Dehydration is a common medical condition in the elderly. This deficit in body water increases the risk of illnesses and mortality. The human body has no way of storing water which makes consistent water intake crucial. Water plays a multifaceted role, from being the medium for all bodily chemical reactions to regulating temperature and ensuring organ functionality.

The challenges in the healthcare system emphasise the need for promoting independent ageing. With an increasing gap between the demand for caregivers and their availability, especially in countries like Germany, the healthcare system is on the brink of a crisis. The situation requires the development of solutions that empower the elderly to age independently, reducing the pressure on primary and secondary care systems. A significant observation is the decline in water intake with age. While younger generations have a variety of tools to monitor and motivate water intake, such products often overlook the elderly demographic.

This thesis introduces "Daria", a product designed for hydration self-monitoring among the elderly. The primary stakeholder for this project is the elderly population, specifically those above 65 years who live outside care institutions.

Context mapping was used to understand the elderly's daily routines and challenges related to fluid intake. Expert interviews provided insights into current medical practices and the nuances of hydration among the elderly. Functional prototyping was key in the design process, allowing for tangible testing and validation of design solutions.

Literature research revealed several challenges the elderly face in maintaining optimal hydration levels. Ageing results in a reduced renal concentrating ability, diminishing the kidneys' capacity to retain water. More importantly, a decreased thirst sensation in older individuals often leads to inadequate fluid intake. Other factors, such as urinary incontinence and social isolation, further contribute to hydration difficulties.

Various strategies have been explored to enhance hydration among older adults. While many interventions have been conducted in controlled environments like nursing homes, none have focused on home settings. Common strategies include verbal reminders to drink and providing a variety of beverages.

In conclusion, "Daria" aims to introduce a new product category to enable hydration monitoring for the elderly. By understanding their unique challenges and habits, this product aspires to motivate them to maintain optimal hydration levels and enhance their overall quality of life.

Gender stereotypical beliefs play a role in everyone’s life, whether people impose personal and subjective norms on themselves, or judge others based on these existing beliefs. Gender stereotypes present a limited and inaccurate representation of reality’s complexity and have the ability to evoke pain and backlash. The goal of this master’s graduation project was to increase awareness about gender stereotypes and the thereof deriving effects on people. This project is part of a double degree program, in which the masters ‘Design for Interaction’ and ‘Communication Design for Innovation’ are combined. This meant that the objective was applied in two contexts with both a specific target group, namely Dutch high school students (aged 15 to 18) and academic professionals working within the TU Delft.

Through a non-systematic literature research further understanding of gender stereotypes and the resulting impact on people was achieved. In modern western society, gender is generally viewed from a binary perspective. But gender isn’t a category with only two variables. The interpretation of gender is socially constructed, and can differ per culture and can change overtime. Gender stereotypes are learned from a young age, children as old as 18 months will start to comprehend them. This goes to show that gender stereotypes play an influential role during a large part of people’s lives. It also indicated that gender stereotypical beliefs are deeply rooted and unconscious, which makes challenging them harder.

Additional to literature research, empirical research activities were performed. These existed of a mini experiment in which eight participants were asked about concepts related to gender, three interviews with academic professionals and an exploration of currently available informative media for teenagers. The conclusions drawn from these empirical research efforts are as follows. When aiming to increase awareness, it does help to encounter multiple perspectives on gender and gender stereotypes. Additionally, it is beneficial to be able to communicate with others about the matter. The created design concepts aim to do just that and should provide the target groups with guidance in the process of increasing awareness about gender stereotypes.

In the context of high school students, the design concept created is a teaching method. In five classroom sessions teenagers are brought in contact with different perspectives on gender, can have conversations about the topic with peers and are guided in reflection. Between the lessons the students work on an individual assignment. To support the teenagers in their learning efforts, different teaching materials were created. These are for example games, a quiz, worksheets and subject inspiration-cards. For the academic professionals a dialogue intervention was designed. During a ten step process these professionals are guided in sharing a personal experience related to gender stereotypes. The aim is to establish conversation amongst each other about these stories. The steps of the process were based on a conversation with a dialogue expert, the method of appreciative inquiry and a three-step model from awareness to action. Based on initial evaluation both design concepts seem to be promising in achieving their objectives. Further testing could help to get an even better understanding of the usefulness of both concepts and could lead to design iterations.

