Designing for Participatory Sensemaking

Abstract

In this Research-through-Design investigation we explore the value of embodiment for social interaction in collaborative settings, and how to supportrather than suppress or ignore-embodiment with interactive technology. We use Participatory Sensemaking (De Jaegher & Di Paolo, 2007), a theory which explains sensemaking as continuous embodied interactions between people in a shared action space. We discuss three prototypes supporting Participatory Sensemaking. We describe how our understanding of participatory sensemaking evolved through (reflections on) design. The first product creates tangible access to moments of reflection in group conversations. We came to understand the tangibles as traces of individual reflection, which become publicly observable and actionable within social interaction. In our second prototype we designed traces as floor-projections dynamically connected to people's body movements. The system mediates the social positioning of session participants. The final system integrates our earlier insights in a dialogue tool for two people. Here participatory sensemaking shows itself as a skill with special emphasis on the sensuality of mutual contact. We end with a more general reflection on how design can contribute to theoretical analysis through iterations of designing and observing what interactive artefacts concretely do within the full complexity of human practices.

Zooming in on embodied social sensemaking: Mapping the design space in the context of videoconferencing

“…In participatory sensemaking, people use their skilled bodies to dynamically and unreflectively 'couple to' others, like an improvised dance. The resulting couplings constitute both 'making sense of one another', as well as collaboratively 'making sense of the situation' [16]. Furthermore, from phenomenology we know that the skilled, sense-making body may be 'extended' by incorporating artifacts (cf.…”