Briefly share your experience going through Dialogue with Time. What were some of the feelings, thoughts, challenges and insights gained while role playing an elderly person?

I think Dialogue with Time was a very meaningful and thought provoking exhibition. It first highlights how ageing is a slow process that is happening at every moment and second of our lives. It brings light to things that we may not realise such as the extent of deterioration in our abilities to carry out activities, both mentally and physically. Since ageing is inevitable, the exhibition gave me a peak into how life could be as I age, allowing me to experience the problems I may face in the future and the drastic difference in capabilities. Through the experience, I felt that I could begin to empathize with my grandparents especially through the interactive games and “becoming them”. I started to wonder, if I could not successfully complete the stimulated activities, how can I blame the elderly for not being able to carry out the same task in greater adversity?

 

Drawing on your experience, can you think and list some of the benefits inherent in the design research technique of role playing?

The technique of role playing allows one to be placed in the shoes of others under similar contexts. By going through the situation through role playing, one’s thought processes becomes that of the person we are role playing. This allows us to better understand the actions as a consequence of one’s thoughts. We will then be able to gain empathy for the individual and understand their considerations and why they make such decisions despite how we sometimes view them as unreasonable actions. At the same time, role playing can also increase interactivity for the audience which will then allow for a stronger personal experience and therefore a more enriching and memorable experience.

Can you think of some contexts where role-playing can be useful to help discover and define design challenges or contribute to the development of design solutions? 

I think such role-playing has the greatest benefit in allowing for other’s to be in another individual’s shoes, thereby allowing individuals to cultivate the idea of empathy for the challenges faced by the elderly today and ourselves in the future. At the same time, role-playing allows us to anticipate and prepare in advance (eg. consumption of supplements). It is only through role-playing that we may be able to further understand the intangible aspects such as the feelings of disappointment, fear and insecurity, experienced by the elderly.

When we fully understand how we feel when we face with such challenges in the perspective of other individuals, will we be able to analyse critically as to finding out the problems. It is also important to empathise with the elderly and think of ways in which our design can help them not just physically but also be of use to their mental welfare and emotions.