The fundamental problem to this study is the fact that after the so-called honeymoon phase of a relationship (the beginning of a new relationship where everything feels carefree and passionate) sexual desire between partners often decreases. A large scale survey conducted amongst 920 people in long-term relationships showed that 65% of the participants thought they were having sex too infrequent. Stress, tiredness and the perceived pressure of other duties like taking the children to bed were the most common reasons for people to not engage in sexual activity with their partner anymore. Therefore the following design goal was formulated:
“To come up with a viable concept that is meant to allow long-term couples get intimate in a way that does not cause the feeling of pressure that any kind of sexual activity should be a follow up step. The concept focuses on helping couples to relax together mentally as well as physically, to inspire them to explore a new way of intimacy. This should be done by means of a physical product which fits the brand portfolio.”
A context mapping study was conducted with six heterosexual couples in long-term relationships to explore the solution space by answering the question: “What product or activity or a combination thereof can help couples get in the mood for intimate activity, when they are typically not aroused?” The results of the study showed that body massage, in combination with creating an ambience were for a multitude of reasons the most effective elements to achieve this goal. Therefore making and taking time together, creating an ambience and physical touch through massage are the fundaments for the concept: the Ignite.
The Ignite is categorized as a “sense toy” instead of a sex toy. It is a metal couples massager which is able to warm up and vibrate, in combination with a mood light which is integrated in the charging station. Because it is a mood light, the Ignite is continuously visible in the bedroom, in either its discrete (when the massager is hidden inside) or its non-discrete (where the massager is displayed) state. It is meant to inspire couples to take time for explorative physical intimacy, without the pressure of having to have genital focused sex.
The Ignite has been evaluated in multiple ways in terms of desirability, viability and feasibility.
Concluded is that the design goal has been achieved, for as far as the research done within the time frame of this project can tell. Further research should be conducted in order to optimize the concept technically. Mainly the context mapping study, in combination with the participants’ evaluation of the Ignite showed how promising the concept is. Five out of five were positive towards the concept, and all also believed that the Ignite would cause them to integrate massage more in their intimate life because of its constant presence in the bedroom. Therefore the overall conclusion is that the Ignite has a positive influence on the intimate life of people in long-term relationships.

Spiritual wellbeing is an important part of human wellbeing. As the field of positive design aims to design for human well-being, how may we design for spiritual well-being? As we address this question in a secular society, an opportunity is presented by a rise in practices that were not explored by traditional western religion but are indeed known to create experiences that are regarded as spiritual. For this graduation project, I looked at breathwork following the research through design methodology for my design process. The COVID-19 pandemic has affected students in a significant manner leading to increasing accounts of stress and even burnout. To address this, the design was aimed at TU Delft students. Embodying the research through design method, the final design is Project Vital presents Spiritus. Project Vital is research platform design researchers can use to produce knowledge about breath enabled experiences of which the first research through design artifact is Spiritus. Spiritus is a data-supported breath practice aimed at guiding the students of TU Delft on their journey towards inner peace. This practice is uniquely different as participants who start the practice, start the same with an understanding of how their mind and body respond to the breath through their data. This data is comprised of electroencephalogram (EEG) data and thoracic data (Expansion/contraction of the chest). While addressing spiritual well-being directly in a secular society proved to be difficult, inner peace, a component of spiritual wellbeing, resonated with the target group. Spiritus, here while addressing the target group also produces data, which is used to further knowledge about how breath-enabled experiences can be used to promote human well-being.

The close app is a concept of a mobile application designed to help COVID-19 patients feel less isolated and lonely, therefore, closer to their loved ones with whom they cannot meet. The main principle of the application lies in fulfilling the fundamental needs of the patients and its family identified throughout the research. An isolated patient feels detached from his environment and unfamiliar with the new one, which can be defined as a lack of relatedness. Other essential needs are stimulation - to be distracted and security - to be informed. On the other side, the family members want to feel close with their hospitalized loved ones. The identified needs are relatedness, competence - to know patient’s feelings and state of health and foremost to have a purpose defined as a meaningful connection and knowledge on how to help. The goal of the project is to reduce the feeling of isolation to Covid19 patients by creating an unobtrusive connection with their family and a warm home environment. The project intended to be a rapid answer to the current pandemic and resulted in the isolation of vulnerable patients. The process started from the market research phase, where the main categories of projects, concepts, services, and consumer products were evaluated. The outcome showed that the majority of identified solutions that tackle the problem of closeness are mobile applications. The main principles of interaction derived from the market research are: sharing the same activity, sharing an experience, evoke memories, share memories, develop a relationship. The exploration and ideation had been made based on those outcomes resulted in the creation of three concepts: Evoke memories, Ambient participation (share experience), Active participation (share an activity). Concepts were evaluated throughout the interviews. Additionally, participants were asked about the meaning of closeness. After every iteration, the list of requirements had been updated and led to developing two concepts the mobile application -Digital Closeness and the physical concept - Modular Closeness. The decision needed to be made; two concepts were evaluated using the Harris profile method. Results have shown the possible higher improvement of perceived closeness with faster development and implementation process than the other concept. The Close app focuses on the discreet way of sharing memories which are the source of positive emotions and moments to send short updates to the patient, that both can serve as a distraction for the patient. App provides the patient’s family with the purpose by showing them the importance of creating meaningful content. The patient is also able to send short reactions that will give the family information. Additionally, the Close app offers an ambiance connection that is based on the family location. The familiar picture will be displayed on the patient’s TV during his inactivity, representing the location of the patient’s loved one. Firstly, the concept had been evaluated with the AttrakDiff to assess the hedonic and pragmatic qualities and its attractiveness. Secondly, the evaluation was conducted with hospitalized ex- COVID-19 patients, a family member of the hospitalized patient, and the healthcare professional. The concept had been received significantly positively by all of the stakeholders.

