July 2017
The book contains ethnographic research, which assigned participants questions and tasks regarding written communication habits, through analog and digital means.
The main tool in design research is called Cultural Probes; these are short tasks that are assigned to participants, who are required to perform assignments, or document situations in everyday life, which may have an impact on the research. The participants are envoys of sorts, who are able to expand the scope of thought and approaches regarding written communication.
About 30 people participated in the study; they were required to undertake a set of analog or digital communication tasks. Among the tasks in the analog section were a blank postcard, which encouraged the users to create a postcard and send it to a close friend or family member, a table for weekly documentation and classification of the home mailbox content and more. Among the assignments in the digital section were tasks including disengaging from social media, a search for the personal handwriting which can act as digital seal, documentation and analyzing of birthday greetings on Facebook and more. Each task had a premise and when it was concluded participants were asked questions to more deeply examine their feelings as they performed it.
This project was collected in a 100-page study that presents participants’ outcomes alongside key conclusions.
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