ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
It’s amazing to sit and think how many people over the past three and a half years, or one thousand, two hundred and sixteen days to be more precise, have contributed to, or supported my own motivation to complete this MPhil, and it’s even more difficult to attempt to acknowledge all those who have contributed to this process in other ways over that time, or even before it started. However,
THROUGHOUT
To Mum and Dad, I’m never totally sure that you got it (yet), and maybe that’s unfair, but it didn’t stop you always putting up with my rants about it, or stop you being understanding of the knock on impact that this work has had on everything else over the past three and a bit years, so thank you for that. I suppose without the education and upbringing you both have given me none of this would have even got started. Boodle, I knew somewhere deep down that despite being the younger sister and despite me having a head start on you in life you were going to beat me to these letters after my name! You did of course! Thank you for all your support along the way and glad we’ve both got there now! I’d also like to say a massive thank you to Steve and Jill Blount (old enough to be my parents…I mean, honorary parents!) for your support on numerous weekends in the early days of this process. If it wasn’t for you both back in the winter of 2003/2004, introducing me to coffee and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and teaching me to ski properly, I don’t think my brain would have ever started working in the way that it has since. You (and everyone else) can be the judge as to whether on balance that’s been a good thing, but seriously you helped me motivate myself to something better in so many ways back then and you continue to be an inspiration to me – thank you!
THE TWITTERSPHERE (NOVEMBER, 2008 – PRESENT)
It’s entirely fair to say that this thesis wouldn’t exist without Twitter so Biz, Jack and Evan, thanks. It is of course ironic that as a result of a medium that limits messages to 140 characters, the world is now bequeathed with this 524,884+ character, 77,000 word monstrosity, but it is less about the length of those tweets and more about the people and ideas with whom and with which I was able to connect throughout this process for which I’m truly grateful. Particularly to the following individuals, in no particular order, @georgejulian, @segelstrom, @rufflemuffin, @redjotter, @designthinkers, @laura_grant, @lixindex, @mrstickdorn, @choosenick, @meanestindian, @syamant, @satumiettinen, @designersaccord, @mattcurrienz, @Hellibop, @jamin, @ylvalindberg, @iterations, (Mr!) @jakoblies, @ninalysbakken, @adamstjohn, @wimrampen, @grahamhill, @apolaine, @danlockton, @niccombe, @shlmld, @ninaksimon, @ideum and countless others. It does unfortunately feel, to quote The Corries, that “those days are passed now, and in the past they must remain”. But they were great whilst they lasted and we are all still connected so, it might not feel like 2009 again, but who knows what could happen in future… I’d also like to give a special nod at this point to Hugh Dubberly without whose work, this thesis might not exist, or, without which this thesis would most definitely have taken on a very different, and far less valuable form. I put this here, as without Twitter I’m fairly sure I might never have discovered Dubberly’s work. #legend #thankyou.
In addition to their mention above, I’d also like to take the time to say a massive thanks to Marc Stickdorn and Jakob Schneider for their work on This is Service Design Thinking and for enabling me to be part of that project and contribute to it. It has been massively reassuring in the latter stages of this process to know that at least a couple of people believed in my work on a professional basis so thank you both gentlemen, the subsequent success of TISDT is a testament to you both and all your hard work. I’d also like to thank Renato Troncon, whom I got to know better as part of that process, for affirming my conviction of the relationship and the importance of philosophy within design, and of the importance of a philosophy of design, particularly when no one else seemed to take this seriously – thank you!