It would be hard to think of someone who isn’t benefiting from their social circles and social interactions within them. The many and varied social interactions we all experience are intrinsic to nurturing and maintaining our social connections, which are arguably one of the core capabilities to which we can attribute our dominance as a species. In parallel, we have our capacity to develop technologies. Which goes from the first tools and deliberately making of fire to antibiotics and the world wide web. All of which undoubtedly elevated our quality of life in general.Still, in spite of all these advancements, we seem to struggle with the pursuit of well-being - to achieve a balance between our capacities and the challenges we face. To be in a state of satisfaction while still driven and stimulated. And to flourish.One can say that today we are more connected to one another than ever before, with hundreds of people one touch away in our powerful smartphones and computers. Yet we seem to feel more isolated than ever (Coombs, 2020). Even more now with the challenges imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic, literally isolating us even more.It shows that simply having the means to connect isn’t enough. It is necessary to understand what motivates us on a behavioural level, what makes us engage and maintain quality social interactions?This graduation project sets out to explore the experience of university students, in the Netherlands, during the Covid-19 pandemic. Aiming to be informed by the unique set of circumstances we face today, in the hope to design better digital solutions for our future. The project has the goal of assisting students in a remote study situation to be able to build and nourish their networks and personal relationships. The project’s approach is focused on qualitative data gathered in context mapping activities (Sanders & Stappers, 2012), combined with literature studies and fitting within a double diamond approach(TU Delft, 2019). In order to design for sustained well-being, the project follows the multi-stage framework for sustained wellbeing promoted by technology proposed by Wiese, Pohlmeyer & Hekkert,(2020).In order to understand the target group’s experiences, we have looked into their routines during the lockdown and collected their recollections of their previous university experiences. With the insights from the research, a problem statement was formed, leading to a design direction.The design direction was focused on stimulating and facilitating the engagement with positive activities related to the nurturing of personal relationships (Wiese, Pohlmeyer & Hekkert, 2020), exploring how to reinstate the drivers of behaviour necessary for the engagement with such activities in a virtual scenario.The ideation phase explored 10 different ways of virtual social interactions, which were later exposed to the target group for feedback and combined into one final concept: Atrium, a close-knit environment to feel connected and interact with your peers in digital university life.Atrium is a well-being informed digital platform. Designed to lower the friction in initiating social interactions between university peers. It creates an environment that conveys belonging and keeps you connected to the community, motivating students in their daily work and enabling moments for spontaneous and more natural online social interactions. Atrium means a communal space to be together and naturally connect, not only for tech-savvy and extroverted personalities but for all students.

As a part of JMP at TU Delft, we had the opportunity to design for implementation of sex education in Indonesia. We were unable to explore the culture of Bali together as a design team because of which we had our own assumptions, perceptions of what the culture is or could be. And most importantly in the project we had reduced a whole culture to a set of constraints we needed to design for. This was deeply troubling. So in order to tackle this issue of culture clash and the need to be sensitive to other cultures, this project was born. The cultural element of Japan and their design philosophy were an inspiration. Their design philosophy and culture are weaved together to form one coherent Japanese Design Philosophy. To address the cultural dilemma for designers, it was decided to bring design philosophies into this project so that one could frame design philosophies based on the culture they design for. The target group for this project was the Master’s design students of TU Delft from the Industrial Design Engineering department. The research began with understanding of existing design philosophies such as Japanese Design Philosophies, Bauhaus and De-Stijl movements, Buen-Vivir centric design model. These formed the basis on how the design philosophies manifested and how it was culturally connected with their respective cultures. Interviewing two design studios viz. Butterflyworks, Netherlands and Whitenoise Design, India gave an opportunity to understand the workings, the tools they used for designing and gave an in-depth understanding of their design philosophy. These case studies provided a strong basic understanding of design philosophy and when should one consider a design philosophy a design philosophy. Keeping this in mind, the next step was to see how one can frame design philosophies depending on a certain context and culture. This was executed by having design students from TU Delft undergoing co-developing sessions using sensitising material and insights from Cultura tool. Students from the sessions developed the design philosophies which were rooted to the context and the culture. These sessions were analysed to extract the process of developing design philosophies along with the content that required to develop the design philosophies. These inputs were further translated to toolkit requirements and interventions. This way a toolkit could aid the designers in developing culture and context driven design philosophies. The ideation for the toolkit began with ‘The Card Set’ which was tested with designers. Though it had some flaws, the participants were able to successfully develop design philosophies. A new concept ‘The Board Set’ was born which was much more refined. In order to make the interactions much more fun and meaningful, a third concept ‘The Block Set’ was developed. This involved exploration cards, blocks, response sheets. The designers would undergo initial exploration of self, culture and later develop the design philosophy as a team. This was surveyed with designers, who mentioned that the toolkit definitely provides moments of reflection and brings teams and cultures together without compromising on either of them.

