Empirical Research Methods for Designers

Faculty of Engineering and Computer Science

Version 10.0 of 01/23/2019

11B1211

Empirical Research Methods for Designers

Media & Interaction Design (B.A.)

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Being a good interaction designer means being a good researcher. Many phases of design and development processes rely on findings and methods of empirical social research.

For this reason it is important to teach students relevant fundamental knowledge and skills to enable them to develop and evaluate design solutions on a firm scientific foundation.

• Application areas of empirical social research for media and interaction design (e. g. user research, usability evaluation, usability research)
• Philosophy of science (e. g. empirical research, deduction vs. induction, operationalization, scaling and measuring)
• Qualitative vs. quantitative research methods
• Formulating relevant and concise research questions
• Research design (e. g. experiments, field studies, longitudinal studies, dependent and independent variables)
• Objectivity, reliability and validity
• Sampling
• Data collection methods (e. g. observation, survey)
• Analyzing and reporting results
• Ethical considerations

Knowledge Broadening
Students are able to name, use and apply basic concepts of empirical social research and to discuss application areas within the field of interaction design.
Knowledge Deepening
Students are able to evaluate empirical research findings and integrate them into the context of interaction design on the basis of the concepts taught in this module.
Instrumental Skills and Competences
Students are able to apply selected procedures to collect and analyze quantitative and qualitative data. They are able to adequately prepare and report research results.
Communicative Skills and Competences
Students are able to identify and name research problems and to formulate and discuss complex research questions. They are able to present and substantiate research results and to discuss their theoretical and practical relevance.
Systemic Skills and Competences
Students are able to find adequate solutions for specific research questions on the basis of their scientific and methodological knowledge. They are able to delibarte their own as well as other researchers’ research work and gauge their practical relevance.

Lecture with exercices

Basic concepts and methods of user-centered product design as well as basic scholarly work methods are assumed to be known.

Ollermann, Frank

• Ollermann, Frank
• Lehrbeauftragte

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Lazar, J., Feng, J. H. & Hochheiser, H. (2017). Research Methods in Human-Computer Interaction (2nd ed.). Cambridge, MA: Morgan Kaufmann.

Bryman, A. (2012). Social Research Methods. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Flick, U. (2014). An Introduction to Qualitative Research. London, Thousand Oaks, New Delhi, Singapore: SAGE Publications.

Presentation

Working knowledge regarding the conception, execution and analysis of empirical data collections in the field of interaction design

1 Term

Only Summer Term

German and English