1. Sensitizing Vignettes for Retrieving Rich Data
from Self-Reports in Design Research
Mentor: Pieter Desmet

2. Outline of the Presentation:
1. Introduction to the Research
2. Literature Overview
3. Exploration: Adapting Vignettes in Design Research
4. Application: Vignettes in Design Research (Main Study)
5. Main Findings
6. Conclusion of the Research Project

3. 1. Introduction to the Research

7. In short, in design discipline, there seems to be a need for a research tool
that gives rich insights about subjective feelings that can overcome the
drawbacks of the current methods used which are mainly consisted of
language problems, lack of support in sensitizing the participants and
recalling the past experiences.

8. ‛vignettes are short descrihtions of a herson or social situation that contain
precise references to what are thought to be the most important factors in
the decision-making or judgment-making hrocesses of reshondents.‚
(Alexander and Becker 1978)

9. 2. Literature Overview

10. Till now vignettes have been utilized in different disciplines and
studies such as psychology, sociology, business, management,
marketing, health and crime.

11. Alexander
and
Becker
(1978)
• attitudes of people
towards rape and
beating
victimization
Alexander
and
Becker
(1978)
• understanding how
employers consider
on-the-job drinking
by employees
Soydan
and Stal
(1994)
• a cross-cultural
social work research
about the delivery
of social services
Tran
(2004)
• to retrieve emotions
elicited by
participants about
the decision-making
processes in
management teams
Caro et al.
(2009)
• perceptions of
widowed elderly
women considering
their residential
choices
previous
studies
with
vignettes

12. ‛At 9:00 P.M. on Juli 21, 1975, a woman deharted a downtown dehartment store and hroceeded
toward her car which was parked on a side street. A man who was walking in the same direction
began to follow her and less than one block from her car, stopped her. The victim was
(raped/beaten). The assailant fled on foot taking with him the contents of her purse. Police
investigation disclosed the victim to be Rita Saunders, a (married/ divorced) 25 year-old white
female, 5'3" tall and 120 lbs. She was interviewed in the hospital emergency room where she
stated that her assailant was a (casual acquaintance/total stranger) and that she (had not
struggled with him/had struggled with the assailant, biting and scratching him). At the time of
the interview, Rita was wearing a (halter top and shorts/ flowered print dress). Medical
examination disclosed that she had (sustained minor scratches and bruises/had severe lacerations
and a broken jaw) as a result of the attack. Anthony Simon, 5'11", 180 lbs. White male was later
apprehended and charged with (rahe/assault).‚
(Alexander and Becker 1978)

13. ‛At 9:00 P.M. on Juli 21, 1975, a woman deharted a downtown dehartment store and hroceeded
toward her car which was parked on a side street. A man who was walking in the same direction
began to follow her and less than one block from her car, stopped her. The victim was
(raped/beaten). The assailant fled on foot taking with him the contents of her purse. Police
investigation disclosed the victim to be Rita Saunders, a (married/ divorced) 25 year-old white
female, 5'3" tall and 120 lbs. She was interviewed in the hospital emergency room where she
stated that her assailant was a (casual acquaintance/total stranger) and that she (had not
struggled with him/had struggled with the assailant, biting and scratching him). At the time of
the interview, Rita was wearing a (halter top and shorts/ flowered print dress). Medical
examination disclosed that she had (sustained minor scratches and bruises/had severe lacerations
and a broken jaw) as a result of the attack. Anthony Simon, 5'11", 180 lbs. White male was later
apprehended and charged with (rahe/assault).‚
(Alexander and Becker 1978)

14. Vignettes can be:

15. provide greater
realism
enhance validity
make participants feel
in comfort
reduce language
problems
enable recalling past
experiences
make the situation
easier to imagine and
put yourselft into
strengths may be directing
may be time-
consuming to design
the research
may be time-
consuming for the
participant
drawbacks
vignettes vignettes

16. should be representative
of the phenomena
should be realistic
should fit the
respondents
tone should be
compatible with the
research and the content
length and should be
appropriate in terms of
time
precise wording is very
important
criteria
for good
vignettes
Wason et al., 2002
vignettes

