Project facts
The Female interaction is a 2 ½-year, DKK 4.7m multidisciplinary research project focusing on female interaction design for advanced electronic products. User-driven development methods and tools will be developed and tested – focusing on the demands and desires of female users. The project brings together development and market-research specialists, scientists and designers in an interdisciplinary collaboration. The project is co-financed by the Danish Enterprise and Construction Authority and has been initiated by design-people.
The project offers a novel approach to user-driven innovation in businesses by bringing together scientists, businesses, designers and market analysts for purposes of developing new process models and guidelines. These new knowledge connections will come to create new results for the benefit of the user.
What – Project goal
The project is aimed towards contributing to an enhanced insight into the dissimilarities between genders – specifically within the field of interaction with advanced electronic products. The results are intended to further the business sector’s understanding and handling of female users when developing electronic products for this target group.
The objective of the Female Interaction project is to contribute with relevant, manageable and practice-oriented guidelines for use in connection with the development of use designs for women.
- design & development guidelines on specific female demands, desires and preferences concerning interaction designs for advanced electronic equipment.
- guidelines for businesses – facilitating user-driven development methods of products and services when addressing female users.
Why Female Interaction?
The world is moving towards "IT in everything". There will be more intelligent technology in tomorrow’s products. This will result in more functions and increased interactivity – at the risk of some users being left out. Therefore, the user-interaction design of such products will be a key factor in a positive user experience. In order to create this positive experience there will be a need for more insight into users’ needs and preferences. This means that user-driven development processes will become increasingly significant.
Women constitute a user segment not hitherto explored with regard to user-interaction design. On the basis of research into the aspect of female preferences, the Female Interaction project intends to remedy this state of affairs by establishing a new set of guidelines for user-driven development processes.
The focal point of the project is constituted by the thesis that overlooked requirements and attention values for female users may be applied in the creation of generally improved use designs and, hence, more successful product concepts within the field of advanced electronic equipment.
How to obtain knowledge about female interaction – the process
After 2½ years of interdisciplinary collaboration between scientists, companies and designers, the project should end up with a disclosure of female-interaction preferences – comprising knowledge within the fields of gender and brain research, anthropology, sociology, psychology, computer science, marketing and user-driven design development.
In order to improve our understanding of the female market segment, the participants will also work towards an understanding of the contrast between men's and women’s approach to technology. The particular female characteristics found in the studies will be used as a basis for selecting and developing user-driven process models and methods.
The case products of the involved companies will be analysed and tested for purposes of developing new user interaction concepts which will meet women’s demands and desires with respect to user-interaction designs of advanced electronic products. The new concepts will be tested and evaluated in an international context.
The cooperation between researchers, companies, market analysts and designers will take the project from theoretical knowledge to validated practical solutions which can be actively and directly used by the companies.