#usc msidbt

[desbiztech]

Acceptance

In the early pandemic, a friend of mine joined our weekly video call, shared that she had just been diagnosed with ADHD, and apologized for certain instances of her behavior over the years. Now that she had a diagnosis, she could explain why she struggled with time management, follow through, inhibiting impulses, and other executive functioning problems. As she described how her internal life worked and how she was working to address some of her issues and habits, I was struck with the thought, "isn't that how *everyone* thinks and acts?" I identified with her executive functioning struggles to such an extent that I brought it up with my therapist the next week, who literally said that she was embarrassed that she had not realized that I am a textbook example of combined-type ADHD. Because I excelled in school and because I am female, my diagnosis had been missed by every health professional I had seen until I sought out a clinic specializing in ADHD at age 27. I had a formal diagnosis within a month, and I have been dedicated to addressing my executive functioning issues ever since.

Here's an example of a behavior that previously was a "weird quirk" but is now explained as a coping method I discovered for my ADHD before diagnosis. My bookshelf is in the style of "cubbies". It has 5 rows and 5 columns. The cubby in the leftmost column and the middle row is where my keys live. Every time I walk in the door, my keys go there. If I put my keys down in another location, I will have no recollection of where I put them, and perhaps not even a memory of setting them down at all. It's almost like the keys will magically disappear from my hand, and I have to hope that they reappeared in the key cubby. I am extremely insistent that anyone who needs to borrow my keys (to get into the garage, for example) returns them to that spot, and I will recurringly ask about it to the point of their annoyance. This is just one example; almost everything in my apartment has some version of the "key cubby", and if the item is not in its designated place then I have no idea where it is. For whatever neurochemical reason, my frontal cortex cannot keep track of items, so I have created a rigid system to cope. If the system is disrupted by me, a friend, or a roommate, I am disproportionately thrown into disarray. There are many instances of small-to-others, significant-to-me issues that I face daily because of my ADHD. Needless to say, if I had an AR app that could carry some of the executive functioning burden for me, I would use it every day without question (as long as I did not lose the AR headset by failing to place it in its designated location!).

Part of my reasoning for returning to school at this point in my life is that I love and miss the experience of succeeding at difficult, collaborative problems. I look forward to seeing how far the AR team will go with our problem. Any amount of success would be delightful. Regardless of how feasible or complex our solution is, I expect to feel some measure of success simply by moving through the design thinking process with this group of people. I can imagine the mental state I would be in as we joyously celebrated our success. I usually find that these moments are accompanied with relief at the resolution of a big push to the final deadline (and sometimes anxiety at what comes next, although this is only our first term, so there's no "what comes next" like there was with my thesis project).

Being involved in this project (and this program as a whole) is pushing me to bring my knowledge of the cutting edge up to date. I have let my awareness of technological progress fall behind since 2019 or so. Additionally, this project is a great opportunity to learn how to function as the person with a technical background on a diverse team. It has already been challenging to work on a project that is tech-heavy but in a team dynamic where it is not appropriate to slip into technical jargon. Learning to work within these constraints would be immeasurably valuable for me in many of my potential future career paths.

#usc msidbt #augmented reality #design thinking

[ashleywolpertmiller]

It’s a good day

to start grad school.

#usc #msidbt #iovineandyoung #iya

[linnagriffin]

On Creativity as a Process

What Does Creativity Mean to You?

The universal experience of reaching epiphany in the shower is one that I believe is more common than believed. Where, after shutting down your laptop and transitioning home, you suddenly have the answer to a problem you were encountering at work or a retort to that off handed comment your coworker made while standing under running water. In that moment of mindfulness you have allowed your mental state to shift and for the influences and stray thoughts wash through you when all of a sudden, an answer to a question you had not asked appears to you. It is unannounced though not unwelcome. 

