I think looking into sociology and behavior is a good idea.
I copied and pasted stuff from that reading you found. I think it's useful to help us find a design strategy.
Haven't read much into this yet but let me know how much you understand about it.
Design for Socially Responsible Behavior: A Classification
of Influence Based on Intended User Experience
Nynke Tromp, Paul Hekkert, Peter-Paul Verbeek
The framework shows how behavior forms an
intermediate stage between social implications
and the user-product interaction, and
thereby respectively between collective
and individual concerns. The latter explains,
respectively, the reason for influencing and
the way of influencing.
Could choose a design strategy from the theory you found. Which one do you reckon suits the topic more?
Four types of influence based on the
dimensions of force and salience. Below are examples of each strategy from that reading. The numbers in chart correspond to the numbers below.
1. Create a perceivable barrier for undesired behavior (pain). This
strategy warns the user about injuries, or uses actual
physical stimuli that harm either the users or the products
they are using (e.g., a car). Figure 12 shows how natural
stones are placed to prevent cars from being parked at
places that were not intended for this use. This strategy
uses a so-called physical punisher for unwanted behavior
(the car will be heavily damaged if one decides to park
there anyhow). Psychologists commonly agree that
enduring behavioral change can only be developed if a
reinforcer, rather than a punisher, consistently follows the
behavior. Although very effective, this particular approach
is a situational and temporary solution and does not result
in an enduring change of behavior.
2. Make unacceptable user behavior overt (shame). This strategy leads
to products that make illegal behavior, or behavior we
commonly regard as socially unacceptable, publicly visible.
Figure 13 shows the Hygiene Guard, which is designed to
make sure employees wash their hands after toilet use. The
Hygiene Guard activates a flickering light attached to the
employee’s badge as soon as the soap dispenser isn’t used
and/or the water tap does not run for at least 15 seconds.
This strategy increases the pressure of and extends an
already existing social norm.
3. Make the behavior a necessary activity to perform to make use of
the product function. When interacting with a product, the
user has a specific goal related to the product function.
This strategy is about including a design element that
requires the user to perform a specific behavior to reach
his or her goal. Figure 14 shows the Social Cups designed
by Niedderer. The cups can only be placed securely on
the table when linked to other cups. The social interaction
becomes a necessary activity for the cups to achieve
stability. This strategy relies on the motivation of the user to
make use of the product function. As soon as users consider
the behavior to require more effort than they are willing to
give to achieve the goal, the strategy most likely will fail.
4. Provide the user with arguments for specific behavior. This strategy
provides the user with objective information about the
consequences of certain behavior. A well-known example,
shown in figure 15, is the cigarette package that contains
explanations of the consequences of smoking. This
strategy tries to address, shape, or alter attitudes, rather
than directly facilitating behavior. Studies have shown
that people prefer to make choices that can be more easily
substantiated by verbal arguments, even when they would
eventually appraise other options as better ones.
5. Suggest actions. This strategy explicitly proposes certain actions
or suggests certain specific behavior. For example, typical
RSI prevention software suggests that computer users
do small exercises when working on their computer to
decrease the chance of developing persistent injuries
(Figure 16). This strategy can explicitly use information
to ground the suggestion, but it is not necessary. When
the product also provides arguments, it aims at changing
attitudes and facilitating behavior. In cases where it does
not, it seeks to trigger a more temporary and automatic
reaction (e.g., a gear sign on the dashboard of a car that
suggests when the driver should shift gears).
6. Trigger different motivations for the same behavior. This strategy
adds an extra function to the product that elicits the desired
behavior. To illustrate, the garbage bin along the highway
is designed as a basket used in sports to score (Figure 17).
By its design, it gives a different meaning to the action of
throwing garbage in the bin. A strong aspect is that the
strategy thereby aims at a different but intrinsic motivation
for the behavior.
7. Elicit emotions to trigger action tendencies. This strategy tries to
elicit an emotion to seduce people to certain reactions.
The smiley in figure 18 is placed on the side of a section
of road that needs maintenance and forces the driver to
slow down. The smiley explicitly thanks drivers for their
understanding, with the expectation that the driver will
not get agitated and start driving recklessly. This strategy
aims at influencing the affective component of the attitude
system to shape or change an attitude and therefore the
evolving behavior.
8. Activate physiological processes to induce behavior. This strategy
makes use of human physiological processes that result
from bodily states so that specific behavior is more likely
to occur. The table Go-to-Move, in figure 19, requires
its users to stand rather than sit during a meeting. The
standing posture is expected to lead to a more active mood.
This strategy aims at stimulating preferred attitudes by
activating physiological processes of which users are often
unaware.
