Chapter 2 Literature Review
2.3 The mental process of Death
2.3.1 Preparations of dying
Death is biologically inevitable, but it also related to social effect. There are different kinds of fear when facing death, including fear of loss of self-fulfillment and
self-annihilation , fear of consequences to family and friends and of loss of social identity, fear of the unknown and of punishment in the hereafter(Florian & Kravetz, 1983). People also want to imbue their lives with meaning when they aware death’s inevitability, and different kind of people who have higher personal need of
structure(PNS) or less PNS will act in different ways, individuals with high PNS would
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maintain their life meaning following reminders of death, while those low in PNS would think life is more meaningless.(Vess, Routledge, Landau, & Arndt, 2009) 2.4 The meaning of objects
Objects in our life are not simply tools for survival; they are also related to people's lives and memories. It is interesting that the emotional attachment appears to be more connected to the functionality of the device, than to the data it contains (Massimi & Baecker, 2010)
People want to make this object important to their loved one, there are different kinds of approaches for them to make the object meaningful and can impact the feeling of their loved ones.
2.4.1 Enhance the influences of the object
In Csikszentmihalyi’s research, people tried to use objects to show their status and to influence other people. There are some factors such as rarity, expense and the age of the object are used to make it important. These factors make the objects precious, and it shows their efforts of preparing the gift and they hope their loved ones can aware the rarity of this gift.
2.4.2 Representatives of self
People used objects to represent themselves since they were a child, objects can stand for the status of a person and tell people’s stories. In Csikszentmihalyi’s research, status is also a form of power, it consists of the respect, consideration and envy of others. According to this view, objects are full of emotion and related to people’s life. Objects can tell their life and their experiences, we can also find their lifestyle in the simple objects for daily use. On the other hand, objects can also used to emphasize people’s individuality. In Csikszentmihalyi’s research, symbols of the self, might stress the unique qualities of the owner, his or her skills and superiority over others. In this case the object serves a process of differentiation, separating the owner form the social context, emphasizing his or her individuality.(Csikszentmihalyi
& Rochberg-Halton, 1981)
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2.4.3 Interaction between objects and people
In Csikszentmihalyi’s research, they proposed three different kinds of transaction between the connection of person and thing. The first kind of transaction is aesthetic quality, aesthetic experiences are not only for art objects but a potential element of all experiences. Interaction of objects has some influence on the experiencers’
interpretation because of its own intrinsic qualities. Art objects have unique ability of producing new visual experiences, feelings, and ideas. For example, if a picture drawn by a child is cherished for this reason and not for what it looks like, the object is valued as a symbol of love or personal relationship. Art tends to be valued more for the symbolic context surrounding it than for the expressive possibilities of the object itself. The next dimension of the transaction between persons and objects is the flow of psychic energy, in Csikszentmihalyi’s research, a certain amount of
psychic energy is necessary when transaction occur, when it comes to psychic energy, attention plays the key role in serving to limit and direct psychic energy. When
people select an object, they choose it from the surrounding environment. For
example, people choose their furniture and decide how to decorate their living room, they pay attention to decide what they want to display for their guests. In this
condition, they use their psychic energy to choose something to connect to
themselves. The third dimension, the goal of transactions is related to the outcome of the transaction, these transactions reveal intentions or goal-directed purposes.
The intention in the meaning of cherished possessions should also be take into account. Their goal or what they care about determines their behaviors, the process of cultivation is motivated by belief in goals held to be ultimate by individuals. There are different kinds of goal, any ultimate beliefs, like their religion, love, moral
standard or truth can provide a energy for individuals to link with the objects.
2.5 Time related design
When people preparing this memorial object, there is no specific function of this object. The function of this product is highly related to time, it encourages users to reflect and think about themselves to enrich the content of the product. In Hallnäs &
Redström’s research, they explain as following:
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When computers become increasingly ubiquitous, some of them will turn from being tools explicitly used in specific situations to being more or less continuously present as a part of a designed environment. One of the aspects of this transition is that the time perspective changes from simply encompassing the moment of explicit use to the longer periods of time associated with dwelling.(Hallnäs & Redström, 2001)
Good design was defined as tools that are easy to use, easy to learn, efficiency and immediate results. Slow technology is that we should use slowness in our design and give people time to think and reflect. Using slow technology should not be time consuming but stretches time and slow thing down. In Hallnäs & Redström’s
research, the basic principle of slow technology to amplify the presence of things to make them into something more than just a silent tool for fast access to something else. When it comes to digital media, it is easy to produce some visual products, but we should slow it down and preserve some space for users to dialogue with
products.
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Chapter 3 Methodology
3.1 Research structure
In this research, objects and intimate people were used as a starting point, through a systematic user study process; people’s needs can be explored when they are
preparing the gift for their loved ones. Why people left something for their loved ones and what was the meaning behind the gift can be found.