BRUNEL UNIVERSITY (SEPTEMBER 2008 – FEBRUARY 2010)
Obviously, a big nod needs to go to Dr Mark Young at Brunel University in his role as supervisor of this MPhil and also in his role as chief instigator of the Ergonomics Real Design Exhibition project, cheers Mark! I’d also like to thank the rest of the Ergonomics Real Design Project team for their work and differing contributions and perspectives, all of which have in numerous positive ways supported and challenged this work, and the thinking and contribution of this thesis. Particularly I’d like to thank Dr Laura Grant and Dr Bella Williams from Laura Grant Associates for their help and support with the evaluation aspects of the project, and as they are referenced here, within this thesis as well. I’d also like to thank Colin Johnson from the EPSRC for his support and enthusiasm for the Ergonomics Real Design Project, Margaret Cabbage at the Design Museum for being such a pragmatist and making it all happen and Henrik at A2/SW/HK and Michael Marriott for bringing the yellow and black, co-created, systems-thinking, all other things antithetical to the Design Museum vision to life, and for providing it with the veneer of the London design establishment it evidently required to be as successful as it was, and which the rest of us quite evidently lacked, (and still do)! Also at The Design Museum, Dejan Sudjic and Gemma Curtin for fuelling my anti-motivation and conviction in the importance and relevance of a democratic approach to design, one day I hope you will see more clearly the participatory perspective, just as each day since I understand more clearly the validity of your own ‘legislating view’, in all sincerity your determination and vision for what is right for your current audience only greater forced me to develop my own idea of what, as a designer, my view and relationship with my users should be.
Also at Brunel, I’d like to thank Dr Hua Dong for her support as my second supervisor and for her advice throughout this process, your work ethic and ambition Hua is an inspiration and a case study in motivation itself! Farnaz, for being the first person I showed the Motivational Design Framework to and for not laughing me out of the room, your support and ideas in so may ways in those early stages was invaluable – kheili mamnoon! To the rest of the Inclusive Design Research Group at Brunel University and to Dr Marco Ajovalasit in the Human Centred Design Institute for allowing me to present in the HCDI Seminars in the early stages of this work, thank you.
Also at Brunel I’d like to acknowledge the huge role Dan Lockton and his PhD work on Architectures of Control / Design for Behaviour played in motivating my own belief in a number of things, 1) that it was possible for a designer or a design researcher to take on the concept of behaviour (or motivated behaviour) and for that to be worthwhile, 2) that it was possible for someone at Brunel to do postgraduate research of value and interest to the rest of the design community and 3) that it was a good idea to blog about some of that work. Seriously Dan, without you I wouldn’t have even got started, or believed it possible. What you achieved with your blog, and the means by which you made your work accessible to others over the course of your PhD says more about Public Engagement with Science and motivation than this thesis will ever manage to theorise or replicate. Thanks buddy.
There are a few other folk from my time at Brunel who I’d like to acknowledge, Graham and Lucy Ormiston, for putting up with me in the first year or so as a flatmate and (probably) lousy friend over that period and since. Perhaps most significantly over this time (Dr!) Nicola Combe for those days at the British Library, coffee, cake and chats that kept me sane through all this madness, a sanity that I’m fairly confident I’ve since lacked – thank you Nixy, you’re wonderful, I miss you and many of the things about those days!
POST-BRUNEL (MARCH 2010 – JANUARY 2012)
There is really only one person, in relation to my MPhil, whom I need to thank post-February 2010, the one person who has really believed in it, and been prepared to let me know that, and put up with me when I haven’t been feeling the love for it. George, words cannot describe your patience and support for a process that, well, frankly has been unbearable for us both over the past couple of years. Writing these words signals one thing however, and that is the fact that the process is over and hopefully what hasn’t killed us has only made us, and our relationship stronger. I can’t say it wouldn’t have been complete without you but what I can emphatically say is that you saved me completely losing my sanity to this, just about, oh, and without you the spelling and referencing would have been considerably worse! Seriously George thank you so much. Having said that there was only one more person that I needed to thank, there is one other, who thinks he is a person – Mogsy – thank you for all the face rubs as part of the process of completing this research and writing this thesis up, your company and occasional typing assistance has helped make things considerably more enjoyable, thank you!
Contributor: @FergusBisset
Source: Bisset, F (2012) An elucidation of the concept of motivation within museum exhibition design; an exploration of how designers can support motivational engagement within design, MPhil, Brunel University
Time for some acknowledgement 