The ongoing Covid-19 pandemic has led to an unprecedented public health crisis worldwide starting from the early days of 2020. Alongside the medical concerns, a set of measures called non-pharmacological interventions (NPIs) affected daily lives of people drastically, in turn having a negative impact on subjective well-being (Berg, 2021; Wang et al., 2020a, b).
One of the evident reasons for this is the obstruction of daily activities and disrupted routines of people. From a humanistic perspective routines and habits are built towards positive experiences as our behaviors are motivated by need fulfillment, and hence they are reliable sources contributing to one’s subjective well-being. Research by Desmet and Fokkinga (2020) states that there are 13 universal psychological human needs that are the basic requirements for the functioning of an organism. Supported by a body of research, these needs are ‘built-in’ to the human nature that fulfillment of them is subject to enhance a person’s feelings of well-being (Ryff & Keyes, 1995; Ryan & Deci, 2000). This project focuses on contributing to the subjective well-being of young adults in daily life in the context of Covid-19, and for this theory of 13 Fundamental Needs is chosen to be operationalized.
The dynamics of 13 Fundamental Needs were explored for future possibilities to operationalize the theory and to understand the daily manifestations of need fulfillment by collecting daily moments. Through this intervention research, how the theory can be operationalized was explored. The observations of the intervention using this need-based theory showed an opportunity to lead people towards new and fulfilling engagements in daily life within the limits of the current NPIs.
Based on this understanding a constructive framework, influenced by experiential learning model, was built on sustaining enjoyable engagements. According to this framework people would be motivated to repeat engagements either when they find or they think they will find joy through these engagements. 
Generative interviews were conducted with 11 young adults to understand the effect of Covid-19 on their daily lives and routines, and in terms of need fulfillment. These interviews showed five main influential factors within the context, leading to languishing: not feeling in control and not motivated to take action, accompanied by a limited perception of behavior space.
Personas were developed in order to understand and address each of their needs better. The framework was detailed further as the findings were implemented. This new layer added to the framework defined the point of intervention using a need-based tool as well as the moment. The scope of the project was narrowed down to converting daily activities into pursuits of joy. Design criteria was refined and design vision was set as: encouraging young adults who are languishing to pursue joy in daily life by facilitating an experiential understanding and exploration of 13 sources of joy. Towards this goal a concept was created and refined through an iterative design process. Cue cards under 13 categories were created that lead to authentic and fulfilling experiences that makes the user focus on each of the 13 Fundamental Needs individually through the same activity. The concept was tested as a card set through the final test with 6 users over the course of 10 days, and the framework was validated as the need-based intervention led to sustained enjoyable experiences. A last set of iterations were made to design the user journey of the concept better to accompany long term use. Unravel_cooking kit was created as the design implementation of the final concept: an explorative journey that aims to show how a mundane activity that has been overlooked can bear so many enjoyments.

