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Science Fiction—An Untapped Opportunity in HCI Research and Education

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Design, User Experience, and Usability: UX Research and Design (HCII 2021)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNISA,volume 12779))

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Abstract

This work open up a conversation about the opportunities that Science Fiction offers to Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and Design research. In doing so, first, it briefly challenges the term Design Fiction, an emerging concept with increasing popularity in HCI and Design research. Design Fictions are either, manifest design propositions, or intangible, imagined future interfaces, speculative interactions and would-be environments. Design Fictions as useful as they are, however, are not necessarily something new nor innovative in themselves. Speculative design and evaluation methods all have been staple methods of Computer Science research since the establishment of HCI as a discrete field sometime in the 1980s. Second, the paper proceeds to propose that the domain of Science Fiction could not only be useful, but rightly considered, as a legitimate field of creative inquire in HCI and Design education. By reframing the notion of Science Fiction from an ‘anecdotal gimmick’ toward an ‘area of study’ a novel, wide-ranging space for design inspiration, ingenuity and creativity opens up for conceptual exploration. We believe that such an elevation of Science Fiction as a serious research topic has strong potential to inform the Computer Science, HCI and Design research application and education endeavours of the future.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    https://slate.com/technology/2012/03/bruce-sterling-on-design-fictions.html.

  2. 2.

    And its many derivatives, among those discursive, critical or reflective design etc. pp.

  3. 3.

    According to some sources, Science Fiction dates back as early as 2AD with the Greek travel tale “A True Story”, a work consensually accepted as the first known writing with basic fictional elements, for example outer space travel and interstellar conflicts.

  4. 4.

    https://news.clemson.edu/tiktok-sensation-learned-some-of-her-iron-man-building-skills-at-clemson-university.

  5. 5.

    https://news.microsoft.com/innovation-stories/microsoft-mesh/.

  6. 6.

    https://physicstoday.scitation.org/do/10.1063/pt.5.9047/full/.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Communication and Information Sciences, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Honolulu, USA

    Philipp Jordan

  2. Department of Informatics Engineering, Center for Informatics and Systems, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal

    Paula Alexandra Silva

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  1. Philipp Jordan
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Hunan University, School of Design, Changsha, China

    Marcelo M. Soares

  2. World Usability Day and Rabb School of Continuing Studies, Division of Graduate Professional Studies, Brandeis University, Newton Center, MA, USA

    Elizabeth Rosenzweig

  3. Aaron Marcus and Associates, Berkeley, CA, USA

    Aaron Marcus

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Jordan, P., Silva, P.A. (2021). Science Fiction—An Untapped Opportunity in HCI Research and Education. In: Soares, M.M., Rosenzweig, E., Marcus, A. (eds) Design, User Experience, and Usability: UX Research and Design. HCII 2021. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12779. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78221-4_3

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