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Solutionism, the Game: Design Fictions for Positive Aging

Blythe, M; Steane, J; Roe, J; Oliver, C; (2015) Solutionism, the Game: Design Fictions for Positive Aging. In: Begole, B and Kim, J, (eds.) CHI '15: Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. (pp. pp. 3849-3858). Association for Computing Machinery (ACM): New York, NY, USA. Green open access

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Abstract

This paper reports a qualitative study of thriving older people and illustrates the findings with design fiction. Design research has been criticized as "solutionist" i.e. solving problems that don't exist or providing "quick fixes" for complex social, political and environmental problems. We respond to this critique by presenting a "solutionist" board game used to generate design concepts. Players are given data cards and technology dice, they move around the board by pitching concepts that would support positive aging. We argue that framing concept design as a solutionist game explicitly foregrounds play, irony and the limitations of technological intervention. Three of the game concepts are presented as design fictions in the form of advertisements for products and services that do not exist. The paper argues that design fiction can help create a space for design beyond solutionism.

Type: Proceedings paper
Title: Solutionism, the Game: Design Fictions for Positive Aging
Event: 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '15)
Location: Seoul, SOUTH KOREA
ISBN-13: 9781450331456
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1145/2702123.2702491
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1145/2702123.2702491
Language: English
Additional information: This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions.
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education > IOE - Education, Practice and Society
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10121234
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