Adolescence is a crucial development stage where both biological and psychological changes take place. Among the various transformations and developments, the discovery of sexuality and intimacy has an important role, especially from sixteen to nineteen years old. The construction of sexual identity is a significant bio-psycho-social development(Kar, 2015), however in Italy almost half of the teenagers have experienced a form of violence from their partners during High School raging from insults to physical aggression (Romito, 2013). The literature agrees that experiencing rejection is a common trigger of aggression with significant repercussions of mental and physical health. Therefore to understand better the phenomenon, its causes and consequences, a combination of desk research and field research was carried out. The results indicated that rejection is lived on an ego level touching the pride of people and therefore it is considered a taboo with strong effects on different levels of society. Based on this analysis, to improve the current situation, it was chosen to focus on the community level by triggering open conversation about rejection. All these insights gained from the analysis were presented to a team of experts and teenagers. Their feedback was helpful to understand the fundamental characteristics that the final design should have to trigger meaningful conversation around the experience of rejection. To discuss how media portraits rejection #FEIC is introduced. #FEIC is a service that provides teenagers with a showcase of media narratives of rejection and interactive activities. The showcase aims to get the teenagers familiar with the idea of media narratives, while the goal of the activities is to make them experiment with them. In the current development, one activity is designed and deepened to use media narratives as a trigger to talk about how society deals with rejection and how that affects teenagers and their thinking. Different variations of the activity were tested to understand what type of interactions were triggering more discussions. Moreover, to evaluate the overall experience and design features, the full service was presented to the experts through in-depth interviews. The feedback gained demonstrated that the use of media is a successful way to trigger meaningful discussion around rejection. The dialogue generated from the #FEIC activity was defined as “different” from what teenagers were used to discussing, “stimulating”, and “useful” to understand better the conditioning behind their judgment.

Due to the increase of political friction and terrorist attacks, the Netherlands Ministry of Defence (MinDef) is preparing its armed forces for combat situations. If these occur, a large number of victims is expected in a short amount of time, which puts pressure on the military medical chain. As it is crucial to treat patients as early as possible, low resource medical treatment facilities (Role 1 MTFs) are placed near the battlefield. Heavily wounded soldiers are transported to this facility, where they are stabilised in order to survive transportation to a facility with more resources. Due to the Role 1 MTF’s critical function, it is of importance that the communication of patient details is optimal, as it improves the patient flow and survival rate. Currently, the communication of patient details causes a delay in the treatment process. This graduation project aimed for the improvement of patient detail communication by providing insight into the current communication process and formulating a vision for future innovation. By performing different research activities, such as observations and interviews, an understanding of the Role 1 MTF and the used communication methods was developed. This resulted in an overview of communication problems that affect the efficiency of care and are experienced as frustrating. The key influence of these frustrations was the lack of situational awareness (SA), which became the focus of this project. To summarise the research findings, a journey map was made. The journey map provides an overview of the events that take place within the Role 1 MTF, the communication activities, the workload, and the cognitive load as it is perceived by the general military physician (AMA). It was decided to focus on the AMA, as this person has the role of commander and has to makes the medical decisions. Design opportunities could be identified from the journey map and were used as a starting point for ideation. The ideation resulted in several design ideas, which were evaluated on their desirability and credibility. The insights obtained from this evaluation were used to formulate a future vision, which was visualised in a vision map (figure 1).
The future vision describes three innovation horizons to increase SA and improve the communication of patient details in the Role 1 MTF. The first horizon describes how process innovation could be achieved in the short term. The second horizon proposes the adaptation of available technology, which can be implemented within 15 years. The third horizon describes disruptive innovation for the far future, where the Role 1 MTF will become obsolete.
In the end, this graduation project provided a tool to evaluate the communication of patient details in the Role 1 MTF and a vision for future innovation. These tools are the outcome of user-centered research, which makes them of value for the MinDef and can support future innovation for the Role 1 MTF.

Ability to provide the first aid is one of the most powerful skills which can save someone’s life. The survival rate of out of hospital cardiac arrest in Europe is only 9%, even though AED (automated external defibrillators) can be accessed in public places to treat it successfully in most of the cases. First aid training is recognised as the most efficient way to provide skills, knowledge and confidence to use AED devices. Laerdal Medical is the company which provides a wide range of training equipment and is specialised in advanced CPR mannequins. As the next step, they research and work on the new tools for AED training. The extensive research was conducted to understand participants, instructor and company perspective towards the future of the AED training. With the help of St John Ambulance in the United Kingdom, the field trip was organised to investigate their current methods and needs of first aid training institution, but also better understand the users by observing courses and interviewing multiple instructors. The research showed that the aim of the courses is to make students effective and not necessarily perfect. Besides, gaining the confidence to act is as important as gaining skills and knowledge. In that process, the huge part plays the practice with the device and the positive and constructive feedback from the instructor. As a result, the project focused on empowering instructors to train and support students without unnecessary limitations. One of the challenges is assessing the performance of multiple students at the same time and also providing constant feedback without losing track of other students. Laerdal’s QCPR (Quality CPR) technology addresses this problem efficiently, however there is no solution which can be applied while students practise the AED use. The concept of future AED training was created. It consists of two elements: the physical QAED Trainer and QAED Classroom app and can be integrated with the Laerdal’s QCPR products. The AED training device does not only provide the conditions for practice but also collects participants performance. The QAED Classroom app analyses the data and provides an instructor with the reliable information which student should be addressed and suggestion what feedback to provide. When an exercise is finished the detailed information about students performance is created. Besides, if the instructor will decide to share the visual feedback with the class, the special interface can be projected on a TV or projector. The concept aims to provide a simple and accessible overview of the student’s performance so the instructor will be less stressed to control everyone but also provide more time to give feedback.

