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WHISPER: We create - Aesthetic driven norm critical service design innovation in health care context

Reference number
Coordinator Konstfack
Funding from Vinnova SEK 298 100
Project duration January 2016 - June 2016
Status Completed
Venture 2014-06304-en

Purpose and goal

We are in the preliminary phase of our study aimed at developing methods combining service design, norm critique & aesthetics for a health care context. Our goal of identifying gender norms has shown the affect norms have on priorities in health care and design. Also the new aesthetic lab session for elderly women concerning patient experience and hospital discharge process was successful. Through the use of physical metaphors in handcrafting, the participants & our design partners, gained insights into problems of discrimination elderly female patient´s can encounter.

Expected results and effects

Our results from combining sensitizing labs with a genus-dichotomy-method demonstrated, for our partners, that gender norms affect how we prioritize in service design & health care. The results indicate that aesthetics, as a lived experience, does not have high status in service design or health care. However aesthetics & emotional response are important for both patient & consumers. The new aesthetic lab for elderly women wove together learning processes from practical hand crafting procedures with focused questions about patience experience in a hospital context.

Planned approach and implementation

- Start identification of gender norms in workshop at Transformator linking sensitizing labs with genus-dichotomy-method to raise the awareness of aesthetics as a lived multiple senses experience & a provocative approach to initiate social interaction. - Initiate the identification of gender norms in a patient discharge process and prepare our partners. Report of Arvika hospital´s discharge processes, including patient & staff interviews, written by Experiolab. - Developed an Aesthetic lab session for six elderly female patients, based on insight from Arvika hospital report.

External links

The project description has been provided by the project members themselves and the text has not been looked at by our editors.

Last updated 25 November 2019

Reference number 2015-06776

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