17. 3. Exploration: Adapting Vignettes in Design Research

18. Aim & Challange: using the vignette method in a different way & rationalizing the
method in design research
Vignettes
as
stimulus
Products
as
stimulus
Vignettes
as
sensitizers
Social sciences
Design research

19. The First Test |
Developing vignettes
• Emotion set
• Diversification of vignettes
• Wording & linguistics
• Product category

20. Emotion set: had to be reasonable
in terms of being available to be
utilized in design research,i.e, being
related to design & up-to-date.
• New Premo (Desmet, 2006)
• 3 vignettes for each emotion

21. Diversification of Vignettes:
• Focusing on material qualities of the product: material quality based vignettes
• Focusing on a feature of the product: feature based vignettes
• Focusing on usage context/situation: usage context/situation based vignettes

22. Wording & linguistics: were very crucial for participant involvement, intimacy &
truthiness of the self reports.
• First person: to enable the participant to identify himself with the user in the
situation mentioned in that vignette
• Informal language: to enable the participant to respond in an intimate and informal
way
• Short sentences: to reduce possible language barrier problems. & to keep the
attention of the participant alive by providing ease in comprehension.

23. Product category:
Mobile phones were chosen to be explored considering the involvement of wide
range of aspects that could evoke all the emotions in the chosen emotion set & the
familiarity with the chosen product category.

24. The First Test |
Testing vignettes
• 3 vignettes per emotion were written and the questionnaires consisted of 21
vignettes were handed out to 10 sets of participants, 20 people in total.
• The handed out questionnaires were 2 different ones to minimize the time and
effort per participant since one set is normally comprised of 42 vignettes.
• The questionnaires embodied vignettes that were written addressing a certain
emotion and seven choices of emotions, either hositive or negative, and one ‘other’
choice.

25. university
students
new
graduates
Age:
22-25

26. The First Test |
Results
• Language problems were still observed.
E.g. When the expected result was ‘sadness’, few of the harticihants did not select it,
but wrote ‘disahhointment’ in the ohtion hrovided as ‘other’, or ‘monotonous’ instead
of ‘boredom’.
This shows that the single word of the emotion itself could be supported by related
vignettes, as a double check in the following studies.

27. • The amount of the participants who selected the expected emotion was higher
in the negative emotions than the positive ones.
It was easier and clear to make distinctions between the negative emotions. However,
it was way more difficult to express the positive ones.
• All of the participants answered the questions.
The participant involvement was high, due to the previous decisions while
developing vignettes about wording and linguistics, as well as the product category.

28. So. . .
Another study was needed to be conducted:
• With the single words of emotions and related vignettes together, to examine
whether it would be easier to comprehend than this study.
• With different product categories since as the aspects involved in a specific
product category changes, the emotions that are evoked and the distribution of the
three types of vignettes might change.

29. 4. Application: Vignettes in Design Research (Main Study)

30. Would a vignette together with the single word of emotion would sensitize the
participant more than the single word of emotion itself; and as a result, would
generate rich insights for the researcher, and also the designer ?

31. Main Study
• 2 types of questionnaires were prepared for each product category:
questionnaire with the single word of the emotion and one related vignette together
& questionnaire just with the name of the emotion
• The participants were asked to write one vignette for each emotion.
• Each questionnaire was handed out to 5 participants according to availability, in
total 20 participants
• Coffee machines & epilators were chosen as product categories.

32. university
students
new
graduates
Age:
22-30

33. 5. Main Findings

34. • When a vignette is provided, people tend to write more personal experiences;
so richer insights could be obtained.
• Participants had difficulties to understand the meaning of the word of emotion
or to recall their previous experiences without the assistance of vignettes.
• Vignettes help the participants to better understand the meaning of the given
emotions in addition to sensitize them more.

35. • Vignettes do direct the participants to a certain extent.
• Participants mostly tended to share their usage context or situation based
experiences than the material based experiences.

36. 6. Conclusion of the Research Project

37. In conclusion,
usage of vignettes in design research in the manner that these studies
proposed can constitute valuable data and rich insights for designers and
design researchers while retrieving self-reports.

38. So, what can be next?

39. Thank you for your time and attention!