At this point, around 280.000 people are living with dementia in the Netherlands and this number is expected to grow significantly in the coming decades due to the aging population. It is expected that by 2040 the number of people with dementia will grow to 520.000 and expand to over 620.000 people by 2050 (Alzheimer Nederland, 2018). This puts pressure on the Dutch healthcare system.Despite their impaired memory, people with dementia still have the ability to (re)learn tasks when addressing the memory systems that are associated with automatic processes and performing activities, which are relatively spared in dementia (Eichenbaum, Cohen, Otto & Wilbe, 1992). These tasks include everyday activities such as knowing how to tie your shoes, how to make coffee and how to walk a certain route.A learning method which makes use of the implicit memory is errorless learning. This is a highly structured learning method used in rehabilitation for people with dementia to (re)learn skills (De Werd, Boelen & Kessels, 2013). By regaining the ability to perform meaningful and important activities, people with dementia could maintain or improve their independence and quality of life (Cohen, Ylvisaker, Hamilton, Kemp, & Claiman, 2010).Within this thesis, the aim was to research the possibilities of involving informal caregivers in the errorless learning process for people with dementia in the home environment. The insights gained from this research are used to develop a solution that supports informal caregivers to (re)learn meaningful tasks or activities to people with dementia to maintain or increase their independence.In the analysis phase of the project, literature research was done on the errorless learning method to give an overview of how this method is applied in the current situation and which elements it consists of. Explorative research methods have been done to define what is needed to bring this method in the home environment and involve the informal caregiver in the process. This research consisted of interviews with experts on errorless learning and dementia care, hosting focus groups with people with dementia and informal caregivers, and performing two case studies.Based on the literature and explorative research, the most important aspects concerning the errorless learning process in the home situation were described by discussing the needs and requirements per stakeholder. These included the person with dementia, the informal caregiver and the professional caregiver who should guide the learning process. This was translated into a vision on how errorless learning could be performed in the home environment by visualizing it in a desired journey.A new design goal, opportunities for design, and design requirements were defined, which formed the base of the design phase. Individual and group ideation sessions were done which resulted in the proposal of a platform that was developed iteratively through low-fidelity tests, interviews and a focus group. Simultaneously the desired journey was refined.The concept proposal Leren met dementie is a platform that informs, educates and guides the informal caregiver throughout the process of errorless learning to (re)learn meaningful activities to people with dementia. It provides information on why this learning method should be applied, how to apply it and how to approach the person with dementia. This is done through a website, booklet, and application. Part of this website and application is an online tool, the Stappenplan maker. With this tool, a (printed) step-by-step plan can be made with pictures and instructions tailored to the person with dementia to use during the learning sessions.The concept proposal was validated in a focus group with the participation of people with dementia and informal caregivers. Secondly, the platform was evaluated with a professor of neuropsychology who is involved in research on errorless learning for people with dementia. This was done by describing the scenario as visualized in the desired journey and discussing the platform Leren met dementie to determine the desirability, feasibility, and viability of the proposal.Based on the validation, it could be concluded that Leren met dementie could serve as a base to further develop, discuss, research and test the possibilities of errorless learning for people with dementia in the home environment by involving the informal caregiver. However, more research is needed to evaluate the usability and understandability of the platform for the target group. Secondly, the effects of involving the informal caregivers and the step-by-step plan on the learning effects for people with dementia should be researched.

