Teaching (with) empathy and creativity in design. Proceedings: http://drslxd19.id.metu.edu.tr/

1. Teaching (with) Empathy and
Creativity in Design
DRS LearnXDesign 2019
Session 03: Paper 006
Ricardo SOSA
ricardo.sosa@aut.ac.nz

3. “I think if we made the oath to
first do not harm as designers,
we would likely never do
anything new. I think that would
be unfortunate.”
“I would hate for designers to feel like
we can’t ever engage with something
that’s unknown, because we’re worried
about what the outcomes might be.”

4. Empathy Creativity
Why this research? Because the connections between empathy and creativity are
often treated superficially and remain largely unexplored

5. Empathy Creativity
Empathy often addressed in design education, although usually with unsupported claims
Empathy in design tends to be extractive, utilitarian and politically naïve

6. Empathy Creativity
We challenge views of empathy as a useful means for “human-centred” claims.
We shift the focus to questions of “useful to whom, useful for what?”

7. Empathy Creativity
Empathy in design: a shift from designing with empathy, to designing within an empathic sociability
(Devecchi & Guerrini, 2017) –Empathy: the capacity to change with others.

8. Empathy Creativity
All human beings are born free and endowed with reason, conscience, and
creative capacities, i.e., free to imagine

9. https://mondoweiss.net/2019/03/hannah-arendt-would/
Hannah Arendt

10. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sartre/
Jean-Paul Sartre

11. https://outline.com/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivan_Illich
Ivan Illich

12. Empathy Creativity
Schooling, societal, and consumption structures often weaken and kill the creative power
of most people (Illich, 1973) in ways that are convenient to those in power.

13. The empathy-creativity nexus
• Both oriented towards change:
• Creativity: triggers change
• Empathy: gives purpose to change
• Both are innate human capacities that lead to well-being
• Both developed through social, experiential learning
• A key link: imagination as the source of “fellow-feelings”
• Both sustained by imagination:
• Empathy: imagination for consensus
• Creativity: imagination for dissent

14. Teaching (with) empathy and creativity
• A radical departure from banking education where experts
transfer knowledge onto students (Freire, 2000)
• To teach empathically opens a dialogue
• Studio learning: strong master-apprentice power relationship
• From teaching creativity to teaching creatively
• Teaching creativity requires/develops empathy and humility

15. The “nine dot” puzzle

16. The “nine dot” puzzle
Connect the 9 dots by
drawing four straight
lines without lifting
the pen from the page

17. The “nine dot” puzzle
Connect the 9 dots by
drawing four straight
lines without lifting
the pen from the page

18. The “nine dot” puzzle
It’s a trick! And it
makes most people
feel stupid and
reinforce their belief
that they aren’t
creative.
One single right
answer to a trivial task

19. Celebrated creators
•“Committed obsessively to
their work”
•“Egotism, egocentrism, and
narcissism”
•“Disregard for others, difficult
toward others, and frankly
sadistic”

20. Tensions, paradoxes, opportunities
Electrocution of "Topsy" the elephant
McNichol, T. (2011). AC/DC: The savage tale of the first standards war. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
www.history.com/topics/inventions/thomas-edison

21. Tensions, paradoxes, opportunities
Henry Ford receiving the Grand Cross of the German Eagle in 1938

22. Tensions, paradoxes, opportunities
https://mashable.com/2014/04/30/facebooks-new-mantra-move-fast-with-stability/

23. A (Prelim) Model
Fig. 1. Framework to examine empathy and creativity synergies and tensions by juxtaposing means and ends.

24. E1
Personal
C2
Historic
E2
Political
C1
Artistic
A (Better) Model
Framework to examine empathy and creativity synergies and tensions by distinguishing them as dimensions

25. A call for PhD research proposals
Research Questions
• “What is it?”
• “How to measure and learn it?”
• “How do they relate?”
• “Risks and opportunities”
• “What for?”

26. https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/mark-zuckerberg-testifies-before-congres-idUSRTX5LWXZ
Silicon Valley bros:
“If we made the oath to
first do not harm, we
would likely never do
anything new. I think that
would be unfortunate.”

27. https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/mark-zuckerberg-testifies-before-congres-idUSRTX5LWXZ
“1–2 of the original 10,000 NCEs result in a marketable product”
https://doi.org/10.1186/2050-6511-14-1
FDA New Drug Development:

28. Teaching (with) Empathy and
Creativity in Design
Session 03: Paper 006
Thank you