project by a supervisor from the staff team. The nature and outputs of the project will obviously vary from student to student and topic to topic, however in all cases the focus is to provide our students with a chance to apply and extend the full range of techniques and ideas they have been exploring on the taught modules.