Due to the sensitivity of such topic, especially in Taiwan, where most people regard death as a taboo and avoid talking about that. To deal with this dilemma, the target users were defined as those who have already purchased before-death contract, with the assumption that they have already thought of death before and made some preparations.
For the purpose of obtaining a thorough understanding of users, as well as their perspectives, related values and experiences, this project was carried out through two stages. Firstly, in-depth interviews were conducted to understand users’
motivations of leaving things and their expectations of these artifacts. In order to make user to be prepared, respondents were asked to imagine preparing a final gift to their loved ones before the interview. Through the interview, the reason behind their opinion toward death could be collected. In this stage, existing services are also used to concrete people’s idea and opinions, and also their preference. Secondly, it was assumed that these objects are highly related to people’s daily life and the intimate persons around them, therefore, probes were used to collect the important person and objects in order to realize the context of their motivation to leave the objects behind. Respondents were also asked to prepare a last gift for their loved ones. By taking down the process by camera or diary, there was a chance to observe their purpose and the difficulties they met.
In this probe, it was also assumed that people care about preserving themselves, therefore, their personal lifestyle and what object they want to keep as a symbol of themselves were also collected. These objects can be used to represent themselves or represent their concerned of the family, as Csikszentmihalyi’s research, the connection between the user and the object and their loved one was clarified in this
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research. Through different user research method, their opinions and the objects in their life are collected.
Fig 3-1 Research structure 3.2 In-depth interviews
The first part of the study was interviews about leaving memorial objects and preparing a last gift for the loved ones. In the interviews, two kinds of users were defined, "expert", people who have already thought of leaving something for their loved ones and having a plan for the gift; through interviewing “expert” participants,
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their opinions and experiences about preparing this gift was collected. The other kind of user is "everyman", people who did not have this situation in their minds before; they did not have a clear vision, but still have some preference about this gift.
In this research, one of the participants in the interview is a cancer patient, she was regarded as an “expert” and the interview focused on her experiences of preparing this memorial object, the other participants were regarded as “everyman” and the interviews were focused on their opinions and their expectation of this memorial object.
There were two parts of the interview: their opinions about preparing the relic and their views on existing services. Each session lasted 90-120 min and was recorded.
Due to the sensitivity of this topic, especially in Taiwan, where most people regard death as a taboo and avoid talking about it, in the in-depth interviews, on a specific group aged 35-60 who have already purchased before-death contracts was focused, with the obvious assumption that they have already thought of death and are more acceptable to talk about death. Seven people who have already purchased
before-death contracts participated, 2 men and 5 women, covering a range of professions (teacher, housewife, customer service, merchant, office worker).
Table 3-1 List of participants of in-depth interview
Number Gender Age Occupation
Participant 1 Male 35 Teacher
Participant 2 Male 44 Customer service
Participant 3 Female 54 Housewife
Participant 4 Female 53 Housewife
Participant 5 Female 62 Merchant
Participant 6 Female 53 Retired teacher
Participant 7 Female 57 Office worker
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3.2.1 Preparations before interviews
From the pretest interview, most of the users do not have a clear idea about the gift, in order to obtain a more in-depth discussion; four parts of questions were given before the interviews.
Table 3-2 List of questions before interviews
Number Question
Question 1 If you want to give your loved ones a gift before you leave, who will you choose to give this present?
Question 2 Please try to imagine this gift, what will it be?
-Will the gift changed with the different target?
-What will you do to make the gift more meaningful?
Question 3 In addition to physical gift, what contents will you leave?
-In the process of preparing the gift, what data will be necessary to collect?
-What is the purpose of collecting these data?
Question 4 What situation you want when your loved ones get the gift?
3.2.2 Interview Part 1 - Interview with their personal experiences and opinions The interviews were started by questioning participants about the most precious things or the important person in their lives. Participants were asked about what they wanted to prepare for their loved ones and what contents they would use. The interview also focused on their reasons for leaving such a relic behind. There were five sections in the interviews. Firstly, participants were asked about their personal experiences and their motivations of buying the before-death contract, in this part, the main task was to understand their feelings and explore their need toward this memorial gift. Secondly, the interview was focused on the memorial objects, participants were asked about what kind of objects they will leave while they leave.
Thirdly, participants were asked about their motivations about leaving this gift and
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how can they transform the relationship with their loved ones toward this gift.
Fourthly, in order to combine this memorial gift with digital contents, the content people want to preserve and the important memories in their life were also collected. Fifthly, during the previous research, people tried to gain control over other’s psychic energy, according to this, the emotional part of this gift were also concerned. In this part, participants were about their ideal situation in their mind when their loved ones get this gift.