This project aims to design an opportunity for helping Catholic LGBT+ members to merge their faith with their sexuality harmoniously. To tackle this complex issue, a detailed research phase was necessary. The desk research analyzed the current situation of Catholic LGBT+ members in Italy. In particular, the research focused on the current position of the Roman Catholic Church, and how this influences the target group’s wellbeing. It has been analyzed the concept of spiritual abuse, how it influences Catholic LGBT+ members’ internalized homophobia and the consequences of these behaviors on the target group’s faith. Furthermore, this chapter determined how faith is connected with spirituality and religion. All these data created the base for the research in Italy.
The primary research investigated the experiences of Catholics LGBT+ members in the context. Its analysis created different persona profiles within the target group and summarized different dilemmas they experience or have experienced. These were used to decide a more specific direction for the following stages. At the end of the analysis phase, the project had a specific direction: Switch perspective of SMALL SIBLINGS from a God that condemns homosexuality to a loving and accepting One by nurturing A feeling of guidance by building up
a trustworthy connection with BIG SIBLINGS A feeling of belonging by associating them with people alike A feeling of hope by inspiring them by the experiences of BIG SIBLINGS A feeling of protection by providing them a safe space to relate with BIG SIBLINGS To help the designer achieve this, an interaction vision has been created, both to inspire the idea generation phase and to produce a method to test the final solution. During this stage, the outcomes form two different ideation session has been used to create possible design directions to match the design goal. Eventually, it has been decided to develop a digital service combined with a ritual: “La Corrente”. The solution boosts reflections of Small Siblings by providing them a space to interact with Big Siblings and to question negative believes they have towards their sexuality and faith. In the designed scenario, “La Corrente” can be downloaded “La Tenda di Gionata”, the main websites that Catholic Homosexuals use as a reference. After that, they get assigned to a Big Sibling based on personal information. When the time for the conversation comes, the Small Sibling starts the conversation by sending an audio message to answers to the question “Why do I think God loves me less as an LGBT+ member?”. Big Siblings will reply with video messages in which they share a similar experience related to that topic. After this conversation, Big Siblings provides material to Small Siblings for reinforcing personal reflections. Small Siblings will perform the ritual of “La Corrente” every time a negative thought has been changed. The solution was tested. The experience with “La Corrente” was positive. The feedbacks were analyzed to understand how to develop the project further.

Female sexuality remains a taboo in our modern society. Women feel shame and social pressure when vocalising their sexual needs and are judged when they express themselves too freely sexually. As our societal view is influenced by the visual design of products and the underlying message they uphold, appropriate visual design can positively influence the public attitude towards female sexual pleasure. Currently, in products and services for female sexual pleasure and sexual wellbeing, there is a persistent attempt to distance sexual products from the representation of sex as ‘dirty’. Sexual expressions are submerged in a posh/designer style, a feminine/innocent look or a clinical appearance. Thereby, an opportunity is missed to visually communicate female sexual pleasure to the consumer and to normalise the subject. When female sexual pleasure is visualised, it lacks a sense of nuance, diversity and inclusiveness. This results in a lack of resonance between product and consumer and creates a unilateral perception of female sexual pleasure. This thesis investigates how women would visually express their personal feelings of sexual pleasure. We propose a new visual language that portrays a variety of personal visual expressions of female sexual pleasure. This visual language is developed into a visual guide, ‘The Pleasure Gallery’, which inspires and guides graphic and product designers through the design process of visually communicating a realistic message from the perspective of women regarding their sexual pleasure. The Pleasure Gallery provides the user with visual stimuli that evoke a new way of looking and thereby create a ‘change in perception’ in the current visual communication design. When The Pleasure Gallery is spread among brands in the field of products for female sexual pleasure and sexual wellbeing, the aim is to trigger a discussion concerning the current visual communication design, leading to innovative designs that communicate a message that enhances female sexual pleasure. When designers start to work from the perspective of women regarding their sexual pleasure, firstly the sense of relatedness and attraction between product and consumer will be increased. Secondly, if female sexual pleasure is more frequently and positively portrayed, women will be positively addressed on their feelings of sexual pleasure and society as a whole will obtain a more open and inclusive view on female sexual pleasure. Eventually, this will contribute to the normalisation of female sexual pleasure and thereby create more freedom for women to express themselves sexually.

In low- and middle income countries there is a need for safe and affordable high quality surgical equipment. Nowadays, electrosurgical units are part of the standard equipment in operation theatres worldwide, since electrosurgery comes with many advantages such as reduced blood loss. However, the technology of electrosurgery also carries several safety risks such as alternative electrical pathways or current leakage which often have burn wounds as a result. The problem is that electrosurgical equipment was not designed with the low-resource healthcare context in mind. And as research shows many hazardous situations are frequently caused by electrosurgical equipment use in low-resource countries (Oosting, 2018). The aim of this study is to determine how the low-resource healthcare context triggers safety risks to occur. Therefore, the general technology related risks, the journey of the electrosurgical equipment in terms of activities, and the user characteristics are researched. In the user study special attention is paid to the users’ knowledge about electrosurgery. The research data was collected by conducting a literature study, and by using a qualitative case study approach. In a Kenyan national hospital fourteen surgeries were observed and semi-structured interviews were held with users of the electrosurgical equipment. The data was used to map out the electrosurgical equipment journey including all the phases and activities the equipment is involved in. Additionally, user profiles were created. The results show that the electrosurgical equipment journey contains following phases: procurement, pre-treatment, surgical treatment, post treatment, maintenance, repair and disposal. The main users of the electrosurgical equipment are the biomechanical engineering technician (BMET), the nurse, the surgical assistant, the surgeon and medical students. What is striking is that only the BMET learn about the principles of electrosurgery during his/her education.
The study results reveal that the interplay of safety risks generally related to electrosurgery, contextual factors, and user characteristics trigger several safety concerns. The risks lead from the selection of too high power settings to incorrect placement of the return electrode plate, and not knowing how to react in case of an system error. The study reveals that many of those safety concerns are caused by the medical staff’s lack of knowledge about the principles and risks of electrosurgery, and by an interface design that does not consider these user characteristics and needs. On this basis, a new interface of the electrosurgical unit and additional information stickers for safe equipment use are developed during this project. The equipment journey is used to pinpoint safety concerns and related root causes which are planned to resolve. Furthermore, the journey helps to determine where the design intervention should be placed. It is recommended to further develop the design concepts in the future and test their usability with intended users. The equipment journey for discovering safety concerns appeared not only to be valuable within this project. An evaluation of the equipment journey revealed that the tool is also valuable for other designers/researchers to empathize with the low-resource healthcare setting, and to gain insights into the journey of the equipment and the related safety concerns. Future research should explore if the equipment journey is also suitable for mapping out the journey and safety concerns of other surgical equipment.

