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Renedo Illarregi, Erika
(2018).
URL: https://research.shu.ac.uk/design4health/publicati...
Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to present the initial theoretical work undertaken in a PhD project which aims to understand co-design in the context of mental health, in particular the effects that designing has on participants with mental health problems, and the role that uncertainty may have on facilitating change in this context. The project was motivated by a series of co-design workshops that the author had facilitated in the past (20142017) with people with mental health problems who had reported some benefits. This experience suggested that by engaging with the inherently uncertain process of co-design in a calm and creative environment, new patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving may begin to emerge, often resulting in some progress in participants’ recovery. In this paper, an interdisciplinary review of relevant literature is presented alongside a speculative discussion of how and why designing may have an impact on mental health, specifically looking at the potential role of uncertainty in this process. We propose that uncertainty could be a key concept both as a potential explanatory factor of why change may occur in participants, and as a generative tool when drafting design activities for this target group. This review and discussion will inform the design activities that will take place in the collaborating mental health organization following successful ethics approval. Following an abductive approach, analysis will be oriented towards explaining what is observed in the co-design workshops, to generate an initial theoretical understanding of the mechanisms at play. The outcomes of the research should shed some light on the effects that designing could have in facilitating psychological change, and our understanding of uncertainty both in relation to design and psychology.
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)