3.2.3 Interview Part 2 - Interviewing with existing services
In the second part of the interview, 8 currently available death-related memorial services were prepared in case sharing, each service was presented in an A5 size card with 2-4 related pictures and descriptions of the service feature. In this part,
participants were asked to express their views of each service and choose three services they like and explain the reasons.
Table 3-3 List of existing memorial services:
Service image Name and description Service Feature
Vidstone
Physical, Combination of tombstone,
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A mail service that help people send mail to
Web Memorial Service Web-based virtual
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3.3.1 Introduction of cultural probe
In order to obtain the emotional context between the participants and objects in their life, probe was chosen as a method to collect their lifestyle and their cherish objects. Probes are design oriented research toolkits that are based on
self-documentation and invite users to share their experiences; probes are focus on users’ subjective world rather than looking for specific answers from the users. In Mattelmaki’s research, the most important reasons of using probes are enhancing design inspirations and gather information. (Mattelmaki, 2005) Probes are used to gather answers from any point of view especially when the design goal is fuzzy. Due to the convenience of media technology, the visual image of the real environment or object can also be collected easily to present the detail of their life. In the probes, participants are asked to note their everyday life, they can help researchers or
designers to discover new design opportunities and broader the research problems.
3.3.2 Workbook plan
After obtaining the preference of the users in the interviews, it was found that when people face death, they concerned about sharing their precious memories with their loved ones more than preserving their lives. In order to obtain more information about the interactions between users and their loved ones in their everyday life, cultural probes were used to gather the information, including the people they cared about, the important things they preserved, the situation of the final moment they want and the personality they want to preserve. For the sake of making users comfortable and relieved when doing the workbook, non-invasive strategy was also
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used in this research for better understanding the issue around death. A scenario of taking a train to outer space and never coming back was used instead of facing death.
Besides, in order to have diverse opinion, the age of our participants is from 25-70 years old and not necessary to have a before-death contracts.
Nine people aged 25-70 participated, 5 men and 4 women; in order to collect the things in their lives, participants were asked to take photos of the objects they wanted to give to their loved ones and the things that can represent them. In order to understand their preferences for using technology to enrich the content of the relic, participants were also asked to choose the technology they might use. The data of the workbooks were collated into flow models, with the object they chose and their motivations.
Table 3-4 List of participants of workbook
Number Gender Age Occupation Education
Participant 8 Female 28 Self-employed Master
Participant 9 Female 34 Teacher Bachelor
Participant 10 Female 53 Housewife Associate degree
Participant 11 Male 42 Artist Bachelor
Participant 12 Male 47 Technician Bachelor
Participant 13 Male 67 Retired High school
Participant 14 Female 52 Administrator Bachelor
Participant 15 Male 31 Sales Bachelor
Participant 16 Male 31 Travel agency Associate degree
3.3.3 Workbook content
There are 7 days divided into two parts in this workbook, in the first part, users were asked to imagine if they are going to leave in 6 days, what their wish will be and
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what are they going to leave? On the last day, participants were also asked to imagine if they had already left their loved ones, what messages they will send to their loved ones via this memorial service.
Fig 3-2 workbook package
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Table 3-5 Contents of the workbook
Part A - Before leaving
Flight Diary – 6 days before departure
What are they worried about before they leave?
Who are the people you most concerned about?
-Please list three persons who are most important in your life, and explain why.
-What do you want to say before you leave?
Is there anything you have to do before you leave?
-Please list two things you have to do before you leave.
How to say goodbye to your family or friends?
-Please describe the way you want to say goodbye to your loved ones, including who will you invite, where and when will it be hold, what will you do and what objects will you need.
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Flight Diary – 5 days before departure
What are the precious things in their life?
What are the most precious things in your life?
-Please take a picture of the most precious thing in your life.
-Who will you give this thing to?
Is there anything that can make people think of you?
-Take a picture of a thing that can make people think about you.
-What's the relationship between you and this stuff?
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Flight Diary –4 days before departure
Try to make user
participant in our design
If you are going to make a special gift for your loved ones, what will this gift be?
-Who will you give this gift to?
-What will it look like?
-What do you want to say through this gift?
-What are the functions of this gift?
Try to use the image stamps to collage the feeling of this gift.
-Please choose the stamp we provide that can meet the feeling of this gift.
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Flight Diary –3 days before departure
How will people enrich the content with computer technology?
Please choose three technologies we provided to help you accomplish this gift.
-What will you do with this technology?
-Are there any different if you use this technology?
Try to find some problems they may encounter.
What will you collect to during the preparation of this gift?
-Please take a picture of the material that you will collect when you preparing this gift.
Do you have any difficulty when organizing these materials?
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Flight Diary –2 days before departure
How to preserve their personal information
If there is a robot which can copy your personal identity, -what will you leave for your family or friends?
-What will you leave for the whole world?
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Flight Diary –1 days before departure
What situation they want when their loved ones get the gift
What situation they want when their loved ones get the gift