Design, creativity and innovation for societal impact
The shared perspectives of our four associate lecturers
EventJoin the bi-monthly live lunch meeting of the Centre for Applied Research FDMCI and the CoE Creative Innovation for researchers, teachers and students. Several speakers update you on current research, new insights and their lessons learned. This time, the Food for Thought is dedicated to the expertise of our four associate professors on design, creation and innovation for achieving social impact. The session will take place in FLOOR, on the ground floor of the Wibauthuis (WBH). The program will be English.
No fewer than four associate lecturers currently work within the Centre for Applied Research of the Faculty for Digital Media and Creative Industries: Jaz Choi, Elise Talgorn, Simone de Droog and Bin Yu. Even though their expertise is diverse, the common denominator lies in human-centred design and the social impact of technology, innovation and storytelling.
In essence, Jaz, Elise, Simone and Bin are all four focused on improving the interaction between technology (or stories) and people, contributing to sustainable solutions to complex social issues. Slide into this Food for Thought session and get inspired by their relevant message. Let's meet & greet!
Civic Interaction Design
Jaz Choi's research focuses on care-full design, a design approach that combines creative methods, a more-than-human perspective, inclusive co-creation, sustainability, playfulness, ethics and concern for health and well-being.
Jaz Choi is situating creative activities at the heart of social change and, for his work, often meets people with diverse opinions. These may be young refugees, but also homeless people, chefs, farmers, artists, scientists, the elderly and entire organisations from different sectors.
Together, they look at how various thoughts, ways, processes and systems can be adapted to create a more just future. A ‘just future’ just looks different for everyone. Therefore, what we end up creating may also be different in form; interactive media with AI, websites, physical artefacts and spaces, services, pedagogical strategies and experiences.
Storytelling for Social and Environmental Impact
In a world facing social and environmental challenges, how can stories help us reimagine our relationships - with each other and with nature? Stories have the unique power to foster empathy and spark imagination, creating connections that go beyond data or facts.
Elise uses participatory story creation methods to help people transform abstract or complex challenges into shared, lived experiences, with applications in user-centered and systemic design, as well as community engagement.
She will present examples of more-than-human storytelling workshops that bridge the gap between humans and nonhumans and amplify the voice of nature. She will also show how anti-heroes can help us rewrite our personal narratives with greater compassion.
Robots for Play, Connection, Comfort and Growth
Children today face numerous challenges that limit their opportunities to thrive – ranging from staff shortages in education and healthcare to increasing urbanization, safety concerns, and declining face-to-face interactions. Could robots offer a solution?
By bridging the gap between children’s digital and physical worlds, robots tap into their natural curiosity and create meaningful, human-like interactions through storytelling and play. In her research, Simone explores how emerging technologies can support children and address societal challenges.
During her talk, Simone will showcase robots like the Dream Robot, HARRy Robot, and Playbot, demonstrating how they assist teachers and healthcare professionals, inspire creativity, and promote social connection, fostering healthier, happier, and more fulfilling childhood experiences.
Turning Small Data into Big Impact
Heart rate is one of the most frequently measured data in our daily lives, collected by various wearable devices for health and fitness. However, these data often remain confined to apps with limited impact beyond personal use.
How can a small piece of personal data, like heart rate, be used in a broader context to create a greater positive social impact? Bin Yu offers his answer: by designing new meanings and experiences around data. Through Heart Bloom, he demonstrates how data can drive a series of innovative design practices.
During this Food for Thought Bin Yu will showcase his design journey, which starts with three minutes of heart rate data and culminates in a charitable fundraising platform that supports children with heart diseases.
About the speakers
Jaz Hee-jeong Choi is associate lecturer in Civic Interaction Design at AUAS' Faculty of Digital Media & Creative Industry (FDMCI) since October 2023 (at the Civic Interaction Design research group). Choi was previously director of the Care-full Design Lab in Melbourne and the Urban Informatics Lab in Brisbane and is known for his transdisciplinary research, involving people from different backgrounds and with diverse interests.
Elise Talgorn is from September 2024 associate lecturer in Social Impact Storytelling at the Creative Media for Social Change (FDMCI) research group. Her mission is to use stories to create new connections between people and the natural world and initiate social change, where a local approach can create a snowball effect.
Elise's research focuses on social and ecological issues, such as inequality, loneliness and ecological collapse. By fostering deeper connections between people and nature, we can relieve pressure and contribute to a more sustainable future. Stories help us revise and reconstruct social structures for the collective good.
Simone de Droog is also associate lecturer at the AUAS Faculty of DMCI (at the Digital Life research group) since September 2024, specifically in the field of Child Technology. With a strong focus on the interaction between children and technology, she focuses on researching how technology, and in particular social robots and digital characters, can positively influence children's well-being and development.
Many challenges in society require sustainable solutions, so interventions must be able to grow with children's interests, preferences and needs, which, as they grow older, change due to cognitive and socio-emotional developments, among other things.
So what we need are design principles for developing more adaptive (and therefore sustainable) interventions. Moreover, the increasing role of technology in children's lives raises questions about children's social and mental development, health, safety and privacy.
Bin Yu is a design researcher specialising in HCI and health technology. At the Digital Life research group, he has been recently contributing to the Interaction Design for Emerging Technologies research line as an associate lecturer since November 2024, with a particular focus on HCI design for data-centred and advanced medical systems.
AI has become a powerful tool in computer-aided diagnosis. Yet it remains challenging to apply AI solutions widely in healthcare. This is often due to overconfidence or lack of confidence in AI, as well as poor integration with existing workflows.
Bin's research efforts to date have led to a number of crucial research questions that he continues to explore at Digital Life, such as:
- How can we integrate AI into current healthcare workflows in such a way that work can be done more efficiently and effectively?
- How can we smartly divide the tasks of AI and doctors so that they can work better together? And how can we develop techniques that help users better understand what AI can and cannot do?
- How does AI make decisions that will increase trust in AI and its successful application in healthcare?
This Food for Thought is a cooperation between:
The 3 research groups:
The Centre of Expertise Creative Innovation
If you are curious what exactly the CoE Creative Innovation does, you can find more information on the website.
The Centre for Applied Research FDMCI
For a complete picture of our research centre, please visit the homepage.