Cultural Probes Summary The cultural probes are designerly research methods used to provoke and generate ideas and inspiration about the study at hand. For this study, we wanted to know the factors that lead to social isolation, how people cope with feeling isolated and the severity of this problem among adults. The probes were designed to tap into our participants’ creative and reflective sensibilities to gently and subtly inquire about their most isolated moments, how they verbalized their feelings, the representations they made of their virtual selves, and the interactions they make with other people. They were distributed on September 30, 2019, and collected on October 9, 2019, left with the participants for a total of 8-9 days. Participants: Our participants were adults aged 23-31, many of them are foreign, postgraduate students. One of our participants is a local Hong Kong citizen. These are adults navigating new lives and recent socio-political events in Hong Kong. They are also frequent internet users.
Figure 1 Participants’ genders and age
Participant 1 is a 29-year-old German student who is in a long-distance relationship with his girlfriend in Shenzen. He is curious, introverted, but driven to succeed. He takes photographs as a hobby and he makes it a habit to capture interesting moments he encounters in Hong Kong, from everyday moments to scenes of protest and interesting buildings. Participant 2 is a 31-year-old female Hong Kong local who has been working for several years before studying again as a postgraduate student. She is a socially-conscious woman who is opinionated and helpful to anyone, including strangers. These days she experiences a lot of stress due to her school work, as well as the tense social situation in Hong Kong. Participant 3 is a 23 year old female postgraduate student from mainland China. She is sensitive, talkative, and friendly. She is interested in fashion and make-up to present herself in the best way she can. Aside from these, she is also an illustrator who likes to draw in her spare
SD5527 Graduate Studio I
Studying Internet-related social isolation and pressure in adults
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