design research

Williams and teammates studied how things heard influence perceptions of what’s seen.  They share that “Visual object recognition is not performed in isolation but depends on prior knowledge and context. Here, we found that auditory context plays a critical role in visual object perception. . . . we demonstrated across two experiments . . . that the representations of ambiguous visual objects were shifted toward the visual features of an object that were related to the incidental sound. . . .

Srna, Barasch, and Small researched the implications of viewing objects that signal the status of owners; their findings have broad implications for the design of both spaces and the objects in them.  The Srna team reports that they “stud[ied] the implications of status signaling for cooperation. Cooperation is principally about caring for others, which is fundamentally at odds with the self-promotional nature of signaling status. . . . we find that people recognize the relative advantage of modesty (i.e., the inverse of signaling status) and behave strategically to enable cooperation.

The Center for Health Design is making an interactive diagram available that can be used to develop behavioral and mental health environments.  It is available free of charge at https://www.healthdesign.org/tools/interactive-design-diagrams/inpatient-rooms/behavioral-mental-health-room  As the linked to website indicates, “Two goals are often at the center of current care models for behavioral and mental health: safety and healing.

Colenberg and Tuuli thoroughly investigated how workplace design can support worker health.  They determined via a multi-disciplinary literature review that “It is widely recognized that interior office space can affect health in several ways. Strategic and evidence-based design, including explicit design objectives, well-chosen design solutions and evaluation of results, aid realization of desired health effects. Therefore, this paper aims to identify possibly effective interior design strategies and accompanying design solutions. . . .

Jia, Wan, and Zheng studied how the way product ratings are presented influences product preferences; it is likely that their findings can be applied more broadly.  The investigators report that they “examine[d] how the shape of basic visual rating units (rectangular vs. non-rectangular) influences product preference. Seven experiments (and 23 supplementary experiments; N = 17,994) demonstrate a visual rounding effect.

Litleskare and Calogiuri looked at the implications of experiencing immersive virtual nature (IVN) during different seasons of the year. They share that “All IVNs represented late spring conditions. Measures included perceived environmental restorativeness, affect, enjoyment, heart rate, and blood pressure.

Johnson and Jabbari link the overt presence of school security systems to lower academic performance.  Their findings indicate that “In response to the continued reoccurrence of school shootings, policymakers have increased surveillance measures to ensure safer learning environments. . . . these surveillance measures may have increased the capacity of schools to identify and punish students for more common and less serious offenses, which may negatively impact the learning environment. . .

Chambers’ study indicates how evolving use of technology can influence sensory experiences.  The investigator found that “The way in which platforms curate and assemble the music they present plays an important role in mediating fields of artistic practice to audiences. The different curatorial logics of platforms help shape the way audiences understand the contours of a field of creative practice and the extent to which they are exposed to novel and unfamiliar sounds.

New research confirms the effects of physical experiences on how we think and behave and indicates the potential repercussions of conditions enabled by the world around us.  Investigators have found that “Dominant or upright postures can help people feel - and maybe even behave - more confidently. A new analysis by the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU), the University of Bamberg and The Ohio State University has confirmed what small studies already suggested. The team evaluated data from around 130 experiments with a total of 10,000 participants. . .

Research by Ustun and colleagues boosts our understanding of human sensory systems.  The investigators report that “The diet of pregnant women exposes fetuses to a variety of flavors consisting of compound sensations involving smell, taste, and chemesthesis. The effects of such prenatal flavor exposure on chemosensory development have so far been measured only postnatally in human infants. Here, we report the first direct evidence of human fetal responsiveness to flavors transferred via maternal consumption of a single-dose capsule by measuring frame-by-frame fetal facial movements. . . .