Rationale
I decided that using cultural probes would be a valuable method of inquiry for my user group. Designing the probes was a difficult process as generally probes are used to gain insight into lifestyle in order to inform the design process. In this case I wanted to engage with the users in more depth and felt that this was a good way of gaining insight into personal anxieties and fears.

The main attraction to using probes is the experimental nature of them. Although they are perhaps not a highly reliable source of data, I think the individuality of each probe pack makes for interesting and diverse information.  I also like the in depth nature of analysing the practises of everyday life. In a way probes are just an observation of how people live and respond to certain situations or environments.

It has been said that designers use probes to ‘immerse’ themselves in their user group, something that I think is even more appropriate when applied to a research project. To get as broad a scope as possible I wanted to attempt many varied approaches to gathering research. Although the outcome of cultural probes could have been disappointing I felt it was a worthwhile experiment as participants often engage on a more personal level than with more direct methods such as an interview. This seems to be due to the informal nature and also the period of time that is given to allow for thought.

Application
I designed my own cultural probes throughout the initial stages of my project. I found it quite difficult to determine exactly what questions I wanted answered and so took a while to finalise exactly what should be included..

I asked around 10 people to complete the probes in total. I think it would have been most beneficial to get a range of participants who have varying social characteristics but it was difficult to find people willing to participate. However I think the results showed a broad scope of anxieties and fears. While designing the probes I wanted to really understand the reasons behind fear and anxiety and how they affect people rather than discover specific fears that individuals may have.

When designing the cultural probe pack I thought about what information I wanted to find out. At the early stages it was most important to observe rather than query the participants too much. For that reason the probes should be open ended and allow their user to contribute ideas.

The main component of the probe pack is a booklet with 3 separate sections titled anxious space, feelings of fear and capturing your own fear. The first section asks participants to give their opinion on photos of different environments that could provoke anxiety or fear. ‘Feelings of fear’ is basically a questionnaire probing the root of anxiety and its effects on individuals. The last section describes how to use the camera and voice recorder, and space to document collected information. 

I included a disposable camera to capture images of the participants fear or anxiety. This is not limited to a real depiction of a physical fear, but instead any photo that would sum up the feeling of anxiety, what provokes it, or a reminder of a fear or its consequences. I did not describe this to the participants because I didn’t want them to feel restricted in what they could photograph. The instructions on the camera are:
“take one photo
or a series of photos
that represent
your fear or anxiety”
This could be too vague a description but I think it is best to keep the instructions short and concise so that there is no confusion.

Also included in the pack is a 10 second voice recorder. This was more of an experiment into how the participants react to different forms of media. I do think that collecting many different types of data will be advantageous in the long run, however, I am not sure that this specific recorder will do justice to the feelings of the participants. The quality of the audio will be poor and the maximum recording is 10 seconds. The reason I felt I should include it was to test how responsive users are to restrictive probes, hoping that the outcome will be creative and original. I asked that participants capture how they feel about their anxiety or a description of what they are scared of.

Result
I hoped that the outcome of this experiment would give me an idea of what to expect from users. As well as searching for answers, I wanted to use the probes to test this approach. It is difficult to predict what methods of investigation will be effective, especially with such a random collection of participants. In the end the probe booklet was very successful. The returned packs provided a rich collection of thoughts and emotions that gave me an insight into the minds of those who contributed.

The returned information helped to confirm a lot of ideas that I had previously. Most people talked about their fears affecting their lives daily and also feeling alone in that they couldn’t or didn’t want to speak to anyone about it. Of those who said that they did speak openly about their fears, most felt that it did help them to feel better about the situation.

Unfortunately the participants didn’t use the other items in the pack, apart from taking a few photos. When I asked the reasons for this the general consensus was that it was too time consuming. Filling in the booklet only required a pen and some thought whereas taking a photo or recording audio would need lots more time and searching for exactly the photo that would portray their fear. Although this part of the process was deemed unsuccessful I am pleased with the outcome overall. Participants engaged with the subject far more than I hoped for and were really honest with their feelings. This gave me lots of material to interpret and develop more refined ideas with.

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