Descriptive text of what this is and why I'm doing it.
Preliminary Research
27/5/2018
Elements of a Great Thesis
Before I go into my thesis topic, I’d like to take a moment to acknowledge the elements that I believe make up a great thesis. I’ve spent many hours studying past student work and I’ve distilled some of my favourite concepts into a few categories.
Direction:
Urgency: Address a problem that is either currently an issue or increasingly becoming one. Speculative concepts are a fun mental exercise, but fail to provide much value. A good problem expresses a sense of agency. It makes us believe that we can and should do something about it right now. The problem is communally felt and understood as a problem either because we’ve experienced it or we can relate to it. Bernice Wong shows agency by revealing the truth about undocumented work in America.
Experts: The quality of the experts will determine the quality of the insights. Experts are an ocean of information. They can point you in a direction that’s likely overlooked. Lassor Feasley put a huge emphasis on talking to the leading experts in his field— many of which informed his design direction.
User testing: Putting ideas to the test with real users. A concept is just a concept until introduced into the world. Pivots and iterations based on the finding from user testing tend to lead to the most effective end solutions. User testing is also a commitment to rigor—it means not settling on the first idea and being open to failure. Kathryn McElroy made crucial course corrections to her haptic touch band by testing it on real users.
Closure: Showing what you’ve created had an impact. Concepts can be mentally stimulating, but a good success story is heartwarming and accepted. It’s important to capture these moments in the documentation. Smruti Adya captures these reflective moments in her sketchnote experience.