9. Trigger human tendencies for automatic behavioral responses.
This strategy activates a human tendency by creating a
perceptual stimulus. The light switch in figure 20 plays
with the human inclination toward order and a preference
for symmetry.26 By attracting attention to its asymmetrical
position when the light is on, users will be more inclined
to turn it off when the light is not needed or when leaving
the room. This strategy makes use of human automatic
behavioral responses that are instinctive or learned.
10. Create optimal conditions for specific behavior. This strategy uses
design to create an optimal situation in which the desired
behavior can occur naturally. An example is the coffee
machine in the hallway of a company. A coffee machine
in the hallway (Figure 21) encourages people to gather at
a neutral place. This situation naturally results in small
talk between colleagues who might not interact in the
normal course of the day. This strategy manipulates the
conditions so that behavior can occur naturally but does
not necessarily interfere in the underlying psychological
processes of the behavior.
11. Make the desired behavior the only possible behavior to perform.
This strategy uses design to make behaviors other than the
desired one impossible. An example is the positioning of
bus stops, which determines the distance that passengers
Bridging Concerns: Repositioning the Designer
choosing a strategy
requires some additional considerations.
Coercive influence can be an effective intervention for specific
types of social issues. Coercive interventions are often experienced
as conflicting with individual freedom and therefore can only
be applied in instances in which the desired behavior is almost
unanimously agreed upon. Nobody revolts against the reasoning
behind such a design strategy when it concerns matters of life and
death. Creating obstructions so that drivers cannot exceed the limit
of 30 kilometers an hour within a school and playground area is
acceptable and understandable. However, designing obstructions
that prevent homeless people from sleeping on public benches
becomes already more debatable. Coercive influence is very restricting, and it therefore requires authority to be applied. As a
result, the public domain and institutional domains are domains
for which coercive design often is suitable, in that government and
managers have the authority to implement such interventions. In the
private domain, a radio for personal use that starts malfunctioning as soon as too much energy is consumed is an example of coercion.
When it concerns the private domain, coercive influence can only
be applied when collective and individual concerns are in line with
each other.
Persuasive influence also is best applied when collective
concerns are in line with individual concerns, which means they
are easily identified or experienced as individual concerns. Many
interventions that use persuasion are about health or safety issues,
which are easily related to and accepted by the individual. However,
persuasive interventions can easily fail as soon as they concern
behavior that has long-term implications but that collide with
short-term matters. A good example is smoking behavior. Smoking
in the long term conflicts with concerns about health, but in the short
term addresses concerns of enjoyment. Persuasive interventions are
present in all domains but are presumably most successful when
interaction with them occurs on a voluntary basis. A campaign
alongside the road to promote safe driving behavior most probably
is less effective in influencing behavior than the (purchased) personal
digital sport coach that structures your behavior during exercise.
Of course, social issues often do not deal with matters of life
and death or with concerns that are in line with short-term individual
concerns. Many issues are constructed around collective concerns
that are often not related to individual behaviors. In addition to
sustainability, these issues are often socially constructed issues, such
as immigration, integration, discrimination, and social cohesion.
Within these phenomena,
seductive influence can be very useful in
eliciting desired behavior because these phenomena often do not
allow for enforcement or explicit arguments. Forcing people to talk to
their foreign neighbor is simply unthinkable, and providing explicit
explanations to people about how contact with neighbors contributes
to cohesion in the area somehow does not sound so compelling so
as to influence behavior. It is especially for these issues, which leave
governmental institutions powerless, that design can offer elegant
interventions
Decisive influence is a very strong influence in that the
design makes the desired behavior the only possible behavior.
However, the application of this influence is limited. The design of
infrastructure and buildings typically is decisive design: The design
of infrastructure determines the distance of a public institution to a
bus stop and thereby influences physical activity, or determines the
width of an alley and thereby its access to cars. But social behavior,
such as communication, is hard to influence with decisive design.
Moreover, decisive design can easily lead to unpleasant experiences. As soon as the government decides to take away half of the bus stops
to stimulate physical activity, objections can be expected
Most, if not all, social issues deal with human behavior.
Deliberately affecting behavior to stimulate specific social
implications requires a redefinition of the role of the designer.
Although designers can never fully predict the social implications
of their design, and although the political significance of artifacts
changes over time, this reality does not imply that designers should
refrain from taking seriously the social implications of their designs.
Designers no longer can hide behind the needs and wishes of the
consumer; instead, they have to take responsibility as “shapers” of
society. Doing so entails a shift from a user-centered approach to
a society-centered one. In defining desired social implications and
behavior, it is the designer’s task to incorporate relevant experts, such
as sociologists and policy makers, as well as citizens. Subsequently, it
is the designer’s quality and expertise that can translate the collective
concerns to individual concerns by means of design.
