Using Design Fiction Memos to Analyze UX Professionals' Values Work Practices: A Case Study Bridging Ethnographic and Design Futuring Methods

Title of the Paper

Using Design Fiction Memos to Analyze UX Professionals’ Values Work Practices

Paper Information

• Subject Area: Research on values and ethical practices in human-computer interaction and user experience design
• Keywords: Values work, ethics in design, user experience design, design fiction, qualitative analysis, UX practices, corporate power dynamics, emotional labor

Research Background and Issues

• Identified Problems or Challenges: How to embed social values and ethics into technology design, the daily practices of UX professionals when addressing ethical issues in technology design, and how internal organizational power dynamics influence the advancement of values work.
• Importance: Social values and ethical issues in technology design and human-computer interaction are critical to ensuring fairness, inclusivity, and social responsibility in technology. UX professionals play a significant intermediary role.
• Research Motivation and Related Work:
  • Traditional frameworks such as "Value Sensitive Design" focus on embedding values into technology design but pay less attention to organizational and power dynamics.
  • Research on ethical practices in UX workplaces is increasing, but new methods are needed to explore the internal and external practices and perceptions of UX professionals.
  • "Design fiction," as a critical and future-oriented design methodology, is often used to explore ethical issues in technology but is rarely applied in qualitative analysis.

Solution

• Method and Solution: Propose a new method combining "design fiction" and "memo analysis," named "Design Fiction Memos." This method involves using fictional stories (e.g., emails, Slack conversation threads, fictional dashboards) as a medium to analyze and extend qualitative data, uncovering themes related to UX professionals' values work practices.
• Innovations:
  • Expands the application of design fiction from conceptual product speculation to qualitative data analysis.
  • Shifts focus to organizational power relations and technology production practices, rather than solely addressing ethical design issues of technological products.
  • Provides a way to present and discuss on-the-ground stories in the tech industry that are often difficult to disclose publicly.
• Implementation Steps and Key Techniques:
  1. Data Collection: Conduct interviews with 12 UX professionals and attend 12 ethics-related tech industry gatherings.
  2. Qualitative Data Analysis: Perform coding and extract preliminary thematic analyses.
  3. Creation of Design Fiction Memos: Develop design fiction works based on imagined scenarios and characters during data analysis for reflection and exploration.
  4. Cross-analysis and Feedback: Discuss design fiction memos with participants to enhance insights and iterate the research.

Research Outcomes

• Specific Achievements:
  • Developed four design fiction memos, including tools for tracking ethical activities, the role of a virtual collaborator "Ethics Tracker," and responses to value-related issues within fictional organizational practices.
  • Revealed organizational dynamics and power balance issues faced by UX professionals during values work.
  • Identified challenges of "emotional labor" and "invisible labor" faced by UX professionals in large corporations.
• Comparison with Existing Solutions:
  • By addressing the limitation of "focusing solely on technology design," the new method emphasizes the importance of ethics within organizational culture and power structures.
  • Through design fiction, the daily practices and emotional labor of research participants are vividly portrayed.
• Experimental or Evaluation Results:
  • Design fiction memos not only reflect the complexity and diversity of UX ethical work but also trigger new questions and themes in the research.
  • The method enhances the depth of data analysis through narrative and intuitive approaches.
• Limitations and Future Directions:
  • Limitations include reliance on the personal experience and perspective of researchers in creating design fiction memos. Future research could explore applying design fiction more broadly in collaborative or participatory studies.
  • Suggests exploring how this research method can be practically adopted in the tech industry as a tool to better disseminate knowledge on ethical practices.