Healthcare-Associated Infections (HAI) can occur when microorganisms spread between hospitalized patients. To prevent highly contagious or resistant microorganisms from spreading from one patient to the other, isolation precautions such as contact isolation are applied when patients carry such a microorganism. The first part of this theses describes how contact isolation has a negative impact on well-being on patients. The experience during contact isolation can improve by establishing an open healthcare environment and providing information during the full isolation process. Collective action theories appear to have potential to be applied to the context of infection prevention. The contribution of patients, healthcare providers and visitors to infection prevention can be stimulated by increasing community feeling, establishing connections between individuals and providing information about past actions of other individuals. Context research has been conducted in VUmc and results on the current patient experience are gathered in a patient journey. Conclusions on the current patient experience during isolation are as following: 1. a shattered sense of responsibility amongst different actors 2. different patient persona’s experience contact isolation differently 3. a difference in experience and behaviour of first time isolation patients and readmitted patients. To improve the patient experience during contact isolation, the second part of this thesis focusses on creating a solution. By combining the conclusions and the literature, a design vision is formulated: I want to increase the feeling of community amongst all actors in the contact isolation process, so that all individuals experience a sense of shared responsibility towards infection prevention in VUmc. A first step towards the design vision is created with the guidance of the following design goal: I want patients to develop a favourable attitude towards contact isolation during the first time into contact isolation by providing a tool that lets them experience partnership with healthcare providers and visitors in contributing to the safety of others. Building from the patient journey and the design goal, a solution, Bundel, is proposed. It aims to increase a feeling of shared responsibility amongst the different involved actors and stimulated collaboration between individual. Bundel provides necessary and desired information to patients and visitors at fitting times. The first time into contact isolation is slowed down by spreading the information a patient needs and wants over the isolation process. By providing all the information to patients from the start of the isolation process, they can discover the necessary information they are looking for when they are ready. In addition, visitors are increasingly involved in infection prevention, because the design makes their involvement necessary them. Bundel thereby stimulates them to personally find the necessary information. For nurses and other healthcare providers, Bundel facilitates the transfer from a ‘controller and corrector’ to a ‘guide and facilitator’ towards patients and visitors. Therefore, responsibility that currently mainly lies with the nurse, shifts to a more equally shared responsibility amongst all actors.

This graduation project focuses on separation anxiety in dogs, a condition which causes distress for both the dog and its owner and can lead to a decision for relinquishing or euthanizing the dog. From the existing literature it was found that one of possible reasons dogs have this problem is excessive dependence on the owner. Therefore the goal of this project was not only weakening the stressful condition of the animal, but also strengthen the bond between the dog and the owner and thus improve the quality of the dog’s life. To achieve this, the positive design approach is followed.

During the exploration phase different studies were conducted to identify wishes, needs, expectations and concerns of the owners and their dogs in daily life and among separation in particular. The main objective of these studies was to understand why some dog-human relationships are more successful than others in order to determine how design can help to improve dog’s well-being and optimise the relationship with the owner.

From the insights the aim evolved to create a new and meaningful ritual prior to separation. The intended consequence of the ritual is to achieve more predictable and secure interactions between the owner and the dog. Also it should help the owner to become more aware of the own caregiving strategy. Knowing this may help to identify the source of conflict, contributing their bond and having a positive effect on the dog when left alone.

On the basis of this vision, a concept proposal is developed. The concept is an illustrated story which serves as a mediator to inspire dog owners to create toys from their worn clothes. The toy can be used for an active play with the dog before separation and, by virtue of its scent, will soothe the dog when left alone.

Finally, the concept proposal is tested on its core assumptions. This helped to estimate the effect it will have on the potential users.