Creativity isn’t just the Eureka Moment that strikes you as you stand in your bathroom toweling off. It is only the illumination stage of problem solving process that you may or may not knowingly be working through. In this example your workday was the preparation and disciplined research, your commute and relaxation at home an incubation stage, before reaching this illumination wherein the answer to your question seems so clear. However, to assume that this is the extent of creativity is a fallacy. If ingenuity is the trait used reach your answer in the third stage of problem solving then creativity is the process by which you arrived there as well as the final step of verifying your ideas. This is because if you cannot execute your idea into something tangible you have no evidence of your creativity. Without such evidence you cannot be verified by a jury of peers as a creative.

In this manner of thinking, creativity is an endeavor that must be seen through to the end. It requires action to match the thought and a knowledge base suitable enough to give yourself the tools needed to fuel your innovation engine, a model of creativity created by Tina Seelig of Stanford University. From my own experience, this is part of the verification step in the process where I usually make the most mistakes. My knee jerk reaction in the past has been to doubt whether or not I am qualified enough to take this idea from the concept phase to the tangible through imposter syndrome. However, the desire of bringing an idea to term, whether or not it resolves the problem I started with, incentives me to cross the finish line. From this perspective, creativity as a process can be a powerful motivator as well.

Where the finish line is for the process is a matter of perspective and fulfillment. In some circumstances this can be upon the completion of a minimum viable project or in others a product that is ready to be stocked in shelves or launched online. This does not mean that there is nothing else to be improved upon once a deliverable is presented. The virtue of the problem solving process is that it is cyclical and the product may be improved as it matures with its audience. Through use, the solution you arrived at may be studied and prepared for the creative process to begin anew and a product, despite its rocky start, may be improved with new, innovative solutions.

#creativity #creative process #usc #MSIDBT #new blog #blog post #design process #creative thinking

[desbiztech]

Evaluation

This week, our team discussed how to best evaluate the solution and final presentation of all four teams, including ourselves. We created a rubric for assessment of the visual and verbal presentation, the feasibility and desirability of the solution itself, and the utilization of the creative problem solving process.

If we were to beta test our implementation with users, we would use metrics and rubrics to collect data. Since individuals with ADHD can have a wide variety of symptoms, we would have to create our evaluation metrics and rubrics to distinguish between "this feature was supposed to address my symptom, but it was not helpful" versus "I do not have the symptom addressed by this feature, so the feature is useless".

We would seek evaluation from ADHD experts and medical providers to understand if our solution was creating any qualitative or quantitative differences in their clients.

Overall, I would expect that feedback may prompt us to return to the ideation stage to generate different ways to address various symptoms, but I would be surprised if any feedback told us to change our problem definition. The small amount of feedback we have received has indicated that this general idea would probably have merit, but evaluation after proof-of-concept implementation would be essential to deploying a useful product.

#usc msidbt #augmented reality #design thinking

[desbiztech]

Iteration

Our team solicited feedback from peers and from individuals with ADHD. We had a short time frame and a low response rate, but we did get some quality feedback. The feedback showed that we were successful overall in identifying app functionality that would be intriguing to a person with ADHD. In particular, the "find my keys" functionality resonated strongly, which amuses me since that idea was the seed from which this idea emerged. We also received feedback on which features might be intrusive or shameful, as well as privacy concerns given the sensitive nature of the data which the AR app would process.

Our largest failure was the low response rate, particularly among peers. Perhaps more time would have helped, or perhaps this is the nature of an online program.

We did not have to pivot our overall idea, but we did pivot towards some features and away from others.

We generated visual assets for our solution by creating a Visual Value Proposition (VVP), modeled on a mental health / wellness app that we admire. We outlined a plan for creating high fidelity images for the final presentation, given user feedback from our initial sketches and renderings. We will integrate our various visual assets to tell the story of this product, from our point of view and from the user's perspective during the final presentation.

#usc msidbt #augmented reality #design thinking

[desbiztech]

Implementation

After selecting the ADHD-focused AR application as the idea that we want to proceed with, the AR team got to work on implementation. We used the following techniques to create a document ready for peer and/or user feedback: sketches, rendering, and solution translation & distillation. We completed another round of group work on the Miro board by posing ideas for implementation, sorting those ideas, ranking those ideas by sorted category, and selecting our top 5 examples (one from each category of executive functioning - planning, attention, emotional regulation, inhibition, and working memory). We then drew sketches and made renderings so that each category had at least one image. After writing open-ended questions to prompt user and peer feedback for each image/category, we submitted our initial implementation ideas for feedback.

Since the user experience would be primarily visual, sketches and renderings work well to communicate the user experience. Writing or video to accompany the images would best explain the processes and interactions with the technology, although this is out of the scope of this class. The ideal prototype for user testing would be a mock up of an app on an actual AR headset, but that is also out of the scope of this class.

It is important to acknowledge that the specific pain points and severity of those pain points is different for each person with ADHD, so people will respond based on their specific issues. One person thinking that a function is unnecessary does not mean that that function is unnecessary for every person with ADHD. For example, some people can't conceive of forgetting their medication in the morning, but for some people it is a reoccurring issue, despite their desire to adhere to their prescription.

#usc msidbt #augmented reality #design thinking

[desbiztech]

Ideation

This week, the AR group met to ideate together. The three steps of our ideation were 1) brain dump 2) group ideas by category 3) group ideas by user category.

We used our problem definition as the idea-seeking question for the brain dump. We set a time limit and did not set any limitations on idea feasibility. The specific techniques used were group brainstorming and asking "what if?"

Once the time was up for the brain dump phase, we grouped the ideas by categories as follows: motivation, scheduling, removing distractions, healthcare, ease of use, user Interface, reminders and cues, hardware requirements, and business models. All the ideas were sorted into one category. To sort these thoughts, we used the techniques of attribute weaving and forced connections.

Beyond sorting our ideas by category, we made three different "use case" scenarios. These were 1) an ADHD-focused AR application 2) an "adulting" AR application for the mass market 3) Alzheimer's-focused AR application. For each use case, we placed the relevant ideas into that category. Some ideas were placed in multiple use case categories, and some ideas were not placed in any use case category.

Overall, after this process, I have a much better sense of our thoughts and direction as a group. Our scope is still very wide, so it will be interesting to narrow down the application in the next phase, selection.

#usc msidbt #augmented reality #design thinking

[desbiztech]

Problem Definition

Collaboratively-written problem statement:

The following statement was constructed by the whole team:

How might we design a solution for adults with executive functioning issues that leverages near future AR technology to empower them to increase their quality of life as measured by improvements in executive functioning and overall well-being?

To reach this statement, we first compared and contrasted our individual problem statements (mine is included below). As a group, we were pretty aligned on audience, accessibility, and approach, with some deviances. The definition of "executive function" varies across the current research, so we also had somewhat varied visions about what parts of executive functioning issues we would address with our problem definition. We all think that it is important that this solution is accessible to those who may not be able to afford the cutting edge of AR hardware, so perhaps we will include something about this in our business model.

Collectively, we used many techniques, including boil it down, priorities, key words, don't reinvent the wheel, recipes and formulae, paraphrased connections, and more.

Individually-written working problem statement:

Building new, healthy habits increases quality of life but is difficult, especially for people with executive functioning issues since building habits requires good executive functioning; headset-based augmented reality platforms provide a novel method to implement habit building to improve quality of life in terms of physical, mental, and social wellbeing.

Things I did to get to that statement:

Boil it down (What is the real issue?): For people with executive functioning issues and for neurotypical people, quality of life can be improved by building habits (“putting tools in your toolbox”). Habit building is really challenging.

Priorities: Help people who really need a tool like this before the generalized “mass market”. Aim for adults before children, as there is already AR in the education sector.

Key words: executive functioning (working memory, inhibition, emotional regulation, planning, attention), quality of life, mental/physical/social wellbeing, habit building, conditions that co-occur with executive functioning issues (ADHD, autism, alzheimers, depression, learning disabilities, more)

Don’t reinvent the wheel: choose adults as the primary focus, instead of childhood education since there is a lot of AR in the education space relative to other areas

#usc msidbt #augmented reality #design thinking

[desbiztech]

Analysis

Analysis for our project was straightforward because I am personally in need of this solution, as detailed in my "acceptance" post. There were two primary topics to research. 1) What do we mean by "help people improve their quality of life"? 2) What is the current state of augmented reality in terms of existing software and applications? I researched what "quality of life" means in a qualitative and measurable way. The WHO and other large organizations analyze quality of life across populations, although it is important to consider the difference between analysis of populations and individuals.

I also included references about executive functioning since we intend to increase quality of life by reducing the time, stress, and mental bandwidth spent on practical tasks so that those resources may be spent otherwise. The book "Taking Charge of Adult ADHD" by Russell A. Barkley provides a great primer to executive dysfunctioning issues and how those issues manifest in adults.

I definitely have the "pack rat" style of research, which is evident in our AR research section. I collected as many examples of existing AR applications as I could and organized them loosely into categories. There are a surprising number of existing AR applications, although the vast majority of them are for use with smartphones, whereas our team seems to be leaning towards an AR application for an AR headset. Interestingly, it does not seem as if AR has moved forward much since I was more keyed into the field when I had an office next to an AR researcher in 2018. When the next generation of hardware is released in the upcoming year or two, I expect a proliferation of AR in way that, frankly, I thought would have already happened.

Most of my research was conducted by searching on the internet, but I did also talk to people in my life about their struggles and their solutions to those struggles. While our idea was inspired by the executive functioning issues directly stemming from ADHD, all people struggle with the routine, administrative tasks in life, regardless of their neurodivergence. Doing a brief "user survey" of my friends and housemates resulted in some interesting thoughts and possible research directions.

In terms of insights, since AR has not proliferated yet, there are a lot of "low hanging fruit" types of application to be developed. When AR hits the mass market, there will be a huge number of applications that need to be developed, similar to how applications were developed en masse after the release of the iPhone in the 2000s. The timing of our idea is advantageous, given that the AR headset hardware will be (theoretically) imminently released.

#usc msidbt #design thinking #augmented reality

[desbiztech]

Exploring Creativity

To me, creativity is rooted in the resilient, courageous exploration of thought, emotion, or action. There are two primary categories of creativity: creative problem solving and creative output.

Creative problem solving refers to the art and science of answering a prompt. My prior engineering curriculum emphasized the importance of a flexible, openminded approach to problem solving as opposed to rote memorization and regurgitation. We were encouraged to bring equation sheets to exams to minimize the time spend memorizing and maximum the time spent considering, internalizing, and truly understanding the subject matter. An interesting approach that ultimately failed was prized equal to or higher than a routine approach resulting in mild success. Creative problem solving describes an approach and an attitude which can be applied across all disciplines and throughout life.

Creative output is the act of "making art" in the broadest interpretation of that phrase. Traditional art forms such as painting or singing are obvious examples, but cutting-edge, risque, or challenging forms of artistic expression are just as relevant. The hobby of "making" is a specific subset of "making art" which refers to fabric arts, 3D printing, wood and metal work, and other physical crafts. My creative output is largely in the "making" category, so my mind immediately pictures those types of projects when exploring the concept of creativity.

#usc msidbt #creativity

[ashleywolpertmiller]

On creativity

“True innovators, true entrepreneurs, are not puzzle-makers—they’re quilt-makers.”

- Tina Seelig

Creativity transcends the rote, prescribed, plug-and-play methodology that defines much of our daily lives. Undoubtedly, the constructs by which we live and move are beneficial and purposeful. For example, the systems we adopt for cooking our food, navigating city streets, trading in the marketplace—are valuable and necessary. But creativity pushes and pulls at normative ideas and actions to form new ways of operating within, perceiving, describing, and experiencing life. Whether for enjoyment, social progress, political engagement, connection, or some other end, creative enterprises hold the potential to enhance the human experience and push us toward new ways of relating to ourselves, one another, and our world. Creative enterprises call into question (at times controversially so) normative ways of being. They push us toward new ways of existing both collectively and individually. They may overturn established systems and long-held ideas and produce new processes, ideas, and products by which we experience life—and then, at times, this new experience becomes the norm, and the creative process begins anew. What a gift it is to contribute to the human experience in this way! What a gift to be a collaborator. A disrupter. A co-creator.

#iya #usc #msidbt #iovineandyoung